We must therefore seek for the earlier home of the Etruscans to the west or north of Italy.

It is not wholly improbable that the Etruscans may have come into Italy over the Raetian Alps; for the oldest traceable settlers in the Grisons and Tyrol, the Raeti, spoke Etruscan down to historical times, and their name sounds similar to that of the Ras.

These may no doubt have been a remnant of the Etruscan settlements on the Po; but it is at least quite as likely that they may have been a portion of the people which remained behind in its earlier abode.
Story of Their Lydian Origin In glaring contradiction to this simple and natural view stands the story that the Etruscans were Lydians who had emigrated from Asia.

It is very ancient: it occurs even in Herodotus; and it reappears in later writers with innumerable changes and additions, although several intelligent inquirers, such as Dionysius, emphatically declared their disbelief in it, and pointed to the fact that there was not the slightest apparent similarity between the Lydians and Etruscans in religion, laws, manners, or language.

It is possible that an isolated band of pirates from Asia Minor may have reached Etruria, and that their adventure may have given rise to such tales; but more probably the whole story rests on a mere verbal mistake.
The Italian Etruscans or the -Turs-ennae- (for this appears to be the original form and the basis of the Greek -- Turs-einnoi--, -- Turreinoi--, of the Umbrian -Turs-ci-, and of the two Roman forms -Tusci-, -Etrusci-) nearly coincide in name with the Lydian people of the -- Torreiboi-- or perhaps also -- Turr-einoi--, so named from the town -- Turra--, This manifestly accidental resemblance in name seems to be in reality the only foundation for that hypothesis--not rendered more trustworthy by its great antiquity--and for all the pile of crude historical speculations that has been reared upon it.