San Francisco's Legion of Honor museum will present "The Etruscans: From the Heart of Ancient Italy" in May 2026, the first major U.S. exhibition on Etruscan civilization since 2009. The show features 180 antiquities from 30 international museums, many never before seen in the United States, and culminates a decade of research led by curator Reneé Dreyfus. Highlights include objects from the Regolini-Galassi tomb, a recently unearthed bronze sculpture from San Casciano dei Bagni, and the longest known Etruscan inscription making its U.S. debut.
The exhibition matters because it addresses a significant gap in American museum programming and public knowledge about the Etruscans, a civilization that profoundly influenced Roman culture but remains poorly understood. Advances in translating the Etruscan language and new archaeological discoveries, such as those at San Casciano dei Bagni, provide fresh insights that the show aims to present as a definitive resource, reshaping scholarly and public understanding of this enigmatic ancient society.