BANTIA
(Banzi) Lucania, Italy.
A native
settlement that developed in iron Age I on a spur which
commands the valley of a tributary of the Bradano river.
The most numerous traces of a settlement and of the
necropolis have been discovered in Via Dante and its
vicinity. The pottery is Daunian, strongly influenced by
Greek imports. A larger settlement, covering the entire
spur, dates to the 4th c. B.C. and there are traces of life
in the second half of the 5th c. B.C.
Contrary to what has occurred elsewhere, the settlement flourished during the 3d c. and the 2d c. B.C. it was
similar culturally to Greek coastal centers. in the first
half of the 1st c. B.C., the settlement, by this time under
Roman domination, became a municipium. its administrative systems are well known from the Tabula Bantina.
A study of the last fragment of the Tabula, discovered in
1967, makes clear that it was drawn up in Latin and
translated into Oscan at Rome by someone not completely familiar with the Oscan language.
The construction of the auguraculum must have started
when the municipium was founded, as various fragmentary inscriptions from the monument and the archaeological materials connected with it attest. in the middle
of the 1st c. B.C., the municipium received a building for
the duoviri (
CIL XI, 418). it is clear from documents
found during recent excavations that the life of the
municipium extended to the Christian era. A great part
of the Roman settlement now lies beneath the countryside. The only area uncovered is that which extends
along the S side of the spur.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
CIL IX, p. 43 n. 416; A. Lombardi,
“Topografia ed avanzi d'antiche città nella Basilicata,”
Mem. Ist. Corr. Arch. 1 (1832) 218;
Diz. Epigr., IV,
715ff; E. Vetter,
Handbuch d. Ital. Dialekte, I (1953)
14ff; M. W. Frederiksen,
JRS 55 (1965) 186ff; C. Nicolet,
L'ordre équestre à l'époque républicaine (1966) 557ff; M. Torelli,
RendLinc 8, 21 (1966) 293ff; D. Adamesteanu & M. Torelli,
ArchCl 21 (1969) 1-17.
D. ADAMESTEANU
