European Kingdoms

Umbri (Sabellians) (Italics)
Incorporating the Camertes, Insurbes, Isombri, Sarsinates, & Vilombri

Indo-Europeans - Italic Tribes (Intro) Anatolian Tribes Balkans Tribes Baltic Tribes Celtic Tribes Germanic Tribes Italic Tribes Indo-Iranian/Aryan Tribes Slavic Tribes Tocharians (Intro)

What are generally known as West Indo-European tribes arrived at the eastern edge of Central Europe around 2500 BC. Their northern group later became the proto-Celts of the Urnfield culture while the southern group seemingly migrated westwards and southwards, reaching Iberia, Illyria, and northern Italy.

Already further divided into semi-isolated tribes, they became more civilised in their habits and available forms of technology due to contact with southern Greeks and Etruscans. In the period between the eleventh to eighth centuries BC some of those groups in Illyria crossed by sea into the Italian peninsula and settled along the south-eastern coast.

Those who had entered peninsular Italy via the north Italian piedmont gradually migrated southwards to occupy much of the rest of eastern and central Italy. These tribes all formed part of a general group which are known as Italics, seemingly part of the main population of West Indo-Europeans prior to the emergence of Celtic culture.

The Umbri group of Italics during the Italian Iron Age were located along a broad swathe of the inland spine of upper central Italy, neighboured along their entire western flank by Etruscans who edged them out of some settlements along the border during the height of their own culture. Etruscans also occupied the north, in a wide arc across to the Adriatic, while the Picentes lived to the east of the Umbrians, along the lower Adriatic coastline, and the Sabini and Vestini were to the south.

The Oscan-Umbrian group of which the Umbri were part are largely accepted as being Indo-Europeans (perhaps proto-Celts) who migrated into the peninsula from the north. Ancient writers thought they were indeed Celts. They settled in communities which were close to a series of hilltops, and while the modern region of Umbria gives some idea of their territory, it penetrates less farther north than they did. They were gradually compressed southwards and eastwards by pressure from Celts and Etruscans respectively.

Their language came from the Oscan-Umbrian group of Indo-European languages (P-Italic), which were widely spoken in Iron Age central and southern Italy prior to the rise to dominance of Latin (Latin itself was a slightly more distantly related language, coming from the Indo-European Latino-Faliscan group, or Q-Italic).

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(Information by Peter Kessler, with additional information by Edward Dawson, from Samnium and the Samnites, E T Salmon, from Researches into the Physical History of Mankind, Vol 3, Issue 1, James Cowles Prichard, from Geography, Ptolemy, from Pliny's Natural History in Thirty-Seven Books, Volumes 1-3, Pliny (the Elder), from An Historical Geography of Europe, Norman J G Pounds (Abridged Version), from The Roman History: From Romulus and the Foundation of Rome to the Reign of the Emperor Tiberius, Velleius Paterculus, J C Yardley, & Anthony A Barrett, from A Genetic Signal of Central European Celtic Ancestry, David K Faux, from The Horse, the Wheel, and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World, David W Anthony, from The History of Rome, Volume 1, Titus Livius (translated by Rev Canon Roberts), from The Histories, Herodotus (Penguin, 1996), from Encyclopaedia Britannica (Eleventh Edition, Cambridge (England), 1910), from Encyclopaedia of the Roman Empire, Matthew Bunson (1994), from Basic Romance Linguistics, E Bourcier, from Research in Popular Latin and its links with Romance languages, N Korletyanu, from Brief Historical Grammar of the Latin Language, W Lindsey, from The Corpus of Oscan Inscriptions, I Tsvetaev, from A Historical Grammar of the Latin Language, I Tronsky, and from External Links: The Natural History, Pliny the Elder (John Bostock, Ed), and The Beaker phenomenon and the genomic transformation of northwest Europe (Nature), and Massive migration from the steppe was a source for Indo-European languages in Europe (Nature.com), and Indo-European Chronology - Countries and Peoples, and Indo-European Etymological Dictionary, J Pokorny, and Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, William Smith (1854, Perseus Digital Library), and The Natural History, Pliny the Elder (John Bostock, Ed), and Geography, Strabo (H C Hamilton & W Falconer, London, 1903, Perseus Online Edition), and L'Arbre Celtique (The Celtic Tree, in French), and Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz or Dictionnaire Historique de la Suisse or Dizionario Storico dell Svizzera (in German, French, and Italian respectively), and Le Alpi (Università di Trento), and Pleiades (Ancient World Mapping Center and Institute for the Study of the Ancient World).)

c.11th century BC

Pliny mentions a mixed group of Siculi and Liburni who are expelled from the Adriatic coast by the arrival of the Umbri. This may occur as the Umbri themselves are being ejected from their western territories by Etruscans, around the seventh century BC, but the later ejection of the Siculi from northern Calabria forces back this event, possibly as early as the eleventh century BC.

Territory which had been settled by the Umbri was focussed along a stretch of the mountainous Apennines which form a spine down the middle of Italy

This would also tie in with the formation of the Sabini, who are held to be a division of the Umbri. Pliny himself believes that the Siculi are the original inhabitants of the southern and eastern sections of Umbri territory. At the same time, the Umbri lose the settlement of Lista to the Latins.

847 BC

According to myth, the Umbrian settlement of Assissi (Roman Asisium) is founded on a spur of Mount Subasio by Dardanus. While entirely unlikely, it suggests a memory of very early Roman influence in the region. Dardanus had been the founder of the Dardanians in the land of the Teucri, close to the city of Troy.

One of his descendants had been Aeneas who, according to legend, led his people after the fall of Troy to settle in Latium, around the site of the future city of Rome, where they had only partially blended with the local Latin culture and people.

This map of Anatolia is set at the time of the Trojan War, covering the general area of Dardania and the Troad (click or tap on map to view full sized)

c.800 BC

Etruscan civilisation begins to flourish and eventually achieves regional dominance in a near-seamless break, thanks to which the previous Villanova culture is gradually subsumed.

Etruscans also take over a large number of Umbrian settlements along their eastern border (three hundred, according to Pliny the Elder), notably the city of Curtun (Roman Corito, modern Cortona), which is probably of Umbrian origin.

Despite this loss of territory to the west, the Umbri also thrive, founding large numbers of settlements over the subsequent three or four hundred years. One settlement which reveals archaeological traces of Umbrian habitation in the eighth century BC is Camars (modern Chiusi).

The Umbri are forced out of Camars after an attack by 'Pelasgians' (probably meaning Etruscans, as some ancients think that the two are related). The Etruscans found an important city on the site which they name Clevsin. The dispossessed Umbri cross the Apennines to found a new settlement at Cameria (or Camerta, modern Camerino).

The ruins of the third century BC theatre of Larissa are not Pelasgian as such, as there is little remaining which could categorically be attributed to them

With the beginning of the Italian Iron Age, signs of territorial variation begin to emerge, although the gradual differentiation between a western area, an eastern area, and an Alpine area will only acquire more consistency in the seventh century BC. This is the Golasecca I A period.

7th century BC

The Umbri are forced out of their settlement at the modern site of Perugia (now the capital of Umbria) by Etruscans (although some sources ascribe this event to the fifth century BC).

The area is settled by Etruscans and an important settlement named Perusna is created which is home to the female lauchum, Sarina (who probably flourishes during the seventh century).

c.650 - 550 BC

Umbrian graves which are excavated in AD 1997 can be dated to this period. An ancient necropolis with at least thirty-six burials is discovered in the modern city of Terni, to the north of Rome.

Early Rome would have looked more like a large, walled village than the collection of grand stone edifices which are more familiar from the imperial period

The graves contain an equal mix of men and women, along with a couple of children, and grave good include Etruscan bronze bowls, and Etruscan bucchero and Sabine-Faliscan pottery. Women at this time are often buried with spindle whorls, rocchetti (small, spool-shaped terracotta objects thought to be used in weaving or as stamping devices), and fibulae.

One woman's grave also contains a loom weight, an iron spindle, and a clay block. The clay may be for treating wool before making yarn. The male burials contain iron weapons indicating the ranks of individual warriors: a lance or javelin alone signifies a soldier of lower rank; a sword, a lance, and two javelins, someone of higher rank. The men appear to be quite tall for the period, the tallest being about 1.7 metres.

c.500 BC

From about this time and for the subsequent two centuries or so, the Umbri construct rural sanctuaries in which they can make offerings to the gods. They also create votive shapes in the form of gods or animals to include with their offerings.

This map shows the greatest extent of Etruscan influence in Italy, during the seventh to fifth centuries BC, including the Campania region to the south (click or tap on map to view full sized)

c.400 - 391 BC

Following the route set by Bellovesus and the Bituriges around 600 BC, other bodies of Celts have gradually invaded northern Italy, probably due to overpopulation in Gaul and the promise of fertile territory just waiting to be captured.

The first of these is the Cenomani around 400 BC, followed by the Libui and Saluvii. Then the Boii and Lingones cross the Pennine Alps and, as all the country between the Po and the Alps is occupied, they cross the Po on rafts and expel not only Etruscans but the Umbri as well.

However, they remain to the north of the Apennines. Then, in 391 BC the Senones, the last to come, occupy the country from the River Utis (or Utens) to the Aesis (near Ancona, which marks the border between the Picentes and the Umbri in Italy).

310 BC

Following the end of the Golasecca culture within the Italian Iron Age, and while embroiled in the Second Samnite War against the powerful Samnite people of central Italy, Rome makes its first notable contact with the Umbri.

Roman military tactics may have owed something to the Samnites, with this efficient and seasoned warrior force matching the Romans and bettering them in the fourth century BC

3rd/2nd C BC

The Iguvine Tablets are composed in the native Umbrian alphabet during a period covering the third to first centuries BC. They describe the Umbrian religious rituals involving animal sacrifice, although the last of them are composed in Latin, revealing the spread and domination of this language during this period.

Subsequently lost either during or after the Roman imperial period, they are rediscovered by a farmer in AD 1444 at Gubbio in Italy. Today they reside in the Museo Civico in Gubbio.

299 - 241 BC

Latin colonies are founded in Umbrian territory by Rome, starting in 299 BC with the conquest of the city of Nequinum, which Rome renames Narni. Further colonies are founded in 268 BC, and 241 BC.

260 BC

The Roman conquest of Umbria is complete. During this century, and possibly not long after this date, some Umbri are given either full Roman citizenship, or limited citizenship which gives them the right to vote. Up to forty thousand Romans are settled in the region, greatly increasing the pace of Latinisation of the Umbri.

The sixth or fifth century BC grave goods which have been found in the Umbrian settlement of Terni include pottery both native and imported from Etruscans and Greeks

218 - 202 BC

The Second Punic War is fought against Carthage. Rome is aided by its Etruscan, Frentani, Picene, and Umbrian forces, but Italy is invaded by Hannibal Barca and a Roman army is massacred at the Battle of Cannae, killing sixty thousand.

91 - 89 BC

The Marsi fight the Social War against Rome in which Rome's allies strive for, and are eventually granted, citizenship. The Frentani, Latins and Umbri are also granted citizenship, although the latter play only a minor role in the war, joining the rebels late and agreeing terms with Rome early on. Thereafter, they are gradually absorbed within Roman Italy and lose their individual identity.