List of ancient peoples of Italy

Ethnolinguistic map of Italy in the Iron Age, before the Roman expansion and conquest of Italy

This list of ancient peoples living in Italy summarises groupings of peoples existing in Italy before and during the Roman expansion and conquest of Italy. Many of the names are either scholarly inventions or exonyms assigned by the ancient writers of works in ancient Greek and Latin.

In regard to the specific names of particular ancient Italian tribes and peoples, the time-window in which historians know the historical ascribed names of ancient Italian peoples mostly falls into the range of about 750 BC (at the legendary foundation of Rome) to about 200 BC (in the middle Roman Republic), the time range in which most of the written documentation first exists of such names and prior to the nearly complete assimilation of Italian peoples into Roman culture.

Nearly all of these peoples and tribes spoke Indo-European languages: Italics, Celts, Ancient Greeks, and tribes likely occupying various intermediate positions between these language groups. On the other hand, some Italian peoples (such as the Rhaetians, Camuni, Etruscans) likely spoke non- or pre-Indo-European languages. In addition, peoples speaking languages of the Afro-Asiatic family, specifically the largely Semitic Phoenicians and Carthaginians, settled and colonized some coastal parts of Italy (particularly in insular Italy in western and southern Sardinia and western Sicily).[1]

  1. ^ "Sicilian Peoples: The Carthaginians - Best of Sicily Magazine - Carthaginians, Phoenicians, Hanibal, Hamilcar, Punic Wars, Punic Language, Carthage, Palermo, Zis, Sis, Panormos, Solus, Motya, Motia, Mozia". www.bestofsicily.com. Retrieved 2022-02-09.