Today, having set off for a journey over the lands of ancient Etruria, we’ll be surprised: so few remains of the Etruscan civilization are left.
Uninhabited and lonely are their roads. Bearing silent witness to a long gone life, nowadays they lead to nowhere, to cities that have passed away for ever, cities which cannot be brought back to life.
Time has destroyed Etruscan temples made of wood, leaving us with only stone basements. Marvelous terracotta sculptures have turned to dust. As a result, in museums today we’ll find only fragments of a profound and beautiful world created by master hands of Etruscan painters and sculptors.
The Etruscan language has been forgotten. Scriptures have been lost. Now we can only read restrained words of sepulchral dedications encrypted on sarcophagi.
But we are left with the tombs of Etruscans, which used to be full of treasures; with majestic ruins of towns of the dead, carved of travertine in rocks; with mysterious caves descending into the depths of the Earth; with enigmatic green hills, that in their own way are ready to tell us the story of the people who believed in immortality.

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