Etrusca Disciplina
vol. VI p.725-730
Etrusca Disciplina
Etrusca disciplina is the first term to turn up in Varro for the general teachings of the Etruscan haruspices: Serv. Aen. IV 166 secundum Etruscam disciplinam. Agrimens. I p. 27. Liv. V 15, 11 sic … libris fatalibus, sic disciplina Etrusca traditum esse. Plin. n. h. ind. auct. II XI qui de Etrusca disciplina scripsit. <40> Arnob. III 40. Fulgent. serm. 4 (p. 112, 11 Helm) disciplinas Etruscas. Cicero sometimes says Etruscorum disciplina (har. resp. 18; Etruriae tradita disciplina ibid. 20), sometimes haruspicina (div. II 28. 37. 42. 49. 50) or haruspicinae disciplina (div. II 50; so too Comm. Bern. Lucan. I 636, cf. Isid. orig. VIII 9, 34 aruspicinae artem). Haruspicium (otherwise = extispicium) appears in this sense in Cens. d. d. nat. 17, 6 pro haruspicii disciplinaeque suae peritia. Fest. 359 discipulinam aruspicii. Agrim. I 303 secundum aruspicium. <30>
The teachings were recorded in holy books (Etrusci libri Cic. har. resp. 37 and elsewhere; E. scripta ibid. 25; chartae E. div. I 20; Tuscorum litterae Plin. n. h. II 138, E. disciplinae volumina II 199; Tusci libelli Iuven. 13, 62; Tyrrhena carmina Lucr. VI 381; referring to the first proponents Tages and Vegoe, Macrob. Sat. V 19, 13 in Tageticis eorum sacris; Ammian. Marc. XVII 10, 2 in Tagetinicis libris .. Vegonicis) and it was traced back to revelations from the gods themselves. <40> They say that a farmer, ploughing the soil in the Tarquinii area, saw Tages Genii filius, nepos Iovis (Fest. 359. Comm. Bern. Lucan. I 636) rising from the ground puerili specie . . sed senili . . prudentia (Cic. div. II 50). Tages then passed on the teachings (in song, according to Censorinus) to the people who were rushing over from all of Etruria (Cic. loc. cit. Fest. 359 duodecim populis Etruriae), <50> and these teachings were then written up by the Lucumones (Cic. loc. cit. Cens. d. d. nat. IV 13 Tages, qui disciplinam cecinerit extispicii, quam lucumones tum Etruriae potentes exscripserunt. Comm. Bern. Lucan. I 636 hic duodecim principum pueris disciplinam aruspicinae dictavit). His immediate vanishing was a detail added later (Comm. Bern. Lucan. I 636. Isid. orig. VIII 9, 34). In Lydus de ost. c. 3, it was Tarchon - the man who gave his name to the Tarquinii - who wrote up Tages’ wisdom: <60> from Strabo V 219 and Eustathius ad Il. II 20 p. 167, 23, who describe Tarchon as being grey from birth, it can be concluded that in one version of the myth, Tarchon took the role of Tages.
A second revelation was given by the “nymph” Vegoe (Begoe), etrusc. vecui or vecunia (see W. Schulze Eigennamen 316f. 313f.), latinised to Vegoia (Agrim. I 350, 17) or Vegonia (Ammian. Marc. XVII 10, 2 libris Vegonicis). <page break 726/726> She was attributed with lighting-based divination (Serv. Aen. VI 72 qui libri [sc. Sibyllini] in templo Apollinis servabantur, nec ipsi tantum, sed et Marciorum et Begoes nymphae, quae artem scripserat fulguriatorum apud Tuscos; accordingly, following CIL XI 6363, I am using that term instead of fulguritarum); there are some extant fragments preserved in Ammian. Marc. XVII 10, 2 and Serv. Dan. Aen. II 649. <10> She also taught Arruns Veltymnus about ius limitum (Agrim. I 350, 17 Item Vegoiae Arrunti Veltymno …. cum autem Iuppiter terram Aetruriae sibi vindicavit, constituit iussitque metiri campos signarique agros etc.; cf. I 348 ex libris Magonis et Vegoiae auctorum), and she is probably also mentioned alongside Aruns in CIL XI 3370 … Aru(n)s a ṃ<agistra edoctus> …, which Bormann completes as a m<agistro edoctus>. <20>
However, according to Cic. div. I 12, the Etruscan discipline belongs to the genus divinandi artificiosum, which is always sparked by something external, rather than by some kind of internal inspiration. It wasn’t passed down to the people in one single revelation, but was instead developed over a long time through constant observations (Cic. div. I 12 observantis longo tempore significationibus. II 50 eam [sc. doctrinam Tagetis] postea crevisse rebus novis cognoscendis et ad eadem illa principia referendis). <30> The volumina Etruscae disciplinae are probably a collection of traditions and teachings which had developed in the individual cities. Although Tages has been placed in the city Tarquinii in southern Etruria, where according to the inscription CIL XI 3382 the treasury and therefore the religious center of the haruspices was situated, the Etruscan gens vecu, which the name Vegoe belongs to, is attested for Clusium by the inscriptions CIEtr. 1494f. Cicero attributes a local revelation or collection of fata to the city Veii (div. I 100; cf. Liv. V 15, 11). <40> Varro says that an edition of their present teachings, regarding the saeculi, was put together in the 8th Etruscan century (Cens. d. d. nat. 17, 5 portenta mitti divinitus, quibus admonerentur unum quodque saeculum esse finitum. haec portenta Etrusci pro haruspicii disciplinaeque suae peritia diligenter observata in libros rettulerunt. quare in Tuscis historiis, quae octavo eorum saeculo scriptae sunt, ut Varro testatur, et quot numero saecula ei genti data sint et transactorum singula quanta fuerint quibusve ostentis eorum exitus designati sint continetur). <50> The Vegoia fragment, preserved in the Agrimensores, contains the same date (I 350, 22 ob avaritiam prope novissimi octavi saeculi), despite the fact that even in Servius (see above) Vegoe is referred to as nympha, and was therefore located in the distant past (cf. the nymph Egeria, Numa’s advisor, as Vegoe was to Aruns). <60> Now, since the both the teachings about the saeculi and about limitatio without doubt belonged to the libri disciplinae etruscae, it seems very reasonable to me to conclude that the connection of Etruscan holy books was first made in the eighth Etruscan saeculum, which roughly corresponds to the 2nd cent. BCE: according to Plutarch Sulla 7, it ended in the year 666 = 88, and following the pattern of the three previous ‘centuries’, we can assume it spanned about 120 years (Cens. d. d. nat. 17, 6). <page break 726/727> An organisation of Etruscan teaching is also suggested by the fact that at that time, in Rome, the haruspices were being consulted more and more, when previously the Sibylline books used to be the most popular (see Wülker Die geschichtl. Entwicklung des Prodigienwesens, Leipz. 1903, 31ff.).
I will only briefly discuss the contents of the discipline here, and will instead refer to the article ‘haruspices’ and my work on the Etruscan discipline in Göteborgs Högskolas Årsskrift 1905-1907. <10>
According to Cicero div. I 72, the three holy books were made up of three main sections: haruspicini et fulgurales et rituales libri.
Libri haruspicini belonged without doubt to the oldest and most important part of the Etruscan discipline, above all because the art of sacrifice-divination (extispicium) is traced back to the Tages’ revelation (Cens. 4, 13 Tages qui disciplinam cecinerit extispicii. Ammian. Marc. XXI 1, 10 extis … cuius disciplinae Tages .. monstrator est. Serv. Aen. II 781. Lucan. I 638), <20> and also because haruspex became the general title of a priest who was an expert in the entire discipline. There are clear parallels to be drawn in the details between the Etruscan and the Chaldaean discipline, as well as with the Greek extispicium. <30> The Etruscans and the Greeks drew from the same source, but their disciplines developed in different ways.
Libri fulgurales gave instruction about how to investigate and interpret, as well as expiate, prevent, and bring about lightning. They were attributed to the second revelation of the nymph Vegoe. This section of the discipline likely came about later, because the word frontae, which corresponds to fulguriator in the bilingual CIL XI 6363, must be a loan word in the Etruscan language. <40> The dependence upon Greek teachings is especially clear in this section of the discipline, which we know about in more detail than the other sections, because the Etruscan Caecina’s work on lightning has been partially preserved in Seneca n. q. II 31-49, Pliny n. h. II 137-148, and Verrius Flaccus (Festus). <50>
Libri rituales, according to the summary shared by Verrius Flaccus (Festus 285), contained instruction about quo ritu condantur urbes, arae aedes sacrentur, qua sanctitate muri, quo iure portae, quobodo tribus, curiae, centuriae distribuantur, exercitus constituant<ur>, ordinentur, ceteraque eius modi ad bellum ac pacem pertinentia. In other words: the entire political and social life of the Etruscans was governed by the holy books, which contained not only the sacred laws but also the political ones (Serv. Dan. Aen. I 2 est enim in libro qui inscribitur terrae † iuris Etruriae scriptum vocibus Tag<a>e, eum qui genus a periuris duceret, fato extorrem et profugum esse debere). <60> The art of limitatio also belongs here, whose original connection with dividing up the population seems to be shown quite nicely through their common term centuria (Agrimens. I 27, 13 Limitum prima origo, sicut Varro descripsit, a disciplina Etruscia. p. 166, 10 unde primum haec ratio mensur<a>e constituta ab Etruscorum aruspicum … disciplina. Fest. 53 centuria in agris signficiat ducenta iugera, in re militari centum homines; one iugerum was made up of two acnuae [Varro r. r. I 10], doubtless an Etruscan word). <page break 727/728> The word gruma (groma) itself, which - as W. Schulze has shared - can only be derived from the Greek γνῶμα (γνώμων) following Etruscan phonetic laws, and not Latin ones, <10> confirms Varro’s account and shows that the Romans did not learn the art of the Gromatici directly from the Greeks, but via the Etruscans.
The ritual books did also contain information about the span of life and the important segments of life, as well as of the state and of people: in other words, the fata of the state and of the individual (Cens. d. d. nat. 17, 5 quae sint naturalia saecula, rituales Etruscorum libri videntur docere. 11, 6 numero .. septenario .., quo tota vita humana finitur, ut … Etruscorum libri rituales videntur indicare). <20> This part of the discipline was named libri fatales accordingly (Cens. 14, 6 Etruscis quoque libris fatalibus aetatem hominis duodecim hebdomadibus discribi Varro commemorat). The omens, through which they would be able to see which segments of the saeculi they had already lived through, were gathered together in Tuscae historiae, as mentioned above (Cens. 17, 6). <30>
The section of the libri fatales which dealt with death and life after death was given the name libri Acherontici (Serv. Aen. VIII 398 sed sciendum secundum aruspicinae libros et sacra Acheruntia, quae Tages composuisse dicitur, fata decem annis quadam ratione differri. Arnob. II 62 neque quod Etruria libris in Acheronticis pollicetur, certorum animalium sanguine numinibus certis dato divinas animas fieri et ab legibus mortalitatis educi). <40>
Finally, we must also place the teachings about ostenta in the ritual books: Cicero summarises the entire Etruscan discipline in the three sections exta, fulgura, ostenta in de divinatione (div. II 49), and he links these three sections to the three books he mentions (div. I 72 haruspicini et fulgurales et rituales). <50> This section gradually came about, building upon itself, through the haruspices’ continual observation and recording of new omens, similar to how Varro describes the development of the discipline of ostenta saecularia (Cens. 17, 6 haec portenta Etrusci pro haruspicii disciplinaeque suae peritia diligenter observata in libros retulerunt). This is also how the ostentaria came about (Macrob. Sat. III 7, 2), and we can see how comprehensive they were from the attested title ostentarium arboretum (Macrob. Sat. III 20, 3). <60> Only two fragments, translated into Latin, are extant (Macrob. Sat. III 7, 2 and 20, 3. see Thulin Italische sakrale Poesie und Prosa, Berlin 1906, 2ff. 70ff.). Besides that, we only really know the contents from the responsa, which haruspices gave to the Roman people about prodigia (we know about one such responsum haruspicum from Cicero’s speech de har. resp., see Wissowa Relig. 471, 4. Thulin loc. cit. 68). <page break 728/729> However, the Roman concept of prodigia, ie. the abnormal phenomena which are interpreted as signs of the gods’ wrath, is much more constricted than that of the Etruscan ostenta, which could signify both ill-will and good-will. We are told that the auspicia were also recorded in the Etruscan books by Serv. Dan. Aen. I 398 in libris reconditis lectum esse, posse quamlibet avem auspicium adtestari maxime quia non poscatur. III 537 in libris Etruscis invenitur etiam equos bona auspicia dare; cf. Comm. Bern. Lucan. I 636 hic Tages … auguriorum libros scripsit. <10>
These Etruscan works were translated into Latin (Isid. orig. VIII 9, 34), but this probably only happened around the middle of the final century of the republic, since Cicero har. resp. 20 veterem ab ipsis dis immortalibus, ut hominum fama est, Etruriae traditam disciplinam doesn’t yet seem to be aware of the story of Tages, <20> which he shares in div. II 50 (see above) from these books (Bormann Arch.-epigr. Mitt. XI 1887, 100). The books of Vegoe were even kept with the Sibylline books together in the Temple of Apollo (Serv. Aen. VI 72, see above). The name of the first translator, Tarquitius Priscus (see there), is so closely connected with the discipline that the books continued to be referred to under his name for a long time afterwards (Ammian. Marc. XXV 2, 5 Etrusci haruspices ex Tarquitianis libris etc.). <30> The following Latin authors have handled this Etruscan literature: A. Caecina (see Caecina nr. 7); Iulius Aquila (Plin. ind. auct. 1. XI qui de Etrusca disciplina scripsit); Nigidius Figulus (see there); M. Terentius Varro (see there); Attalus the Stoic and Seneca’s tutor (Sen. n. q. II 50 Attalus noster qui Etruscorum disciplinam Graeca subtilitate miscuerat); Seneca n. q. II 31-49; Umbricius Melior (Plin. ind. auct. 1. X; n. h. X 19. Tac. hist. I 27); <40> Capito (see Wachsmuth Proleg. in Lydum de ostentis XXV); Fonteius (ibid. XXVI); Vicellius (ibid.); Labeo (ibid. XXIX); Apuleius (ibid. XXVII).
Literature: K. O. Müller Die Etrusker, recent edition from W. Deecke, Stuttgart 1877 II 1-195. Bouché-Leclercq Histoire de la divination IV; ‘Divinatio’ and ‘Haruspices’ in Daremberg-Saglio Dictionnaire des antiquités grecques et romaines. C. Thulin Die etruskische Disziplin I-III, Göteborgs Högskolas Arsskrift 1905-1907. <50>
The following works handle individual parts of the discipline: G. Schmeisser Quaestionum de etrusca disciplina particula, Diss. Vratislaviae 1872; Die etruskische Disziplin vom Bundesgenossenkriege bis zum Untergang des Heidentums, Progr. Liegnitz 1881; Beitr. zur Kenntnis der Technik der etrusk. Haruspices, Progr. Landsberg 1884. W. Deecke Etrusk. Forsch. IV Das Templum von Piacenza, 1880; <60> Etr. Forsch. und Stud. II Nachtrag zum Templum von Piacenza 1882 (Extispicin). L. Stieda Anatomisch-archöologische Studien I, Wiesbaden 1901 (Bonnet-Merkels Anatomische Hefte). G. Blecher De extispicio capita tria (Religionsgesch. Versuche u. Vorarbeiten, published by Dieterich and Wünsch II 4), Gießen 1905. C. Thulin Die Götter des Martianus Capella und der Bronzeleber von Piacenza (ibid. III 1) 1906; <page break 729/730> Scriptorum disciplinae etruscae fragmenta I (Tages, Vegoe, Tarquitius Priscus), Berlin 1906. G. Körte Die Bronzeleber von Piacenza, Röm. Mitt. XX 1905, 348ff. F. Luterbacher Der Prodigienglaube und Prodigienstil d. Römer, Progr. Burgdorf, 2. Aufl. 1904. L. Wülker Die geschichtl. Entwicklung des Prodigienwesens bei den Römern, Diss. Leipzig 1903. <10>
[Thulin.]