ITALY Tut early history of Italy, like that of most other nations, is rendered obscure and uncertain by the want of authentic records of its ancient inhabitants ; and the fabulous legends invented by the vanity of their more distinguished descend ants. Hence the fictions of the voyages of .tEneas, Ante nor, and Diomede, which, though probably contrived by the Grecians, in order to impress the world with the idea that the arts and policy of the Etruscans and other Italian nations were derived from their early colonies, were ea gerly adopted by the Romans themselves, desirous to throw the splendid veil of fable over the comparative meanness and obscurity of their origin. From whatever source, how ever, the original population of Italy was derived, the ear liest accounts of its inhabitants present us with a picture but little differing in its features from that of human na ture in its savage state among other nations of ancient or modern times. But while the surface of Italy exhibits al most every degree of physical variety, a similar diversity seems, from the most remote period, to have prevailed among its natives. So striking, indeed, was the difference between the rude and simple, yet bold and warlike tribes, who inhabited the rallies of the Appennines, and the feeble and luxurious cultivators of the marshes of Verona, or the plains of Campania, that it does not appear at all surpriz ing that the natives themselves should have been led to be lieve, that characters so dissimilar could not be descended from the same common ancestors. But so entirely does this diversity seem to have been owing to the influence of climate, that when the warlike Umbrians themselves be came by conquest masters of the plains, we find them in fected by the same degeneracy, and obliged to submit to the Etrurians, who, in their turn, suffered no less in their national character by this pernicious acquisition.
The form of government which most prevailed, seems to have been a sort of federal republic, or defensive league, by which all the tribes of the same original stock were bound together. And as the colonies, which, some from convenience, and others, in consequence of a religious ob servance, frequently sent out, were often removed to a great distance, this family compact had the effect of con necting nations otherwise remote from each other. Thus,
from the ancient stock of the Osci or Aurunci, were de rived the Sabines, and from them, in consequence of a re ligious vow, the Samnites and the Lucanians.
The limits prescribed in a work of this nature, prevent us from entering at large into the ancient history of the Italian nations, a field of research far from uninteresting : there is, however, one state which has left behind it so ma ny memorials of its grandeur and advancement in the arts of civilized life, that it requires from us a more particular attention.
The people called by the Romans, Etrurians or Tus cans, and by the Greeks Tirrheni, a corruption of the word Traseni, which probably was their original appellation, in habited the district lying betwixt the Arno and the Tiber. By their victories over the Umbri, Osci, and Veneti, they extended their power to the other-side of Italy, and there founded the flourishing colonies of Adria and Bologna. Having, however, at an early period of their history, had the wisdom to renounce all wars of conquest, they devoted their chief attention to commerce and the arts of peace. The result of their commerce was a decided naval superi ority, in consequence of which they became masters, by means of their colonies, of the islands of Sardinia, Corsica, and Elba. The last acquisition, by its inexhaustible mines of iron, for the manufacture of which the Tuscan forests af forded ample materials, was of immense importance, not only in constructing a navy, but also as an article of com merce. By the possession of these mines, and the art of fabricating tools of iron, the Tuscans were enabled to con struct those prodigious citadels and fortifications, which have acquired for them the reputation of being the inventors of military architecture, and the ruins of many of which remain at this day the splendid and indestructible monu ments of the greatness of their founders. And though many succeeding ages of war and slavery and oppression, have converted into pestilential deserts much of the once highly cultivated territory of Etruria, yet even there the ruins of harbours and cities, and the consequently nume rous population which must have been maintained, attest their progress in the science of agriculture.