HERDONIA
(Ordona) Italy.
Some 25 km S
of Foggia above the Apulian plain on the S bank of the
river Carappelle. The Roman city has the form of an
elongated lozenge (730 x 300 m). It stood on the site of
a much larger native settlement which included necropoleis and dwellings.
Although the name of the town is perhaps to be found
on 5th and 4th c. coins, it appears in literary sources only
in the 3d c. in the accounts given by ancient authors of
the events of the Punic wars in S Italy. In 214 and 212
the Roman army was beaten there by Hannibal, who
burned the city and deported the population in 210. Herdonia appears to have received the title of municipium
under the Republic. Strabo describes it as a way station
on the road from Brindisi to Benevento (
Geog. 6.3.7).
Pliny mentions it, but for Silius Italicus it is only a poor,
abandoned spot (8.567). Included in the II Augustan
region, the city underwent a remarkable renaissance in
the 1st c. A.D. when it became an important crossroads
on the Via Traiana. In this capacity it is mentioned in
the majority of the itineraries. In the 5th c., it appears
to have been an episcopal see. The mediaeval town, a
pale reflection of the ancient one, lived meagerly on one
of the hills of its predecessor. The townspeople buried
their dead in a series of chapels set up in the ancient
buildings. On the acropolis was erected a fine early
church, which was soon transformed into a fortress.
Coins and ceramics show that the site was occupied until
the 17th c.
Among archaeologists, Ordona is known principally
for its rich necropoleis, which have furnished artifacts
illustrating the native civilizations of Apulia, particularly
that of Daunia. The first official explorations were made
there in 1872, followed by others in 1902. The Roman
city was touched for the first time in 1954-1955, and in
1962 systematic study of the site was undertaken. This
recent work has led to the complete excavation of the
public buildings of the city center, as well as a detailed
study of the city wall and the examination of a part of
the necropolis.
It is now clear that towards the beginning of the 3d c.
B.C. a sector of the native settlement was surrounded by
a wall composed of an earthen rampart almost 13 m
thick reinforced by a wall of sun-dried bricks. This rampart was restored on many occasions with the addition
of towers and bastions. At the beginning of the 1st c.
B.C., under the threat of the civil wars, Herdonia was
surrounded by a new wall of more solid construction.
The old wall of sun-dried bricks was enclosed in fine
facings of opus incertum masonry. At the beginning of
our era, the rampart was dismantled, and an amphitheater erected in the moat. Inside the city, the first attempts at city planning took place from the end of the
2d c. B.C. A temple of Italic tradition was built in the
artisan sector, which was destined to become the monumental center of the city. During the reign of Augustus
a magnificent basilica (41 x 27 m) was erected. The
laying out of the forum (59 x 35 m) necessitated considerable terracing. Along a vast esplanade stood shops,
a cryptoporticus, and a market. During the 1st c. A.D.,
the aediles of Herdonia were extremely active: the original shops were replaced, a second temple built across
from the basilica. The Via Traiana was flagged for the
whole of its length within the city. This flowering was
short-lived. From the 3d c. on, many of the public buildings were abandoned or transformed. Small Christian
chapels appeared in the ancient edifices; the population
concentrated increasingly in the N sector of the town, at
the farthest extremity of which a great Christian
basilica with three naves was soon to be built. Two noteworthy coin hoards have been found: the first, dating
from the 5th c., shows that the center of the town continued to be occupied under the Late Empire. The second, from the end of the 10th c., is composed of gold
coins struck in imitation of Arab money, and is a valuable contribution to knowledge of numismatics of early
mediaeval Italy.
Although the most recent excavations have centered in
the Roman city, they have furnished important information on the native pre-Roman settlement, such as the
fact that the tombs and the dwellings were mingled together indiscriminately with no separation of city of the
dead from that of the living. In the tombs, the deceased
was placed in a squatting position, surrounded by rich
grave goods.
The excavations have furnished a particularly rich and
varied quantity of artifacts: coins, lamps, sculptures, inscriptions, ceramics. Among the latter should be noted
the local pottery, with its polychrome geometric decoration. It is an important contribution to our knowledge of
the native Italic civilizations of S Italy.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
A. Chieffo,
Herdoniae (1948);
EAA S
(1963) 725-26 (N. Degrassi); J. Mertens,
Ordona I.
Rapport provisoire sur les travaux de la mission belge en
1962-64 (Etudes de philologie, d'archéologie et d'histoire anciennes publiées par l'Institut historique belge de
Rome VIII, 1965); id.,
Ordona II (Etudes IX, 1967); id.,
Ordona III (Etudes XIV, 1971);
Herdonia. Chantier archeologique belge en Italie (1969); G. Alvisi,
La viabilità
romana della Daunia (Società patria per la Puglia. Doc.
et Monografie XXXVI, 1970); M. D. Mann,
Topografia
storica della Daunia antica (Civiltà della Daunia I, 1970)
31-137. For a study of the lamps and coins, see
Ordona
IV (1973).
J. MERTENS
