A History of Rome to 565 A D - 1921 Author:Arthur Edward Romilly Boak Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III THE PEOPLES OF HISTORIC ITALY: THE ETRUSCANS; THE GREEKS I. The Peoples Of Italy At the close of the sixth century B.c., the soil of Ital... more »y was occupied by many peoples of diverse language and origin. The Ligurians. The northwest corner of Italy, including the Po valley as far east as the river Ticinus and the coast as far south as the Arno, was occupied by the Ligurians. The Veneti. On the opposite side of the continental part of Italy, in the lowlands to the north of the Po between the Alps and the Adriatic, dwelt the Veneti, whose name is perpetuated in modern Venice. They are generally believed to have been a people of Illyrian origin. The Euganei. In the mountain valleys, to the east and west of Lake Garda, lived the Euganei, a people of little historical importance, whose racial connections are as yet unknown. The Etruscans. The central plain of the Po, between the Ligurians to the west and the Veneti to the east, was controlled by the Etruscans. Their territory stretched northwards to the Alps and eastwards to the Adriatic coast. They likewise occupied the district called after them, Etruria, to the south of the Apennines, between the Arno and the Tiber. Throughout all this area the Etruscans were the dominant element, although it was partly peopled by subject Ligurians and Italians. Etruscan colonies were also established in Campania. The Italians. Over the central and southwestern portion of the peninsula were spread a number of peoples speaking more or less closely related dialects of a common, Indo-germanic, tongue. Of these, the Latini, the Aurunci (Ausones), the Osci (Opici), the Oenotri, and the Itali occupied, in the order named, the western coast from the Tiber to the Straits of Rhegium. Between the valley of the upper Tiber an...« less