ALFARO
(“Gracchurris”) Logroño, Spain.
Town in the upper Ebro valley 22 km SE of Calahorra,
founded in 179 or 178 B.C. by Tiberius Sempronius
Gracchus on the site of the Iberian Illurci (Livy,
Per. 41;
Pomp.
Festo 86.4). Its name is frequently mentioned in
the war against Sertorius in 76 B.C. (Livy) and Pliny
(
3.24) describes it as oppidum Latii veteres within the
Conventus juridicus Caesaraugustanus. During the agrarian reform of 133 B.C. an agricultural colony is also
thought to have been established there. No inscriptions
or remains have been found.
Coins were minted here, although they do not appear
until the time of Tiberius, denoting that the town was a
Latin municipium. The asses bear the bull and the semisses a bull's head with the laurel-crowned head of the
emperor and the name Gracchurris.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Fontes Hispaniae Antiquae III, 223ff;
iv, 189; VIII, 134;
RE VII, 1687; A. García y Bellido, “Las
colonias romanas de Hispania,”
Anuario de Historia del
Derecho Español 29 (1959) 448ff.
A. BELTRAN
