OCRICULUM
(Otricoli) Umbria, Italy.
The
southernmost town of Umbria, on the left bank of the
Tiber just N of the point where the Via Flaminia crosses.
In 308 B.C. it had already concluded an alliance with
Rome. The original settlement, the graves of which go
back to the Early Iron Age, stood on a hill, but was
destroyed in the social war; it was probably then that
the city was moved from the hill to the river plain below,
reorganized, and inscribed in the tribus Arnensis. It would
seem to have flourished as a center of commerce and
rich villas and to have continued to be important through
the Empire. It was probably destroyed at the time of the
Lombard invasion, after which we find no mention of it,
and by the 13th c. the community had transferred itself
back to its more defensible hilltop.
Excavations were conducted here from a very early
period, especially from 1776 to 1784, when a great
quantity of material was removed. Somewhat fanciful
plans of buildings were made by G. Pannini, but a
detailed account of the work is lacking. Construction on
the site is typical of the Empire: concrete faced with
reticulate and small block, brick, or opus mixtum listatum. The forum was explored and a basilica of exceptionally interesting plan was found; unfortunately today
this is completely buried. It was rich in sculpture,
producing a fine series of portraits of the Julio-Claudian
family. A theater and an amphitheater outside the city
provided places for spectacles; the theater seems to have
had a scaena of concave front, argument for a comparatively late date. The baths, of the 2d c., with a
winter baths annex, were unusually rich in inscriptions
and mosaics. The most imposing of the ruins is a vast
substructure of at least 14 parallel vaults in two stories
destined to support a public edifice of which nothing is
visible. Walls, cisterns, and the debris of ancient construction dot the site, and along the Via Flaminia in
the vicinity are remains of several monumental tombs.
Pietrangeli was able to compile a list of 34 items
known to have come from here; the most famous pieces
are the heroic head of Jupiter and the octagonal mosaic
pavement in the Sala Rotonda of the Vatican. All but
a few pieces are in the Vatican collections. Other
antiquities, especially inscriptions, are preserved at the
site.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
T. Ashby & R.A.L. Fell,
JRS 11 (1921)
163-65; C. Pietrangeli,
Ocriculum (Otricoli), Reale Istituto di Studi Romani (1943)
MPI;
EAA 5 (1963) 805
(C. Pietrangeli).
L. RICHARDSON, JR.
