𐌍𐌖𐌈𐌄 · 𐌌𐌀𐌋𐌄𐌍𐌀 · 𐌕𐌉𐌑𐌔 · 𐌕𐌀𐌓𐌑𐌌𐌉𐌍𐌀𐌔𐌔
𐌈𐌉 · 𐌈𐌉𐌍𐌀𐌈𐌉 · 𐌂𐌅𐌉𐌋𐌄𐌌

nuθe · malena · tiśσ · tarśminaσσ
θi · θinaθi · cvilem

ode lo specchio del lago trasimeno
acqua nel tinello cieco

–

malena is one image said twice, first in Etruscan and then in Italian. The Italian couplet is less a translation than an account of what is left of the Etruscan after twenty-five centuries.
malena, “mirror”, is the word engraved on Etruscan bronze mirrors themselves. It has been linked to the verb male, “sees”, so the mirror is the “seeing thing”. It is also a woman’s name.
nuθe means “hears”. It comes from the witnesses’ formula cnl nuθe malec, “hears and sees this”, on the Tabula Cortonensis. The poem keeps the hearing and drops the seeing.
tiśσ tarśminaσσ, “of Lake Trasimene”, is from the same tablet, a legal document from the lake’s own shore. The reading of tiśσ as “lake” is probable but not certain.
θi · θinaθi means “water in the vessel”. The word for water is enclosed inside the word for jar. Θina passed into Latin as tina and tinum, and into Italian as tino and its diminutive tinello, which also names a small windowless back room of a house.
cvilem means “eyeless”: cvil, read here as “eye”, plus -em, “minus”, the suffix of Etruscan subtraction numerals. The usual gloss of cvil is “gift”, so the word can also be read as “without offering”.
Scholars are tempted to connect tiś, “lake”, with θi, “water”, but the sounds don’t allow it: plain t is not aspirated θ. The poem keeps the two apart, with the lake in line 1 and the water in line 2, and lets the reader make the connection that linguistics won’t.
A lake open to the sky is a mirror. The same water shut in a vessel is a blind one. The poem begins by removing sight from the witnesses’ formula and ends by removing the eye itself.
Etruscan is in the same condition. We can read every letter and sound out every word, but much of the meaning stays closed to us. We hear the language without seeing it. The bronze mirrors that carry the word malena have mostly corroded and no longer reflect. What survives is their engraved back, and a few words carried from vessel to vessel into Italian, losing a little sight with each pouring.