This volume, the twenty-sixth in an illustrious series, reflects a conference held in 2007. Forty-eight essays and over seven hundred pages represent the most serious contribution to the relationship between the Etruscans and Campania for many years, and offer a particular challenge to the reviewer, since the wealth of detail is extraordinary. The main focus of the majority of the papers is on the study of inter-relationships through analysis of ceramics, and we shall return to that after dealing briefly with the other areas touched upon.
Tagliamonte presents an account of the relevant material in the archaeological museum of Naples, and Nizzo similarly presents Campanian material in Florence. There is also an account by Dobrowolski of a collection of impasto and bucchero in Warsaw. This approach to collections is well contextualised by essays from Bonghi Jovino, Nava and d'Agostino, which look respectively at the history of the subject (through Capua as a case study), a survey of current activity in the prehistoric period (up to the Middle Bronze Age) and a general account of interactions. This last is complemented by Mele's detailed historiographical account of Cuma, which draws attention to a strong local tradition which survived to subsequent authors. Marchese looks at linguistic change as a result of the Samnite influence, whilst Prosdocimi presents a complex article on ethnic and place names with a focus on Suessa (Satricum) and the word suodales in the famous inscription, and Colonna reflects on the Oscans. Rescigno looks at architecture, Benassai at chamber tombs and their architecture, and Steingräber gathers the relatively slight but intriguing evidence for tomb paintings.
As indicated, most of the other papers focus on evidence from pottery, in a variety of contexts, but obviously sanctuaries and tombs are to the fore. Capua and Cuma are well represented, but there are a number of other sites discussed. Cerchiai is good on sanctuaries generally; Cales and Suessula are discussed; Caiazza gives a very long account of Lucani Apuli and other ethnic groups. At least some updating since the conference means that it is not completely outdated. So what does one learn from this volume which is new?
In a sense, the answer is disappointingly little, and this is partly because of the strong ceramic focus. There is a sense that the returns are diminishing; a collection of relatively short articles positing connections on the basis of similarities between ceramic forms in Etruria and Campania gives the impression of a field of study which simply is not moving very far or fast. There is little here that radically changes the landscape or the game – it is incremental progress.
Take for instance the valuable article by Poggesi, Bocci, Pagnini and Lo Schiavo on kyathoi with large perforated and hollow handles. We now have a substantial number from the intriguing site of Gonfienti near Prato, but also examples from S. Maria Capua Vetere and further south. The ones from Capua are from the eighth century, the ones from Gonfienti from the sixth and fifth, but there are others in the region contemporary with the Campanian versions. We therefore know that pottery forms are moving and shared – even quite unusual ones – but we do not know of course how they were moving, or what we should necessarily infer. Throughout the volume, shared pottery forms and decoration are taken to have some significance, but Gilotta is one of the few who tries to get to grips with this, with thoughts on models of transmission, and also on the sorts of imitations and artistic expressions in metal especially which have not survived well.
One could also criticise the volume for some fairly ill-defined boundaries. Chiaramonte Treré is not the only author to stray into neighbouring regions in her paper on the Aurunci, and there is almost more about the Osco-Sabellan peoples than the Etruscans. There is on the other hand relatively little about the Greeks; the phenomenon of Greek colonisation is barely discussed. It is interesting that when Ciardiello looks at Attic pottery from Cuma, the emphasis is on local choice of imported imagery.
Yet these apparently negative criticisms can be turned on their head. It is extremely welcome to be able to think about these Italian sites as phenomena of local significance with local agency, and not simply as the penumbra around the bright lights of Greek colonies. Even Mele's historiographical account, which inevitably looks at the Greek sources, stresses local narratives. This volume, then, gives an indication of how emancipated the study of Campania can be from a Greek oriented narrative, and that leaves space for a more nuanced understanding of the Etruscan domination.
Moreover, although this volume does not answer the question, it is now more feasible to discuss whether and in what sense there was an Etruscan domination of the area. The sources which allege this imperial expansion have in mind models of empires which may in fact be as problematic as the Greek-inspired model of the polis is for the settlements of Italy. Benelli and Ciffarelli show very interestingly how much interaction there was between southern Lazio, Campania and the Abruzzo; not only are the boundaries fluid, but there is repeated and cumulative evidence of an openness to external ideas as well as a capacity to create local traditions. The votives from Fondo Patturelli (Migliore), the necropoleis of Gricignano d'Aversa (de Caro) and Maddoloni-Calatia (Laforgia) all show a mixture of forms and decoration that none the less together constitute individual identities.
The Catonian vision of an Italic empire under Etruscan control and authority begins to require a good deal of explanation therefore to match the archaeological evidence. First, it is clear that the connections between the areas are strong from the ninth century onwards. So the nature of any takeover needs to be understood both against that context, and against the apparent shift from a largely aristocratic and elite exchange in the eighth and seventh centuries to a more broad-based interaction in the sixth and fifth, with the overlay of the Greek influence on the coast, and the interaction with the Samnitic areas from the sixth century b.c. too. Yet it is clear that one simply cannot run narratives in which the colours of the map change (as it were) from Etruscan to Greek to Samnite and back again. Ethnicity, identity and choice are highly complicated and highly variable, as we now all know, and Campania is a good case study. At some stage, however, we need to move beyond a statement of complexity, and try to come up with new models for an understanding of the way communities worked within a world in which identity (at least as we see it through material culture) was so mixed and fluid. The indications are that network theory will become important within an understanding of central Italy, and the basic data given here will be critical to that endeavour. There is still a long way to go from this point, however, and it remains the case that the idea that one can deduce a network of people solely from material evidence will always be suspect. The richness of this volume in terms of the detail (pottery, epigraphy, language, historiography, burial practice, etc.) will eventually permit more complex and sophisticated modelling, but at the same time, with major questions such as the nature of community in central Italy and the nature of the fit between material culture and broader issues of identity still unresolved, there is a danger that network theory will simply plot the data differently. To escape this impasse will no doubt require substantial collaborative thinking, and it is therefore regrettable that the volume's unnecessarily high price will limit its availability.
