From the Italian language reports it's not the full skeleton. I hope that the bones weren't partially burned. That's why I think it matters even more than in most cases that the right lab work on them.
In general terms, I think this is still correct. Anyway, it's what I learned and I didn't find anything contrary to it that came out in the compendium last year.
"The Etruscan obsession with elaborate burials leads us to suppose that they may have had an underlying belief, similar to the Egyptians that a part of the soul remained with the body, or at least that the body was important for the afterlife. Having said that, the earliest grave sites were cremations, with the ash being retained either in biconical urns, or urns fashioned to represent huts. Gradually inhumation burials began to appear, the first being in Tarquinia and Caere, and during the Orientalizing period eventually became the prevailing rite, except in northern Etruria, where cremation persisted right up to the 1st century BC, epitomised by the elaborately carved alabaster urns of Volterra.
In the Orientalizing period the use of writing, the potter's wheel, and monumental funerary architecture reflected the accumulation of luxury goods of gold and ivory and exotic trade items such as ostrich eggs, tridacna shells, and faience. Many scholars hypothesize the existence of a powerful aristocratic class, and craftsmen, merchants, and seamen would have formed a middle class."
http://www.mysteriousetruscans.com/tombs.html
If we ever get enough representative samples it will be very interesting to discover if there were significant differences in genetics.
The tombs are of course mostly empty, having been looted over the centuries, so you need a pretty active imagination to see them, and the cemeteries, as they were.
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-iRGsdc0uHEw/VAYy3J46lVI/AAAAAAAALJk/5PZTh6hNma4/s1600/Tomb+Street+2.jpg
http://image.slidesharecdn.com/pre-...e-roman-italy-upload-13-728.jpg?cb=1317390032
For me, though, perhaps it wasn't quite as difficult because our modern cemeteries, and especially the ones from the 19th and 20th centuries, bear some resemblance to them. They too are like cities of the dead, with streets, lots of beautiful funerary statuary etc. We often went to see our deceased family members when I was a child, and even now when I'm home I go with my elderly relatives on Sundays to clean the tombs, tend the flowers they've planted or left etc. It's like part of the normal Sunday visit to relatives. Even in these times there are pictures under glass of every deceased. I was very surprised and disturbed when I came to the U.S. to discover that wasn't the custom here. It seemed so cold, and the dead seemed so forgotten. I don't know what it's like in northern Europe.
The most beautiful cemetery I've ever seen is Staglieno in Genova. Honestly, it should be on tourist itineraries, in my opinion. The sculptures are often beautiful and touching and emotional, sometimes homey, sometimes bizarre and almost gothic, and sometimes even funny.
http://cdn.gq.com.mx/uploads/images...osos_del_mundo_para_viajar_485857500_618x.jpg
http://fredtriffaux.free.fr/_media/img/large/igp7567.jpg
Girl with the dog:
http://www.italianways.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Staglieno-ragazza-con-cane-04-665x661.jpg
http://gb.fotolibra.com/images/previews/192202-a-last-look-statue-staglieno-cemetery-genoa.jpeg
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-t3rM2n0Zz...C+The+Staglieno+Cemetery%2C+Genoa+-+Italy.jpg
