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ROME, Jun 19, 2006 (UPI via COMTEX) -- Italian archaeologists say the oldest examples yet of Western civilization art have been discovered in an Etruscan tomb near Rome.
Scientists say the paintings were found in the tomb at the buried Etruscan city of Veio, north of Rome.
"We are at the dawn of what has been called Orientalizing civilization," Rome University Etruscanologist Giovanni Colonna told the Italian news agency ANSA.
Colonna said the tomb, probably the last resting place of a prince, predated the previously oldest tomb at Veio -- known as the Tomb of the Ducks -- by approximately 10 years, meaning it was built in about 690 B.C. when the pre-Roman Etruscan civilization was at its prime.
The tomb was found after police officials interrogated an 82-year-old Austrian tour guide arrested during an investigation into the trafficking in looted artifacts between Italy and Austria, ANSA said.
Italian Minister of Culture Francesco Rutelli said the government would turn the area "into a huge dig site" to look for other tombs in what was, until recently, a field of barley.
URL: www.upi.com Copyright 2006 by United Press International
