The course aims to illustrate to the students (at their first approach to archaeology) the history, the role and the meaning that the Etruscans have had in the history of Italy since the Bronze Age with the formation of the first city-states. Particular attention will be paid to the most ancient phases, the so-called Villanovan culture, which also saw expansion in the North (Emilia) and South (Campania) of the peninsula. The productions and the trades that have characterized the orientalizing phase and the principal facts of the history will be faced from the archaic age up to the conquest by Rome. Italic Antiquities will not be left out in a comparative synoptic framework with the Etruscan environment. The methods and information of funerary archaeology will be particularly thorough given their relevance in the theme of both Etruscology and the panorama of pre-Roman peoples. To obviate to information deficiencies, the course will have a first part, preparatory, which will cover the most recent phases of Italian prehistory and, above all, the early history that led to the birth of Italian "regional" cultures of which the Etruscans constitute the most famous element and relevant.