CLUVIAE
Abruzzi, Italy.
A city of the Carricini Samnites, now identified with a locality called Piano
Laroma near Cásoli in the province of Chieti. The site
has previously been noted erroneously under the name
of Pagus Urbanus (
CIL IX p. 277). That the city was
founded by the Carricini is attested by Tacitus (
Hist.
4.5, the Italian region Carecina and the municipality
of Cluviae), and by two inscriptions. One is from the
2d c. A.D. at Isernia, and the other is a tabula patronatus
from A.D. 384 at S. Salvo. The Cluvienses Carricini figure
in both. We know that the place was fortified in the 4th
c. B.C. (
Livy 9.31.2-3). It was a municipium assigned to
the tribus Arnensis after the social war (
CIL IX, 2999=
ILS 6526) as noted by the
Liber Coloniarum (260 L s.v.
Clibes). It must, in fact, be identified with the first of
the two municipalities that in Pliny's list (
HN 3.106)
appear as Caretini Supernates et Infernates. The city
was on an upland surrounded on three sides by the Aventino and its tributaries the Laio and the Avello. The
perimeter of the walls that enclosed a very limited area
(ca. 42,000 sq m) remains almost completely recognizable. There are also conspicuous remains of a theater
and of other buildings.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
A. La Regina in
RendLinc 22 (1967)
87-99; id.,
EAA Suppl. (1970) 238-39.
A. LA REGINA
