The Ethnicity of the Sea Peoples - RePub - Erasmus Universiteit ...

grave of North Pontic steppe type, in which a man was
buried with his wife. The skeleton of the man was associated
with a stone battle-axe, copper daggers, an arrowhead,
and a pot. Skull injuries attested for the skeleton of the
woman suggest that she was dispatched on the death of her
husband to accompany him in the afterlife according to the
likewise North Pontic rite of suttee. Other Rinaldone
tombs produced horse remains – a feature pointing once
again in the direction of the North Pontic steppe where the
animal in question was not only abundantly found but also
suggested to have been already domesticated from the 4th
millennium BC onwards. 308
From a linguistic point of view, it has been observed
by Hans Krahe that Tuscany, with names like Alma, Armenta,
Aventia, Albinia, Arnus, Elsa, Auser, Ausenna, and
Visentios, is included in the distribution of his Old European
river names. 309 These names, which are based on
well-attested Proto-Indo-European roots, may well be
rooted in the 3rd millennium BC, as their overall distribution,
as rightly stressed by Peter Kitson, coincides remarkably
with that of the Bell Beaker culture. 310
Accordingly, the bearers of the Rinaldone culture are
likely to be held responsible for the given layer of Old
European river names in Tuscany.
All in all, then, there can be distinguished at least
three different layers in the process of Indo-Europeanization
of Tuscany: (1) the bearers of the Rinaldone culture of
North Pontic steppe affiliations (3rd millennium BC onwards),
(2) the Osco-Umbrians and Latin-Faliscans, which
we have held responsible for the introduction of the European
Urnfield culture in Italy (12th century BC onwards),
and (3) Luwian population groups originating from the
308 Mallory 1989: 93-4; 198-201; in my opinion Drews 2004: 15-
9 goes too far in discrediting the Dereivka bone cheekpieces as
evidence for horse control.
309 Krahe 1962: 304; note that Auser and Ausenna may have been
introduced later by the Ausones or Oscans, just like the Ombrone
is likely to be named by the Umbrians. The Tiber is the Etruscan
and hence latest name of the foremost river in Tuscany (< Luwian
Tiwat/ra- “sun-god”), which used to be called Albula (< PIE *alb h -
“white”) in an earlier period, see Krahe 1964: 53.
310 Kitson 1997: 204-5; cf. Tovar 1977: maps 1-6 with Harrison
1988: 12, map 1. Note that Tuscany is not included in the distribution
of the Bell Beaker culture, but the inclusion of the region of
Palermo, where a twin catacomb grave from the Aeneolithic
Conca d’Oro culture has been found (see de Vries 1976: 210-11),
may suggest a connection between the Bell Beaker culture on the
one hand and the catacomb culture on the other.
87
north-Aegean and southwest Anatolia, introducing the Orientalizing
culture (c. 700 BC onwards). And all this in a
region which Massimo Pallottino in a lifelong effort would
have us believe (and succeeded in making his fellow
Etruscologists believe) to be the home of a pre-Indo-
European rest group!
Postscriptum
In an article about Etruscan origins which appeared in
BABesch 79 (2004) 51-7, the Etruscologist Bauke van der
Meer speaks out in favor of the orientalist thesis, but he
does not choose between the two variant models of colonization
as presented here, viz. at the end of the Bronze Age
or during an advanced stage of the Early Iron Age: in fact,
he posits three waves of colonization in sum, namely one
c. 1100 BC, a second c. 900 BC, and the third c. 700 BC
(p. 55).