The victors write the history and the Romans wrote a ton. Along the way, they managed to obscure, if not outright bury, the records of their former neighbors, rivals, and predecessors. And no people were simultaneously more accomplished and obliterated than the Etruscans.
The Etruscans are often dubbed the first superpower of the Western Mediterranean, paralleling the classical Greek civilization further east. We know little about their origins; it’s like they were shot out of the earth. Recent DNA testing, though, suggests that they were native to the Italian peninsula. Regardless, from perhaps the 9th century BC until the third, they thrived in central Italy, dominating a region today that overlaps parts of Tuscany, Lazio, and Umbria. The Etruscans were responsible for founding a number of major city-states that persisted through the millennia–including Siena and Florence–and they also provided the cultural framework that Rome employed so effectively. Religious rituals, gladiatorial combat, farming techniques, hydraulic engineering–that’s all Etruscan. And yet, following their initial conquest by Rome in the 3rd century BC, and their complete assimilation into the Republic by 90 BC, we lost nearly all relevant evidence that could illustrate how Etruscans lived.
Despite having been responsible for teaching Romans the alphabet and spreading the art of reading and writing across the peninsula, no Etruscan literature survives. It’s all gone. The earth swallowed them whole. Fortunately, Etruscans put a great deal of energy into their burials, and the ways they approached death have proven invaluable for illustrating how they lived.
I slipped out of Proceno under cover of darkness, as has become the trend in recent days, and thus reached Acquapendente before most of the pilgrims staying there had stirred from bed. A bar was open for coffee; alas, the concattedrale was not, so I missed seeing the shrine to the Holy Sepulchre in the crypt. Still, I knew my eyes would have their fill before day’s end, so I pushed on without too much regret. The next stretch was through flat, agricultural land, nearly all of which had been harvested in past weeks. They grow the good stuff here–garlic, onions, potatoes, a bit of oil. A few small crews were out working, typically one or two Italian men alongside two or three African immigrants.
The original San Lorenzo had Roman origins, dating to the 8th century BC, but San Lorenzo Nuovo was relocated in the 18th century because Lake Bolsena kept rising. As such, the planned city was inspired by Enlightenment ideals, and features an octagonal central piazza and a towering, neoclassical church. While that makes for a pleasant place for a break, I’m always most excited about leaving San Lorenzo. That has nothing to do with the town itself, but rather for the view of the aforementioned Lago di Bolsena that one receives at the exit, when the road suddenly plummets into a descent, and the horizon opens wide before you.
It didn’t always look this way. The lake marks the center of the Vulsinii Volcanic District of the Roman Comagmatic Region. Millennia ago, this lakebed was higher and seethed with magma, as underground chambers churned with the stuff. And then, at some point, volcanic eruptions occurred, releasing all that pent up energy, and those suddenly emptied chambers could no longer withstand the weight above. They collapsed, creating a widespread depression that became Lake Bolsena. For the Etruscans, this became a sacred site, believed to be the home of a set of underwater gods. A number of tombs have been discovered in the area, including the Necropolis of Turona.
Years ago, the Via Francigena descended from San Lorenzo Nuovo to follow a road near the lake. These days, it stays higher, and follows a mix of footpaths and dirt roads along the hillside–a major improvement. At many points, the walker enjoys an expansive panorama of the lake below, framed by olive trees. And when the town of Bolsena is finally reached, one enters the medieval center past the hilltop castle, looping down into the lower center. There is some dispute about the Etruscan links to the town of Bolsena. Most have conceded that earlier identification of it as an Etruscan town was a byproduct of conflating it with Orvieto. Etruscans generally favored hilltops for towns, and Bolsena didn’t offer much of value on that front. Regardless, the spiritual nature of the place made it one worth visiting, and one of the oldest roads in the region connected Orvieto and Bolsena in those years.
Today, Bolsena is most famous for its medieval history, and particularly for being the site of a Eucharistic miracle in 1263. During the celebration of mass, the consecrated host–what had been bread and what became the body of Christ–began to bleed upon the corporal, or the small cloth on which the host and chalice are placed during the service. The sudden appearance of blood offered confirmation of the miracle of transubstantiation, a critical belief of Catholicism. In the Basilica of Santa Cristina today, an altarpiece preserves a piece of tile with a drop of blood on it, evidence of the miracle, while a reliquary in Orvieto houses the corporal in a reliquary.
The Via Francigena continues from Bolsena to Montefiascone along the hillside. It’s a pretty walk; there’s no reason to avoid it. However, I had my sights set on a more extended detour, looping northward to see the great Etruscan towns of Orvieto and Civita di Bagnoregio, before working my way back to Montefiascone. A CAI-marked trail led me to Orvieto, with red and white blazes indicating the way, while the Via Romea Germanica carried me onward from there back to Montefiascone. There were a few points when I was happy to have gps–most of all when the trail was quite overgrown before the last approach to Montefiascone and I needed to ad lib–but otherwise the waymarking was sufficient.
The walk to Orvieto climbed high onto the hill overlooking the lake, sometimes on old roads made from volcanic rock, and others on trails. Very little of the walk followed pavement. At one point, I passed an archaeological complex filled with (roped off) tombs. The final approach to Orvieto is exhilarating–you can see the giant rock from quite a distance, as it gradually takes hold on the horizon, the whole city skyline taking shape before you. Unbelievably, geologists argue that this massive rock–the one upon which an entire city rests–was a mass of tufa rock launched at one point from Lake Bolsena.
Orvieto quickly became one of the most important Etruscan cities, right from the beginning of their elevation in the region. It was not solely a place of political power or commercial dynamism; beneath the cliffs, archaeologists have discovered an ancient Etruscan sanctuary that they claim was the heart of Etruscan religion. This made Orvieto a gathering place for representatives from the twelve major Etruscan cities. Romans swept into Orvieto in the 3rd century BC, and they had their work cut out for them–given that the city has cliffs on all sides, plus an expansive network of caves and wells, the Etruscans were able to hold out for two years. But the Romans were inevitable. Conquest wasn’t enough; they destroyed the city in 264 BC, exiling the few survivors to Bolsena.
While the Etruscans and their cities died, their necropolises survived, and I made my way to one after visiting the city, climbing alongside the medieval aqueduct back into the hills. The site, once set up as a lovely picnic spot, with a pair of benches looking back across the valley at Orvieto, is currently closed because of fallen trees. Those trees, though, were an asset for me, affording me complete privacy. I slept at the covered entrance to one of the tombs, sheltered from the brief rain shower that passed by early in the evening.
I emerged from the tomb mouth very much alive and pushed ahead with enthusiasm. While my first shot at coffee missed, I had better luck in Lubriano. Looking back, knowing what I know now, it’s hard to believe I stopped, even if only for a few minutes. Because just a hundred meters ahead, the earth abruptly gave out, plummeting into a gorge far below. Lubriano, I realized, sat on a cliff’s edge overlooking that gorge. Even more remarkable, though, was what stood at eye level on the other side of that chasm. Civita di Bagnoregio, “the city that dies,” founded by the people that died.
Civita’s death has unfolded on multiple fronts. First, it quite simply ran out of people. Even today, after it has experienced a dramatic resurgence thanks to tourism, only ten people live full-time on the hilltop. The second death, meanwhile, is unfolding in slower motion. Due to erosion, Civita loses roughly seven centimeters of urban space annually. In the last 500 years, the total surface area has been reduced by as much as a quarter. All the more remarkable, then, that population density has plummeted to such a degree!
Once I navigated my jaw back into its socket, I set forth on a strenuous commute between hilltowns, winding through a series of switchbacks into the base of the gorge, and then repeating the process in reverse as I climbed back up the other side, working around some trail-hogging cattle along the way. What I didn’t see coming, though, was the “Bucaione,” or the old tunnel that I had to follow beneath the city, emerging on the opposing cliff for the final ascent through the secret back entrance into Civita. Of the five original town gates, only one survives–the Porta di Santa Maria–which now has a modern bridgeway leading to it. I departed that way, reveling at the fact that this was once a bustling Etruscan town, set along the most frequented transportation corridor of its day.
After the modern town of Bagnoregio, the walk lost a little of its charm, due to some extended stretches on well-trafficked roads, along with an overgrown section of trail. None of that, though, could strip any of the magic from everything that had preceded it over the preceding two days. Three thousand years after their rise, the Etruscans remain with us, in the stunning cities they founded pressing high into the sky, and in the final resting places they bore deep within the earth.
