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Dennis, George
The cities and cemeteries of Etruria: in two volumes (Band 2) — London, 1848

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https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.786#0283

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ORBETBLLO.

[chap, xlvi.

to assent to this opinion, and am rather inclined to regard
it as an Etruscan town, the name of which has not come
down to us. That it was also inhabited in Roman times
is proved by columns, altars, cippi, and other remains
which hare been found here. Its ancient name cannot be
traced in its modern appellation, which is apparently a
mere corruption of urbictda,1 unless it be significant of its
antiquity—urhs vetus. It must suffice for us at present
to know that here has stood an ancient town, originally,
it may be, Pelasgic, certainly Etruscan, and afterwards
Roman.8

Orbetello is now a place of some size, having nearly
3000 inhabitants, and among Maremma towns, is second
only to Grosseto.9 Instead of one good inn, it has two
indifferent ones, called Locanda dell' Ussero, and that of

correctness of these Itineraries may
indeed often be questioned. But I
think it more probable that Succosa,
or Subcosa, was a station at the foot
of the hill on which Cosa stands, only
called into existence after the ruin of
that Etruscan city. See Abeken, Mit-
talitalien, p. 34. Some have even taken
Orbetello to be the site of Cosa itself.
Mionnet, Suppl. I. p. 197.

7 So called, it may be, to distinguish
it from the larger city of Cosa on the
neighbouring heights. Certainly the
name cannot be derived, as has been
suggested, "from the rotundity of its
walls, which form a perfect circle,"
(Viag. Antiq. Via Aurelia, p. 50) ; see-
ing that the said walls form a truncated
cone in outline, without any curve
whatever. There is nothing rmmd
about Orbetello. Nor is it more
likely to be derived from Orbieam and
Tellus, as Repetti (III. p. 665) pro-
poses in preference to the Urbs Vitelli,
suggested by Lami. That it was
derived from urbicula, or urbiccUa,

seems confirmed by the fact of its
being called Orbicellum in a papal bull
of the thirteenth century. Dempster,
II. p. 432.

8 That such a town is not men-
tioned by Strabo or Mela, by Pliny or
Ptolemy, in their lists of places along
this coast, is explained by its distance
from the sea, from which it could not
be approached. It must have been
regarded as an inland town, and may
be mentioned under some one of those
names of Etruscan towns, for which no
site has yet been determined.

9 It is a proof how much population
tends to salubrity in the Maremma,
that Orbetello, though in the midst of a
stagnant lagoon, ten square miles in
extent, is comparatively healthy, and
has almost doubled its population in 24
years ; while Telamone, and other small
places along this coast, are almost de-
serted in summer, and the few people
that remain become bloated like wine-
skins, or yellow as lizards. Repetti,
IIT. p. 680.
 
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