The Veneti of Ancient Europe - Part 3
The Bringers of the Urnfield Culture
This article was based on a series of posts written by La Torre associazione culturale, which writes about Venetian history and anthropology for an italian-speaking audience. You can find it on Facebook.
The Veneto-Celtic language group
The Italo-Celtic language, more accurately defined as Veneto-Celtic, is a reconstructed language group classified within the Centum group of the Indo-European languages. It is considered a transitional stage following the separation of the Balkan and Germanic linguistic branches but preceding the emergence of the two linguistic families from which its name is derived: Celtic and Proto-Venetic (known as Proto-Italic), which would eventually give rise to the Italic languages, including the Latino-Faliscan and Osco-Umbrian branches.
The introduction of these languages into the Italian Peninsula is most likely linked to the expansion of the Urnfield culture, which initiated the Proto-Villanovan culture in the italian peninsula, where various Indo-European languages began to develop and diverge.
The most archaic languages closely related to Italo-Celtic after its entry into the peninsula were Venetic and Lepontic. Both are attested in the Cisalpine region and were spoken by peoples linked to the Urnfield culture. These languages retained many archaisms associated with Italo-Celtic, though with notable distinctions: while Lepontic is regarded as closely related to Proto-Celtic, Venetic is more aligned with Proto-Italic, particularly the Latino-Faliscan group.
This linguistic distinction also hints at the migration patterns within the peninsula. The expansion of Latino-Faliscan-speaking groups (Latins, Faliscans, and Siculi) into southern Italy appears to have occurred after the earlier movements of Osco-Umbrian populations. Unlike the Latino-Faliscan groups, the Osco-Umbrians had abandoned the practice of cremating their dead.
The Genetics of the cisalpine region and of the italian peninsula
A noteworthy aspect of this transition is the genetic continuity observed in the Y-DNA haplogroup R1b: earlier populations associated with the Polada and Terramare cultures were predominantly characterized by R1b Z36 and Z56. However, this genetic signature was largely supplanted by the R1b U152 haplogroup, specifically the L2 subclade, which became especially prominent in northeastern Italy, in the historic Venetic region.
Unfortunately, the availability of ancient genetic material from the late Copper Age to the Bronze Age is limited, preventing a comprehensive technical analysis comparable to studies on the Indo-European expansion from the steppes into Western Europe. As a result, our understanding relies on analyses of modern genetic samples, which reveal a stratified Indo-European genetic influence in three successive phases.
The Y-DNA haplogroup R1b U152 dominates the Italian Peninsula, with its prevalence varying geographically:
55–45% in Northern Italy
35–45% in Central Italy
Around 25% in Southern Italy
Y-DNA represents the paternal genetic lineage passed from father to son. Thus, R1b U152 is proof of the predominantly Indo-European paternal ancestry of modern-day “italians”. Within the territory of the italian state, this haplogroup can be further subdivided into three main subclades, which provide a clear timeline for Indo-European expansion:
Z-56: This subclade is considered "pan-Italic" due to its dominance in central and southern Italy and its notable presence in northwestern Italy and the Lake Garda area. Its distribution suggests it was the first to enter the peninsula, likely between the late Copper Age and early Bronze Age.
Z-36: Often described as "Gallo-Romance," this subclade aligns closely with the distribution of Gallo-Romance speakers in northern Italy. It is heavily concentrated in the Lake Garda region, particularly between Brescia and Verona, and diminishes further east in Venetia.
L-2: This is the oldest subclade genetically but appears to be the most recent major arrival in the peninsula. Its presence is most prominent in northeastern Italy, particularly in the historic Venetic heartland. The concentration of L-2 in this region suggests it entered the peninsula during the migration of the Venetic peoples, coinciding with the expansion of the Urnfield culture and the emergence of the Proto-Villanovan phase.
The Urheimat of the Proto-Venetics
Where did the Italo-Celtic speakers who colonized the Italian Peninsula around 1200 BCE and gave rise to the Proto-Villanovan Culture, originate?
The Italo-Celtic speakers who colonized the Italian Peninsula around 1200 BCE and gave rise to the Proto-Villanovan culture originated from the European branch of the Urnfield culture. This culture developed between the Carpathians and the Magyar plain between 1500 and 1300 BCE, during which time its people had already linguistically differentiated into Proto-Celtic and Proto-Venetic.
By 1200 BCE, from this cultural and linguistic core, groups of Italo-Celtic speakers began migrating into the Italian Peninsula. This marked the first phase of the Indo-Europeanization of the region, initiating the Proto-Villanovan culture and leaving a lasting genetic and phenotypical imprint, particularly in the northeastern regions - Venetia.
Various Italo-Celtic languages, associated with the R1b U152 genetic haplogroup, were already established across the Alpine basin by this time. Among these groups, a distinct branch - the Proto-Venetic - migrated into the peninsula via Friuli, playing a key role in colonizing the northeastern regions. In doing so, the Proto-Venetic populations displaced the earlier Polada culture in much of the region, though the latter’s people remained concentrated around Lake Garda and the Po Valley.
From their northeastern stronghold, Proto-Venetic groups drove the expansion of the Urnfield culture throughout the Italian Peninsula. This cultural wave Indo-Europeanized the region, leaving a profound linguistic and cultural legacy.
The Italic languages that emerged in the peninsula are direct descendants of Proto-Venetic, as Venetic itself - part of the Latino-Faliscan group of Italic languages - presents a clear linguistic and genetic continuity with those early settlers. The Venetic language retained numerous archaisms, positioning it as an intermediary between the earlier Proto-Italic or Proto-Venetic stages and the fully developed Italic languages. Alongside this cultural diffusion, these groups contributed significantly to the prevalence of the Dinaric phenotype in the area.
It is important to note that the Hallstatt Culture (1200 BCE-450 BCE) and the later La Tene Culture (450 BCE-1 BCE), traditionally associated with Celtic-speaking populations, would develop from areas involved in the aforementioned Urnfield expansion, which had led to the establishment of a Venetic Continuum in Central Europe.
The cultural-religious connection
Venetic culture is thus the direct and purest derivation of the European branch of the Urnfield Culture, as evident in its custom of cremation and burial in urns, something that distinguished the Urnfield Culture from its predecessors - who buried the dead in mounds. The establishment of an aristocratic warrior class, together with the resulting technological development, enabled the Urnfield Culture to expand rapidly throughout Europe, laying the foundation for the later Hallstatt and La Tène cultures.
The Balkan-Danubian origin of this culture is also found in the etymological analysis of a goddess central to the island Celts, heirs to the first expansion of the Urnfields, mentioned by Caesar in relation to the Veneti of Brittany: the goddess Danu.
This deity has been reconstructed through the medieval Irish legends of the Tuatha Dé Danann (“tribe of the goddess Danu”), the Vedic river deity of the same name Dânu, and the Italic deities Ianu (Juno) and Anu (Etruscan). Although Juno is not a river deity, she is directly associated with the Milky Way, symbolically generated from the milk of her breast, from which she takes her name. This link connects her to the “cosmic river” par excellence. The river element is central to the Urnfield Culture, as evidenced by representations of waterfowls and the Sun Boat motif, depicted stylized on urns throughout Central Europe. We also find the same symbol in Venetia, improperly called the “key of Rejtia.”
The phenotypical connection
The prevailing phenotype of the Urnfield people was the Proto-Nordic Danubian, with a significant presence of the Dinaric type. The Danubian type, now extinct in its pure form, gave rise to two of today's three major northern phenotypic variants: the Keltic and Hallstatt.
Unlike the Corded type, which developed mainly in the Baltic, the Danubian was characterized by a lower cephalic index. If the Corded were hyperdolicocephalic, the Danubians were mesocephalic, tending toward brachycephaly. They were of taller stature and more robust constitution than Mediterraneans.
In Italy, the Danubian phenotype mixed with the more gracile Mediterraneans derived from the Neolithic, generating the common North-Mediterranean Central-Cisalpine type. On the Atlantic coast, it crossed with the Baskid type , generating the Keltic, while in Central Europe, in contact with Corded tribes, it gave rise to the canonical northern Hallstatt-type phenotype.
The Venedi of the Baltic and the Lusatian Culture
Having dealt with the Urheimat of the Venetian peoples and of the Urnfields, analyzing their ethnogenesis in the northern Balkans - between the Magyar plain and the Carpathian mountains - we will now try to explain the presence of the Veneto ethnonym in much of Europe and, specifically, in the Baltic area, the main site Lusatian culture.
Let us start by saying that, unlike the Veneti of the Adriatic who left us traces of writing allowing us to classify and place them in a specific linguistic hierarchy, we can’t say the same for the Venedi of the Baltic. We do not know the language and, therefore, the ethnicity of these peoples, which is why both Germans and Slavs try to claim them, both with valid reasons that we will examine here.
The Lusatian Culture is associated with the Urnfield Culture and expands northward, between what is now East Germany and Poland, around 1200 B.C., at the same time when the Veneti entered the Italian peninsula, founding the city of Padua (Patava, in Venetic).
The Lusatian culture developed in the western territory of the earlier Trzciniec Culture, which stretched from Poland to western Ukraine. This is considered by experts to be the probable cradle of the Balto-Slavic civilization, i.e., the entity from which both the Balts and the Slavs descended, analogous to the Italo-Celtic we described above.
The people of the Trzciniec culture used to bury the dead, but towards the end of this culture we can observe the beginning of cremation in urns, under the influence of the Urnfield Culture from the Carpathian region, eventually leading to the Lusatian culture, attributed to the Venedi of the Baltic.
The Venedi are first mentioned as inhabitants of the Baltic area by Pliny the Elder and Tacitus. The latter describes them as a people somewhere between the Germans and the Sarmatian nomads, pointing out that they lived in settled houses and were equipped with powerful infantry, like the Germans, but devoted to raids and abductions in the forested and mountainous areas between the Fenni and Peucini, placing them east of the Vistula River. Thus, it seems that “Venedi” was a synonym for early Proto-Slavic and Baltic peoples, probably confirming that the people of Lusatia were ethnically Balto-Slavic. However, reality may be more complex.
The Lusatian culture had an intense cultural interchange with the neighboring Nordic and Proto-Germanic Danish culture, contributing to the emergence of the later Pomeranian culture and eventually the Przeworsk culture, which developed between the II century BCE and the IV century CE.
The Przeworsk culture was located between the Oder and Vistula rivers in what is now central and southern Poland, tracing the ancient cultural boundaries of Lusatia and continuing to practice cremation of the dead. However, at this point, it appears culturally well integrated into the Germanic sphere, reconnecting more precisely with the ethnogenesis of the East Germans, from whom the Goths and the Vandals would later descend.
The Vandals' ethnic name (Wandili) is very reminiscent of the original Venedi ethnonym. It is likely that we are dealing with two distinct situations: the Germanized Venedi west of the Vistula and the Sarmatized and Slavicized Venedi to the east.
What seems certain is that, beyond the ethnic connotation, for both Germans and Finns, the peoples of the Urnfield Culture who inhabited and controlled the territories of present-day Poland and East Germany were identified as Venedi, a term that, in time, became a synonym used to identify the Slavic peoples of the easternmost cultures, directly influenced by the Venedi from the time of the distant Lusatian culture (1300 - 500 BC).
Today, the heirs of those Venedi, speaking a language belonging to the Western Slavic branch, are the Sorbs, inhabitants of eastern Germany who survived the cultural Germanization that occurred in medieval times, promoted by the Teutonic Knights to “Christianize” the last pagan part of Europe. However, under the continuous flow of Germanization and Slavicization, their deep roots remain tied to the Ancient Venedi.
The etymology of the Venet- ethnonym
Having understood that the ethnonym Veneti is closely related to the expansion of the Urnfield Culture in the Bronze Age, let’s now try to understand where this ethnonym originated and why these disparate peoples decided to adopt it.
The etymological root of Venet- comes from Proto-Italic Wenos, derived in turn from Proto-Indo-European wenh₁-os, the meaning of which is “to desire” or “to love.” This root is shared with the name of the Roman goddess of love, Venus, which in Proto-Italic becomes precisely Wenos.
This has led to a misinterpretation that the term Venetian means “the friendly ones” or “friends,” especially by virtue of the fact that the Veneti were strategic allies of the Romans against the Celts, and Venetia itself was integrated into the Empire without being conquered by arms.
However, this interpretation is to be categorically ruled out: it downplays the much deeper meaning of Wenos, and, moreover, it is hard to believe that a people such as that of the Urnfield Culture, who in a short time expanded and colonized much of Europe, the people of Homeric poems and of hero worship, would call themselves “the friendly ones.”
In fact, the Proto-Indo-European root wenh₁ also generates very different meanings, such as Sanskrit Vanòti (“to win, defeat, procure”), Proto-Germanic winnaną (“to win, effort, victory”) and Latin venor - venatio (“to hunt, to follow a prey”). A more reliable version emerges from this reconstruction, which gives Venet the meaning of “victorious” or “conquerors.”
Having made these premises, we want to propose our own interpretation, using as a yardstick of comparison the Germanic rune that encompasses the same etymological root: Wunjo (ᚹ) in Proto-Germanic, Winja in Gothic.
The origins of the runic alphabet
The ancient Veneti, as well as the Germans, used runes for sacred purposes: for them, runes were not a trivial form of secular writing, but the materialization of an evocation. Runes were considered a means of communication between man and the divine, the verb through which the divine and the human could connect through divination.
According to official historiography, runes were devised by the Phoenicians as a form of proto-writing, later learned by the Etruscans and finally by the Cisalpine peoples, including the Venetics, who would be among the first to use them for divinatory purposes. The secret of the runes would then have been transmitted to the Germans along the famous Amber Road, which connected the Mediterranean to the Baltic and of which the Venetics were the main intermediaries and controllers.
It should be pointed out, however, that the Phoenicians began using their proto-rune alphabet for commercial purposes beginning in the VIII century B.C., with the earliest inscription dating from 1000 BC (in the sarcophagus of Biblo, Lebanon), following the expansion into the Mediterranean of the Sea Peoples around 1200 B.C., an event that, not coincidentally, coincides with the expansion of the Urnfield populations.
The Urnfield Religious Revolution
Returning to the etymological root of the rune ᚹ Wunjo, we can see how it fits perfectly with the analysis so far. Its meaning is “joy, success, victory”. It is associated with the bonds between men that generate love, friendship, gens, tribes, but it goes further: Wunjo is the rune associated with Wotan (Odin), which through the “W” originates its name. It is thus a rune connected to magic and the sacred, to that force that binds man to the divine.
Wenos, therefore, represents this force: the desire that drives man to create bonds, achieve his goals and, above all, draw closer to the divine (veneration - Wenos). Wenos is the force with which the vir (the hero) pursues his path of transmutation towards the divine; it is the force with which the hero generates his epic. In keeping with the Latin mos maiorum, the demigod fulfills his destiny to ascend to heaven.
Venet, from which Wenos, is the name by which the people of the Urnfield Culture decided to identify themselves with, following the “cultural revolution” that occurred within the earlier mound-builder culture. This shift represented, and perhaps enshrined, a new principle: the way of the Hero in pursuit of glory, success, and ascent to the divine.
We cannot state with certainty which philosophical revolution distinguished this people from the proto-Indo-European predecessors, but it was with the Urnfields that we can observe the emergence of the first features of a philosophical system that would find its full expression in Platonism and Pythagoreanism.
Ancient sources tell us of the Druids, experts in mathematics and astrology, who allegedly learned of this knowledge from the Pythagoreans. However, the opposite may perhaps be true: both the Druids and the Pythagoreans may have been bearers of a common ancient tradition, that of the Urnfields.
It is precisely with the Urnfield Culture that, in Germany, we find artifacts such as the golden hats, which testify to clear astronomical knowledge that is not limited to the simple observation of an agricultural calendar, but includes an interpretive study of astrology and the fate of the world.
The myths that have come down to us are not just tales and epics, but conceal an esoteric-astronomical message. In these myths, the demigod is not simply the fruit of the union between a mortal and a deity: he is the Hero, the Vir, who, born under a star of reference, embodies an archetype. Through the Wenos, he pursues his path to victory and divine transmutation after death.
Georges Dumézil interprets and reconstructs Proto-Indo-European myths through the analysis of the heroic epic. But what if the epic itself is the Indo-European myth par excellence? A people who places the Hero Myth at the center of their existence, who treads its path according to an astrological perspective, and who do not kneel before the gods, but look upon them proudly, dealing with them as equals.
Venet, then, represents a people that arms itself, federates itself and imposes its new worldview. It is a people that, unstoppable, pursues the path of the Hero to reach the divine, seeking the Harmony that will lead them to the new Golden Age.