The Civita

10th century BC

The Acropolis

‘And those who want to see the landscape of Corneto in its most varied, profound and meditative aspects must observe it from this elevated spot… The connection between what we know of the Civita and the impressions evoked by its remains and its location is marvellous… The Civita is a natural and environmental mystery, a great conspiracy of the religious and political imagination of the Etruscans.’ Vincenzo Cardarelli translated these emotions into the pages of his 1948 Strega Prize-winning novel ‘Villa Tarantola’. Emotions that the ‘Civita’, the innermost plateau parallel to that of the Necropolis and a wild area full of deep traces of the ancient civilisation of the Etruscans, still evokes. Walking along the Civita, which you can see stretching towards the sea between two hilltops, means being in the heart of the history of one of the most famous Etruscan cities. This is echoed in the literary sources that tell us of Tarchon, the founder of the city: ploughing a patch of land in Tarquinia, he saw Tages – the boy born an old man – emerging from it. It was Tages who taught him the fundamentals of the Etruscan religion. This is how the city came to play a leading role in the culture of the Etruscan people, whom Livy describes as ‘people above all others devoted to religious practices’ (Livy. V, I, 6). The Civita of Tarquinia consists of two plateaus joined by a narrow isthmus where systematic excavations have been carried out since the 19th century. In the first half of the 20th century, the archaeologist Pietro Romanelli highlighted the fact that the Civita is an Etruscan city, discovering the circuit of walls that joins the area ‘Pian della Regina’, with the imposing sanctuary of the ‘Ara della Regina’ (the ‘Alter of the Queen’ in English), to the western plateau, which contains the remains of buildings from the settlement. At the junction between the two plateaus, on the side facing inland, he discovered the city gate which still carries its name, ‘Porta Romanelli’. In 1982, excavations by the University of Milan began on the western plateau and brought to light the ‘monumental complex’ – the oldest Etruscan sacred area discovered to date – and the oldest parts of the ‘Ara della Regina’ sanctuary. In more recent years, investigations on the walls have been resumed by the Superintendency for Archaeological Heritage of Southern Etruria and the University of Milan.

The Sanctuary of the ‘Ara della Regina’ (the ‘Altar of the Queen’ )

The temple, with its grand proportions, gives an indication of the importance of Tarquinia throughout all of Etruria.
Excavations have provided evidence that Tarconte, the founder of the town, was possibly commemorated here as early as the 6th century BC. Presumably, the monumental cenotaph of Tarconte was created by two platforms of squared blocks, oriented in a different direction than the temple of the 4th century BC.
Only a few fragments of terracotta decoration from this more monumental phase remain, including the famous Winged Horses panel, now housed at the National Archaeological Museum of Tarquinia.
The scene depicted in the few surviving fragments of the terracotta decoration on the temple’s pediment may suggest the apotheosis of the hero Heracles, who is believed to be an ancestor of Tarconte and was possibly depicted after his cremation on the funeral pyre.

Porta Romanelli

The only monumental gate discovered so far in the town walls leads with a slight slope into the town, where powerful buildings constructed with interesting and diverse masonry techniques stand.

Monumental Complex

The Monumental Complex corresponds to a part of the settlement, with uninterrupted life until the 2nd century BC.
The origins of the aggregation of the urban nucleus date back to the 10th century BC: a natural cavity constitutes the hub of sacro-institutional activities of considerable interest.
Next to it, a child affected by the ‘sacred disease’ (epilepsy), which the ancients believed could put them in communication with the divine, was discovered.
These findings shed light on the ways in which the religious practices of the community took shape, from pre-civic times to the brink of Romanization, particularly because they were discovered in the mother town of the Etruscan religion.

The Ancient Ruins

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