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Ancient Campania (often also identified as Campania Felix or ager Campanus) originally indicated the territory of the ancient city of Capua in the Roman period, and later also the plains of the various neighbouring municipalities. It was a very large territory when compared with the other Italic cities of the Roman and pre-Roman period.[ citation needed ]
According to the Roman philologist Sextus Pompeius Festus (II century BC), the pre-Roman name of Campania was Oscor, the name from which the Osci peoples who lived there (Osci enim a Regione Campaniæ, quae est Oscor, vocati sunt.). [1] The toponym Campania, dating back to the fifth century BC, is of classical origin. The most accredited hypothesis is that it derives from the name of the ancient inhabitants of Capua. [2] From Capuani, in fact, we would have Campani and, therefore, Campania; furthermore, both Livio and Polybius say of an Ager Campanus with a clear reference to Capua and the surrounding area. [2]
Campania extended from the slopes of Mount Massico (to the north) up to the Phlegraean Fields and the Vesuvian area to the south.[ citation needed ]
The main inhabited centers of this historical region were (from north to south) Capua, Atella, Liternum, Cumae, Baiae, Puteoli, Acerrae, Nola, Neapolis, Caprae, Oplontis, Pompei, Sorrentum, Stabiae, Nuceria Alfaterna and Salernum. Thanks to the fertility of the soil, also due to the presence of the Volturno river, it earned the name of Campania Felix. [3]
Ancient Campania, closed between the Apennines and the sea, had the Sele river as its boundaries to the south and the Garigliano to the north.[ citation needed ] According to Pliny the Elder, however, the city of Sinuessa was its boundary.[ citation needed ]
Necropoleis on the edges of modern Santa Maria Capua Vetere suggest the region has been continuously inhabited since the 10th century BCE. [4] Most ancient sources refer to the indigenous peoples of Campania as Ausoni. [5] Settlers from other peoples arrived in subsequent centuries, first mainly the Greeks from Pithekoūsai who founded the colony of Cumae in the mid-8th century, that would dominate the region until the 5th century BCE. [5] The evidence suggests that the city of Capua was founded in the 6th or 5th century BCE by Etruscans, though scholars have not been able to establish an exact date. [6] Several Roman and Greek authors writing centuries later have penned varying and contradictory foundation myths about Capua. [7]
Strabo's Geographica (written in the 1st century BCE or CE) asserted that Capua became the capital of a league of twelve Campanian cities, mirroring the notion that twelve cities in Etruria also formed a league, which may be indicative of such a foundation myth. [8] Ever since Theodor Mommsen (1860), [9] some 19th-century and early-20th-century historians have supposed that there may indeed have been a Campanian or Capuan league or (con)federation of cities from the mid-5th century BCE until 211 BCE, but the evidence from primary sources is poor and contradictory. [10] There is no clear evidence of the membership of this supposed league, let alone of its political institutions and thus how it might have functioned in practice, if it existed. [10] Historian Nikoletta Farkas (2006) concluded that Capua did control quite some rural territory – known as the ager Campanus – beyond its urban centre, but apart from the subordinate city of Atella (and the otherwise unattested Sabatinum), there were no other cities in Campania under its control, and the meddix tuticus appears to have been a local official of Capua, not someone presiding over a council of a (con)federation or league of cities. [10] The name Campania for a geographical region does not appear in Greek and Roman sources until the 2nd century BCE. [11]
Classical sources agree that Samnites conquered Etruscan Capua in 423 BCE, [12] and Greek Cumae in 421 or 420 BCE. [11]
It is uncertain exactly how Capua and the rest of Campania came under the dominion of the Roman Republic. At the beginning of the First Samnite War in 343 BCE, Capua either "surrendered" or "allied" itself to Rome, depending on one's interpretation of Livy's meaning of the word deditio, and how historically reliable his account is. [13] Either way, Capua soon joined other Latin cities in revolting against Rome during the subsequent Latin War (c. 340–338 BCE), but was defeated and became a socius of the Roman Republic, with both obligations and benefits. [14] The inhabitants of Capua received civitas sine suffragio – Roman citizenship without voting rights, meaning they were allowed to trade and intermarry with Romans, and maintained political and legal autonomy. [15] But Capua lost some territory, and was required to supply soldiers to Rome. [15]
During the Second Punic War (218–201 BCE), Capua sided with the Carthaginian army under Hannibal against Rome, but was defeated after a long siege by the Romans in 211 BCE, ending in its loss of autonomy. [16]
Initially Campania also included the ager Falernus, [17] then it was heavily downsized by Rome due to the alliance of the city of Capua with Hannibal.[ citation needed ] The late Roman historian Festus wrote in the 4th century CE that Campania was divided into ten praefecturae , although he does not indicate when this supposedly happened. [17] Franco Sartori (1953) argued for a 318 BCE date, but later scholars Sherwin-White (1973) and Frederiksen (1984) reasoned that the Romans did not regularly appoint praefecti in Capua until 211 BCE, and hence the division of Campania into ten praefecturae should also be dated to that year. [18]
The territory of Campania, together with Latium, became part, in the Augustan subdivision, of the Regio I: Latium et Campania.[ citation needed ]
In the Middle Ages, the toponym Terra Laboris, recorded for the first time in 1092 (although there are doubts about the originality of the document), replaced the name Campania. [19] The new toponym will officially replace the old one in the Norman territorial subdivision. In fact, from the seventh century, due to the prevalence of the Duchy of Naples, the connection between the Latin toponym Campania and what it originally indicated was lost in the language: in an emblematic way, the geographical maps, from about 1500 to 1700, show the indication Terra Laboris olim Campania felix. [20]
Campania is an administrative region of Italy; most of it is in the south-western portion of the Italian peninsula, but it also includes the small Phlegraean Islands and the island of Capri. The capital of the Campania region is Naples. As of 2018, the region had a population of around 5,820,000 people, making it Italy's third most populous region, and, with an area of 13,590 km2 (5,247 sq mi), its most densely populated region. Based on its GDP, Campania is also the most economically productive region in southern Italy and the 7th most productive in the whole country. Naples' urban area, which is in Campania, is the eighth most populous in the European Union. The region is home to 10 of the 58 UNESCO sites in Italy, including Pompeii and Herculaneum, the Royal Palace of Caserta, the Amalfi Coast, the Longobardian Church of Santa Sofia in Benevento and the Historic Centre of Naples. In addition, Campania's Mount Vesuvius is part of the UNESCO World Network of Biosphere Reserves.
The Appian Way is one of the earliest and strategically most important Roman roads of the ancient republic. It connected Rome to Brindisi, in southeast Italy. Its importance is indicated by its common name, recorded by Statius, of Appia longarum... regina viarum . The road is named after Appius Claudius Caecus, the Roman censor who, during the Samnite Wars, began and completed the first section as a military road to the south in 312 BC.
Benevento is a city and comune of Campania, Italy, capital of the province of Benevento, 50 kilometres (31 mi) northeast of Naples. It is situated on a hill 130 metres above sea level at the confluence of the Calore Irpino and the Sabato. In 2020, Benevento has 58,418 inhabitants. It is also the seat of a Catholic archbishop.
Capua is a city and comune in the province of Caserta, in the region of Campania, southern Italy, situated 25 km (16 mi) north of Naples, on the northeastern edge of the Campanian plain.
The Osci were an Italic people of Campania and Latium adiectum before and during Roman times. They spoke the Oscan language, also spoken by the Samnites of Southern Italy. Although the language of the Samnites was called Oscan, the Samnites were never referred to as Osci, nor were the Osci called Samnites.
Cumae was the first ancient Greek colony of Magna Graecia on the mainland of Italy and was founded by settlers from Euboea in the 8th century BC. It became a rich Roman city, the remains of which lie near the modern village of Cuma, a frazione of the comune Bacoli and Pozzuoli in the Metropolitan City of Naples, Campania, Italy.
The Samnites were an ancient Italic people who lived in Samnium, which is located in modern inland Abruzzo, Molise, and Campania in south-central Italy.
Atella was an ancient Oscan city of Campania, located 20km directly north of Naples.
The province of Caserta is a province in the Campania region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Caserta, situated about 36 kilometres (22 mi) by road north of Naples. The province has an area of 2,651.35 square kilometres (1,023.69 sq mi), and had a total population of 924,414 in 2016. The Palace of Caserta is located near to the city, a former royal residence which was constructed for the Bourbon kings of Naples. It was the largest palace and one of the largest buildings erected in Europe during the 18th century. In 1997, the palace was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The Battle of Mount Gaurus, 343 BC, was the first battle of the First Samnite War and also the first battle fought between the Roman Republic and the Samnites. The battle is described by the Roman historian Livy as part of Book Seven of his history of Rome, Ab Urbe Condita Libri, where he narrates how the Roman consul Marcus Valerius Corvus won a hard-fought battle against the Samnites at Mount Gaurus, near Cumae, in Campania. Modern historians however believe that most, if not all, of the detail in Livy's description has been invented by him or his sources.
Avella is a town and comune in the province of Avellino, Campania, southern Italy. It is renowned for the cultivation of hazelnuts, whose specific name (Corylus avellana) derives precisely from this territory.
The history of Naples is long and varied, dating to Greek settlements established in the Naples area in the 2nd millennium BC. During the end of the Greek Dark Ages a larger mainland colony – initially known as Parthenope – developed on the Pizzofalcone hill in the 8th century BC, and was refounded as Neapolis in the 6th century BC: it held an important role in Magna Graecia. The Greek culture of Naples was important to later Roman society. When the city became part of the Roman Republic in the central province of the Empire, it was a major cultural centre.
Giugliano in Campania, also known simply as Giugliano, is a city and comune (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Naples, Campania, Italy. A suburb of Naples, as of 2017, it had some 124,000 inhabitants, making it the most populated Italian city that is not a provincial capital.
Terra di Lavoro is the name of a historical region of Southern Italy. It corresponds roughly to the modern southern Lazio and northern Campania and upper north west and west border area of Molise regions of Italy.
Nocera Superiore is a town and comune in the province of Salerno in the Campania region of south-western Italy.
Macerata Campania is a comune (municipality) in the Province of Caserta in the Italian region Campania, located about 25 kilometres (16 mi) north of Naples and about 6 kilometres (4 mi) west of Caserta.
The Battle of Suessula was the third and last battle between the Samnites and the Roman Republic in 343 BC, the first year of the First Samnite War. According to the Augustan historian Livy, the Samnites gathered their army at Suessula, at the eastern edge of Campania. The Roman consul Marcus Valerius Corvus took his army by forced marches to Suessula. When the Samnites had to scatter their army to forage for food, Valerius seized the opportunity to capture the Samnite camp and then rout the Samnite foragers. Modern historians believe that details of the battle were entirely invented by Livy and his annalistic sources, and the battle's historicity has also been questioned.
The military campaigns of the Samnite Wars were an important stage in Roman expansion in the Italian Peninsula.
The Campanians were an ancient Italic tribe, part of the Osci nation, speaking an Oscan language.
The coinage of Capua concerns coins minted in ancient Capua, a city in ancient Campania, corresponding to present-day Santa Maria Capua Vetere. The city was located on the Appian Way and was the most important in the area, probably the largest center in the Italian peninsula after Rome.
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