TEA´NUM
TEA´NUM (
Τέανον: Eth.
Teanensis:
Civitate), sometimes also called TEANUM APULUM (
Cic. Clu. 9;
Τέανον Ἄπουλον, Strab.: Eth.
Teanenses' Apuli), to distinguish it from the Campanian city of the
[p. 2.1116]same name, was a city of Apulia, situated on the right bank of the river Frento (
Fortore), about 12 miles from its mouth.
It appears to have been one of the most considerable cities of Apulia before its conquest by the Romans; but its name is first mentioned in B.C. 318, when, in conjunction with Canusium, it submitted to the Roman consuls M. Foslius Flaccinator and L. Plautius Venno. (
Liv. 9.20.)
It is again noticed during the Second Punic War, when it was selected by the dictator M. Junius Pera as the place of his winter-quarters in Apulia. (Id. 23.24.) Cicero incidentally notices it as a municipal town, at the distance of 18 miles from Larinum (
Cic. Clu. 9), and its name is found in all the geographers among the municipal towns of Apulia. (
Strab. vi. p.285; Mel. 2.4.6;
Plin. Nat. 3.11. s. 16;
Ptol. 3.1.72.) Its municipal rank is confirmed also by an inscription, as well as by the Liber Coloniarum, and it is clear that it never at. tained the rank of a colony. (Orell.
Inscr. 140;
Lib. Col. p. 210.) Its ruins still exist at a place called
Civitate, near the remains of a Roman bridge (now called the
Ponte di Civitate), over the
Fortore, by which the ancient road from Larinum to Luceria crossed that river.
The distance from the site of Larinum agrees with that stated by Cicero of 18 miles (the Tabula erroneously gives only 12), and the discovery of inscriptions on the spit leaves no doubt of the identification. Considerable remains of the walls are still extant, as well as fragments of other buildings. From these, as well as from an inscription in which we find mention of the “Ordo splendidissimus Civitatis Theanensium,” it seems probable that it continued to be a flourishing town under the Roman Empire.
The period of its final decay is uncertain, but it retained its episcopal see down to modern times. (Holsten.
Not. ad Cluver. p. 279; Romanelli, vol. ii. p. 291; Mommsen,
Inscr. R. N. p. 271.)
Strabo speaks of Teanum as situated at some distance inland from a lake, the name of which he does not mention, but which is clearly the Lacus Pantanus of Pliny, now called the
Lago di Lesina. From an inscription found on its banks it appears that this was comprised within the territory of Teanum, which thus extended down to the sea (Romanelli,
l.c.), though about 12 miles distant from the coast.
Several Italian topographers have assumed the existence of a city in Apulia of the name of Teate, distinct from Teanum (Giovenazzi,
Sito di Aveja, p. 13; Romanelli, vol. ii. p. 286); but there seems no doubt that the two names are only different forms of the same, and that the Teates Apuli of Livy (
9.20) are in reality the people of Teanum.
It is true that that writer mentions them as if they were distinct from the Teanenses whom he had mentioned just before; but it is probable that this arises merely from his having followed different annalists, and that both statements refer in fact to the same people, and are a repetition of the same occurrence. (Mommsen,
Unter--Ital. Dialekt. p. 301.)
In like manner the Teate mentioned in the Liber Coloniarum (p. 261) is evidently the same place called in an earlier part of the same document (p. 210) Teanum.
[
E.H.B]
