The most southern Etruscan cities, Veii, Caere, and Tarquinii, were accounted in Roman tradition the primitive and chief seats of Etruscan art; the most northerly town, Volaterrae, with the largest territory of all the Etruscan communities, stood most of all aloof from art While a Greek semi-culture prevailed in South Etruria, Northern Etruria was much more marked by an absence of all culture.  The causes of this remarkable contrast may be sought partly in differences of nationality—­South Etruria being largely peopled in all probability by non-Etruscan elements(42)—­partly in the varying intensity of Hellenic influence, which must have made itself very decidedly felt at Caere in particular.  The fact itself admits of no doubt.  The more injurious on that account must have been the early subjugation of the southern half of Etruria by the Romans, and the Romanizing—­which there began very early—­of Etruscan art.  What Northern Etruria, confined to its own efforts, was able to produce in the way of art, is shown by the copper coins which essentially belong to it.

Character of Latin Art

Let us now turn from Etruria to glance at Latium.  The latter, it is true, created no new art; it was reserved for a far later epoch of culture to develop on the basis of the arch a new architecture different from the Hellenic, and then to unfold in harmony with that architecture a new style of sculpture and painting.  Latin art is nowhere original and often insignificant; but the fresh sensibility and the discriminating tact, which appropriate what is good in others, constitute a high artistic merit.  Latin art seldom became barbarous, and in its best products it comes quite up to the level of Greek technical execution.  We do not mean to deny that the art of Latium, at least in its earlier stages, had a certain dependence on the undoubtedly earlier Etruscan;(43) Varro may be quite right in supposing that, previous to the execution by Greek artists of the clay figures in the temple of Ceres,(44) only “Tuscanic” figures adorned the Roman temples; but that, at all events, it was mainly the direct influence of the Greeks that led Latin art into its proper channel, is self-evident, and is very obviously shown by these very statues as well as by the Latin and Roman coins.  Even the application of graving on metal in Etruria solely to the toilet mirror, and in Latium solely to the toilet casket, indicates the diversity of the art-impulses that affected the two lands.  It does not appear, however, to have been exactly at Rome that Latin art put forth its freshest vigour; the Roman -asses- and Roman -denarii- are far surpassed in fineness and taste of workmanship by the Latin copper, and the rare Latin silver, coins, and the masterpieces of painting and design belong chiefly to Praeneste, Lanuvium, and Ardea.  This accords completely with the realistic and sober spirit of the Roman republic which we have already described—­a spirit which can hardly have asserted itself with equal