FORULI
Eth.
FORULI (
Φόρουλοι), a town of the Sabines, situated, as we learn from Livy (
26.11), on the road from Amiternum to Interocrea.
It is mentioned by Virgil among the ancient cities of the Sabines (
Aen. 7.714), as well as by his imitator Silius Italicus (
8.417); but in later times it appears to have been a mere village or vicus dependent upon Amiternum. (Liv.
l.c.; Vicani Forulani, Inscr. ap. Romanelli, vol. iii. p. 333; Orell.
Inscr. 3794.) Strabo describes it (v. p. 228) as built on a rock, in a position better suited for a band of outlaws than for peaceable inhabitants. Its site may be fixed with certainty at
Cività Tommasa, about 5 miles from Amiternum, where there are numerous ancient remains, and the inscriptions above cited were discovered.
The distance from
Antrodoco also agrees with that of 13 M. P. assigned by the Tab. Peut. from Interocrea to “Eruli,” which name is evidently a corruption of Foruli.
The precise situation of
Cività, Tommasa scarcely corresponds with the expressions of Strabo, but the general wild character of the neighbourhood is sufficient to justify them. (Romanelli,
l.c.; Bunsen, in
Ann. dell' Inst. vol. vi. p. 109; Chaupy,
Maison d'Horace, vol. iii. pp. 124--126.)
[
E.H.B]
