Etruscan Deities
The three great deities, who had temples in every Etruscan city, were Tina or Tinia—Thalna or Cupra and Menrva, or Menerva.
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From The Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria by George Dennis, 1883.
The three great deities, who had temples in every Etruscan city, were Tina or Tinia—Thalna or Cupra and Menrva, or Menerva.
Tinia was the supreme deity of the Etruscans, analogous to the Zeus of the Greeks, and the Jupiter of the Romans—"the centre of the Etruscan god-world, the power who speaks in the thunder and descends in the lightning." He alone had three separate bolts to hurl, and is therefore always represented on Etruscan monuments with a thunder-bolt with triple points in his hand.
Thalna or Cupra was the Etruscan Hera or Juno, and her principal shrines seem to have been at Veii, Falerii, and Perusia. Like her counterpart among the Greeks and Romans, she appears to have been worshipped under other forms, according to her various attributes as Feronia, Uni, Eileithyia-Leucothea.
Menrva, as she is called on Etruscan monuments, answers to the Pallas-Athene of the Greeks. It is probable that the name by which the Romans knew her was of purely Etruscan origin.
She seems to have been allied to Nortia, the Fortuna of the Etruscans. Like her counterpart in the Greek and Roman mythology, she is represented armed, and with the aegis on her breast, but has sometimes wings in addition.
There were Twelve Great Gods, six of each sex, called Dii Consentes or Complices. They composed the council of Tinia, and are called "the senators of the gods" "the Penates of the Thunderer himself." They were fierce and pitiless deities, dwelling in. the inmost recesses of heaven, whose names it was forbidden to utter. Yet they were not deemed eternal, but supposed to rise and fall together.
Still more awful and potent were "the shrouded Gods," Dii Involuti whose appellation is suggestive of their mysterious character; they ruled both gods and men, and to their decisions even Tinia himself was obedient. They were also called Dii Superiores.
The Etruscans believed in Nine Great Gods, who had the power of hurling thunderbolts; they were called Novensiles by the Romans. Of thunderbolts there were eleven sorts, of which Tinia, as the supreme thunder-god, wielded three. Cupra, or Juno, as one of the nine, also hurled her bolts. Menerva, the third, hurled hers at the time of the vernal equinox. Summanus hurled his bolts by night as Jupiter did by day, and received even more honour from the old Romans as a thunder-wielding god, than Jupiter himself. Vejovis, or Vedius, though with a Latin name, was an Etruscan deity, whose bolts had the singular effect of making those they struck so deaf, "that they could not hear the thunder, or even louder noises." Vulcan, or as the Etruscans called him Sethlans, was another bolt-hurling god. Mars was also one of these nine. The last two are not mentioned, but it seems probable that one was Saturn, or it may be their great infernal deity Mantus. The ninth was probably Hercules Ercle, or Hercle a favourite god of the Etruscans.
Besides these, were other great deities, as Vertumnus, or "the changeable," the god of wine and gardens, the Etruscan Bacchus; though that god is sometimes also called Phuphluns. Allied to him, probably in more than name, was Voltumna, the great goddess at whose shrine the confederate princes of Etruria held their councils. With her also may be analogous, Horta, whose name perhaps indicates a goddess of gardens, and from whom, a town of Etruria derived its name. Aplu, or Apollo, often appears on Etruscan monuments, as god of the sun, being sometimes called Usil; and so also Turms, or Mercury; and Turan, or Venus; and more rarely Thesan, the goddess of the dawn, Eos-Aurora; and Losna, or Lala the Etruscan Luna, or Diana. Nethuns, or Neptune, also appears on monuments, though rarely, which is singular considering the maritime character of the people; and Janus and Silvanus are also known as Etruscan gods, the double head of the former being a common device on the coins of Volateme and Telamon. Then there were four gods called Penates Ceres, Pales, Fortuna, and the Genius Jovialis; and the two Penates of Latium, the Dioscuri, Castur and Pultuke were much worshipped in Etruria, as we learn from monuments. The worship of the mysterious Oabeiri testified to the Pelasgic origin of a portion of the Etruscan population.
All these deities are more or less akin to those of other ancient mythological systems, and what were of native origin and what of foreign introduction, it is not alwa} r s easy to determine. But there were others more peculiarly Etruscan. At least if their counterparts are to be found in the Greek and Roman mythology , they had a wider influence in Etruria, and occupied a more prominent place in the Etruscan Pantheon. Such is the goddess of Fate, who is generally represented with wings, sometimes with a hammer and nail, as if fixing unalterably her decrees an idea borrowed by the Romans; but more frequently with a bottle in one hand and a stylus in the other, with which to inscribe her decisions. She is found with various names attached; but the most common are Lasa, and Mean. A kindred goddess is frequently introduced in the reliefs on the sepulchral urns, as present at the death of some individual, and is generally armed with a hammer, a sword, or torch, though sometimes brandishing snakes like a Fury.
What gives most peculiarity to the Etruscan mythology is the doctrine of Genii. The entire system of national divination, called "the Etruscan Discipline," was supposed to have been revealed by a Genius, called Tages a wondrous boy with a hoary head and the wisdom of age, who sprung from the fresh-ploughed furrows of Tarquinii. But the worship of the Lares and Penates, the household deities who watched over the personal and pecuniary interests of individuals and families, was the most prominent feature in the Etruscan mythology, whence it was borrowed by the Romans. Thence it was also, in all probability, that the Romans obtained their doctrine of an attendant genius watching over every individual from his birth
Genius natale conies qui temperat astrum,
who was of the same sex as the individual, and was called Genius when male, and Juno when female. Yet we find no positive proof of this doctrine among the Etruscans.
Last, but brought most prominently before the eye in Etruscan sepulchral monuments, are the dread powers of the lower world. Here rule Mantus and Mania, the infernal deities of the Etruscan creed, whose names never occur on the native monuments, but are ascertained from Latin writers. In fact, in two painted tombs at Corneto and Orvieto, in which these divinities are depicted, they are designated by the corresponding Greek appellations of Hades and Persephone. In both those instances Mantus is represented seated on a throne, with a wolf-skin on his head, and a serpent in one hand, or twining round his sceptre. Mania also, in the tomb at Corneto, has her head bristling with snakes. She was a fearful deity, who was propitiated by human sacrifices. Intimately connected with these divinities was Charun, the great conductor of souls, the infernal Mercury of the Etruscans, the chief minister of Mantus, whose dread image, hideous as the imagination could conceive, is often introduced on sepulchral monuments; and who, with his numerous attendant demons and Furies, well illustrates the dark and gloomy character of the Etruscan superstition.
Dennis, George. The Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria. John Murray, 1883
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