SENA GALLICA
or Senagallia (Senigallia) Ancona,
Marche, Italy.
A settlement of the Galli Senoni
in the 4th c. at the mouth of the Misa river above an
alluvial plain at the center of a coastal lagoon depression. After the battle of Sentino (295 B.C.), the Romans
made it a jurisdictional colony (Polyb. 2.19.12; Livy
Per. 11, 27.38.4), which the sources mention particularly
in connection with the battle of Metaurus in 207 B.C.
(Cic.
Brut. 18.73;
Liv. 27.46.4; Sil. 15.552; App.
Hann.
52; Eutr. 3.18.2; Oros. 4.18.3; Zonar. 9.9). In 82 B.C.,
the city was sacked by Pompey in his struggle with the
followers of Marius (App.
BCiv. 1.87-88). It was an
Early Christian diocesan seat. In A.D. 551, it was a Byzantine naval base during the Gothic war (Procop.
Goth. 6.23) and subsequently became part of the Pentapolis. Two roads ended here: the Adriatic coastal road (
It. Ant.
100, 316;
Tab. Peut.;
Rav. Cosm. 4.31; 5.1) and a branch
of the Via Flaminia coming from Cagli (
It. Ant. 315-16;
CIL XI, 2, p. 997).
The remaining Roman works are limited to the ruins
of a tower and of a stretch of the circuit walls toward
the sea, today contained in the Renaissance la Rocca. The
ancient urban plan was square with its N angle blunted
(to adapt to the area of the alluvial plain) and oriented
according to the coastline. In the modern Via Arsilli the
cardo maximus may be recognized and the decumanus
maximus in the Renaissance Strada Grande (today a
part of Via 2 Giugno). The forum is in the Piazza Roma.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
CIL XI, p. 922; Nissen,
Italische Landeskunde, II, 385; F. Lanzoni,
Le diocesi d'ltalia (1927)
492-93; N. Alfieri, “Topografia della battaglia del Metauro,”
Rend. Ist. Marchigiano di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti
15-16 (1939-40) 93; id., “I fiumi adriatici delle regioni
augustee V e VI,”
Athenaeum 27 (1949) 128; A. Baviera,
“Alcune memorie dell'epoca romana a Senigallia,”
Nel
bimillenario della nascita d'Augusto (1948) 42-52; M.
Ortolani & N. Alfieri, “Sena Gallica,”
RendLinc 8, 8
(1953) 152-80.
N. ALFIERI
