LUKERIA
(Lucera) Apulia, Italy.
A city of
the Daunii ca. 19 km N-NW of Foggia. According to
legend, like Arpi and Canosa, it dates to Diomedes,
who carried the Palladion to the site (
Strab. 6.264;
Plin. 3.102). There is no historical mention of the city
prior to 326 B.C. when during the second Samnite war
it appears as an ally of the Romans, to whom the city
gave aid following the disaster of the Caudine Forks
(
Livy 9.2). After falling twice into the hands of the
Samnites, the city was retaken by the Romans in 314
B.C. (
Livy 9.26;
Diod. 19.72). The earliest coinage of
the city goes back to this date. During the second Punic
war the Romans established winter quarters here (
Livy
22.9). In the last years of the Republic it was considered one of the most important cities of Apulia (Cic.
Clu. 69) and played a role in the civil war between Caesar and Pompey (Caes.
BCiv. 1.24). Lukeria was ascribed
to the tribus Claudia (
CIL, p. 74). The rather uncertain
notice of the sources (
Plin. 3.104), according to which
Augustus established a colony there, appears definitely
to be confirmed by the discovery of an inscription in
the amphitheater of Lukeria, dedicated to the living Emperor by M. Vecilius Campus.
The recently restored amphitheater (131.4 x 99.2 m)
is the best-preserved monument in the city. Some ruins
of the ancient city wall remain near the Swabo-Angevin
fort, but the remains of a circus and of the theater have
been lost. An inscription documents a Temple of Apollo
(
CIL IX, 823). In the Museo Civico are preserved fragments of inscriptions and of statues from the Hellenistic-Roman period, mosaics from a bath building, and from
San Salvatore a rich votive deposit which indicates the
probable existence of a sanctuary to the chthonian deities.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
W. Smith,
Dictionary of Greek and
Roman Geography, II (1857) 210 (E. H. Bunbury);
RE
XIII.1 (1927) 156Sf (Philipp);
EAA 4 (1961) 706-7
(G. Cressedi).
F. G. LO PORTO
