Project Ancient ItalyAlphabetsThe Venetic alphabet

The Venetic alphabet

Venetic inscriptions are encoded in a substantially uniform enchoric alphabet, which shows nonetheless chronological and local varieties. It was locally created upon Etruscan models and tailored in order to adapt the writing to the needs of the Venetic language.

Writing first appeared in the first half of the 6^th cent. BC: the Etruscan model is a northern-type alphabet (from the area of Chiusi) probably transferred through the mediation of the Padanian Etruscan centres. The alphabet is transmitted from Etruscans to Veneti by means of a complex doctrinal corpus which belonged to the Etruscan writing teachers. The corpus was made up of multifaceted sources, including the alphabet of the time, but also the complete theoretical alphabetari, the possibility for many graphic traditions to survive in the same centre, and the oral teaching of writing. Thus, the differences between Venetic and Etruscan alphabet used in the inscriptions can be explained, i.e., by instance, the presence of the graph o or the adoption of Etruscan letters with a different value and used in order to convey the voiced plosives: t T for [d] (while θ X for [t]), φ for [b], χ for [g]. Moreover, such corpus explains apparently inconsistent choices such as the use of th North-Etruscan velar k and at the same time of the South-Etruscan symbols for sibilants s e ś, together with the different shapes of θ, either with or without outer circle.

Syllabic punctuation, typical of the Venetic writing, was also transferred from the Etruscan model around the 6^th cent. BC. In Etruscan epigraphy such practice appeared between the 6^th and the 5^th cent. BC in the inscriptions from the South-Etruscan area (above all Veio and Cere) and from Campania but is not attested after the 5^th cent. BC. Conversely, syllabic punctuation was used in Veneto from its introduction to the last records in Venetic, and it was attested in all areas, with minor local differences. According to Venetic syllabic punctuation, the clusters consonant + vowel or consonant + l/r/m + vowel are inscribed within two points; therefore, simple consonants (i.e., not followed by vowels), initial vowels, and vowels after vowels are treated as isolated and followed by punctuation. Besides those main rules, some subrules and exceptions apply. Syllabic punctuation reflects the teaching of the writing by syllabification. The ratio and application of punctuation as a consequence of such teaching principle are well attested in Veneto by the alphabetic tablets of the sanctuary of Reitia at Este: the turning of the writing tablets into votive gifts let the survival of the structure of the exercises used to learn to write by constructing syllables.

Several graphic varieties differentiate throughout the areas where Venetic was used, starting from the 6^th cent. BC. (Este; Padova; Vicenza; Eastern and Northern Veneto). The main difference lies in the graphitization of the dental consonants [t] and [d], which indicates where the inscriptions come from. The first system (showing T t = [d] and X θ = [d]) is attested in Vicenza, together with a five-bar m. The symbol T with an upper oblique bar was abandoned at Este, probably because it could be ambiguously read, and the Etruscan sign for z, oblique rotated and recalling X’s oblique bars, was instead adopted to indicate [d]. Eastern Venetic (probably Altino, and Cadore) seems the same as Atestine type. Padua employs a cross-θ instead of a pointed one for [t] and keeps the sign T for [d]: T is oblique in the most ancient inscriptions and is progressively turned into a cross-X.

Further differences as for Venetic alphabets are either geographically or chronologically motivated. Graphs which show a degree of variation are mostly those for a (orthogonal, oblique, rounded, flag-shaped, open); h (stair-shaped, same as pointed i, three-bar); m (four or five-bar); f (mostly the digraph vh, but also hv, or just h in the Northern area, and maybe just v in some inscriptions from Padua).

Venetic writing is generally the same throughout the Venetic area, this allowing – besides geographical and diachronic differences – for considering all the varieties as one and the same ‘Venetic alphabet’. Venetic inscriptions share, beyond syllabic punctuation, some further common features, namely:

• The text is in scriptio continua, with no division between words;
• The ductus of the writing can be either destrorse or sinistrorse, or alternate between the two, with no apparent reason;
• The layout of the writing often depends on the shape of the support (stone slab, stone, cippus, vase, and so on). Therefore, inscriptions can be horseshoe shaped, concentric frame shaped, bustrophedon styled with alternating ductus.

Beginning from the 2nd cent. BC (Roman period), the Venetic alphabet is used along with the Latin alphabet, which is employed in epitaphs which are still Venetic as for language, formulas and onomastics. This shows the will to adhere to the Latin cultural model without necessarily abandoning the local tradition.

 

Bibliography:

• Lejeune M. 1974. Manuel de la langue vénète, München.
• Pellegrini G.B. -  Prosdocimi A.L. 1967. La lingua venetica, I-II, Padova-Firenze.
• Marinetti, A. 2020. «Venetico», Palaeohispanica 20, pp.367-401.
• Marinetti A. 2024. «Il contatto tra Etruschi e Veneti: una rilettura dei dati epigrafici», in Gli Etruschi nella Valle del Po. Atti del XXX Convegno di Studi Etruschi ed Italici (Bologna 23-25 giugno 2022), Roma.
• Marinetti A. 2024. Le iscrizioni dal santuario di Reitia/ Die Inschriften aus dem Reitia-Heiligtum, Oppenheim.
• Prosdocimi A.L. 1988. «La lingua», in G. Fogolari, A.L. Prosdocimi, I Veneti antichi. Lingua e cultura, Padova, pp.221-420.
• Prosdocimi A.L. 1990. «Insegnamento e apprendimento della scrittura nell’Italia antica», in M. Pandolfini, A.L. Prosdocimi, Alfabetari e insegnamento della scrittura in Etruria e nell'Italia antica, Firenze Olschki, pp.155-301.