DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.786#0234
chap, xlii.] PRETENDED SITE OF VETULONIA. 217
an. Etruscan site, as the neighbouring tombs seem to indi-
cate, it can have been only one of the thousand and one
" villages and castles "—castella vicique—which existed in
Etruria. The traveller may rest satisfied that no remains
of an Etruscan town are to be seen on the spot. Should
he wish to verify the fact, he will find accommodation at
Monte Rotondo, a town two or three miles from the
Poggio of Castiglione; and he can see, in the house of
Signor Baldasserini, the proprietor of this tenuta, a number
of vases and other Etruscan antiquities, found in the neigh-
bourhood.
A continual descent of many miles through a wild tract
of oak forests, underwooded with tamarisk, laurestinus, and
brushwood, leads to the plain of Massa. That city crowns
the extremity of a long range of heights, and at a distance
is not unlike Harrow as seen from Hampstead Heath; but
its walls and towers give it a more imposing air. Though
the see of a bishop, with nearly 3000 inhabitants, and one
of the principal cities of the Maremma, Massa is a mean,
dirty place, without an inn—unless the chandler's shop,
assuming the name of "Locanda del Sole," may be so
called. The Duomo is a small, neat edifice, of the thirteenth
century, in the Byzantine style, with a low dome and a
triple tier of arcades in the facade. The interior is not
in keeping, being spoilt by modern additions, and has
nothing of interest beyond a very curious font of early
date, formed of a single block.
Massa has been supposed by some to occupy the site of
Vetulonia, an opinion founded principally on the epithet
" Veternensis," attached to a town of this name by
Ammianus Marcellinus,1 the only ancient writer who
1 Amm. Marcell. XIV. 11, 27. He Caesar, the brother of Julian the Apos-
speaks of it as the birth-place of Callus tate.
an. Etruscan site, as the neighbouring tombs seem to indi-
cate, it can have been only one of the thousand and one
" villages and castles "—castella vicique—which existed in
Etruria. The traveller may rest satisfied that no remains
of an Etruscan town are to be seen on the spot. Should
he wish to verify the fact, he will find accommodation at
Monte Rotondo, a town two or three miles from the
Poggio of Castiglione; and he can see, in the house of
Signor Baldasserini, the proprietor of this tenuta, a number
of vases and other Etruscan antiquities, found in the neigh-
bourhood.
A continual descent of many miles through a wild tract
of oak forests, underwooded with tamarisk, laurestinus, and
brushwood, leads to the plain of Massa. That city crowns
the extremity of a long range of heights, and at a distance
is not unlike Harrow as seen from Hampstead Heath; but
its walls and towers give it a more imposing air. Though
the see of a bishop, with nearly 3000 inhabitants, and one
of the principal cities of the Maremma, Massa is a mean,
dirty place, without an inn—unless the chandler's shop,
assuming the name of "Locanda del Sole," may be so
called. The Duomo is a small, neat edifice, of the thirteenth
century, in the Byzantine style, with a low dome and a
triple tier of arcades in the facade. The interior is not
in keeping, being spoilt by modern additions, and has
nothing of interest beyond a very curious font of early
date, formed of a single block.
Massa has been supposed by some to occupy the site of
Vetulonia, an opinion founded principally on the epithet
" Veternensis," attached to a town of this name by
Ammianus Marcellinus,1 the only ancient writer who
1 Amm. Marcell. XIV. 11, 27. He Caesar, the brother of Julian the Apos-
speaks of it as the birth-place of Callus tate.