NOVIOMAGUS
NOVIOMAGUS (
Νοιόμαγος).
1.
A town in Gallia, which afterwards had the name Lexovii [
LEXOVII], which was that of a people of Celtica.
In the Greek text of Ptolemy (
2.8.2), as it is at present printed, the word Limen (
λιμήν is put after the name Noeomagus.
But this is not true, for Noviomagus is
Lisieux, which is not on the sea, though the territory of the Lexovii extended to the sea.
2.
Afterwards
NEMETES in Gallia, the capital of the Nemetae or Nemetes [
NEMETES] The name
[p. 2.450]is Noeomagus in Ptolemy (
2.9.17). In Ammianus Marcellinus (
15.11,
16.2) and the Notitia Imp. it occurs under the name of the people, Nemetes or Nemetae.
It is now
Speier, near the small stream called
Speierbach, which flows into the Rhine.
In some of the late Notitiae we read “civitas Nemetum, id est, Spira.” (D'Anville,
Notice, &c.）
3.
A town of the Batavi, is the Dutch town of
Nymegen, on the Vahalis (
Waal).
It is marked in the Table as a chief town. D'Anville observes that the station Ad Duodecimum [DUODECIMUM, AD] is placed by the Table on a Roman road, and next to Noviomagus ; and that this shows that Noviomagus had a territory, for capital places used to reckon the distances from their city to the limits of their territory.
4.
A town of the Bituriges Vivisci. (
Ptol. 2.7.8.) [
BITURIGES VIVISCI]
5.
A town of the Remi, is placed by the Table on a road which, leading from Durocortorum (
Reims) to a position named Mosa, must cross the
Maas at
Mouson [MOSOMAGUS.] Noviomagus is xii. from Durocortorum, and it is supposed by D'Anville to be
Neuville.
6.
A town of the Treviri, is placed in the Antonine Itin. xiii. from
Trier, on the
Mosel. In the Table it is viii., but as viii. is far from the truth, D'Anville supposes that the v. in the Table should be x.
The river bends a good deal below
Trier, and in one of the elbows which it forms is
Neumagen, the representative of Noviomagus.
It is mentioned in Ausonius's poem (
Mosella, 5.11):-- “
Novimagum divi castra inclita Constantini.”
It is said that many Roman remains have been found at
Neumagen.
7.
A town of the Veromandui.
In the Antonine Itin. this place is fixed at 27 M. P. from
Soissons, and 34 M. P. from
Amiens. But their distances, as D'Anville says, are not exact, for Noviodunum is
Noyon, which is further from
Amiens and nearer to
Soissons than the Itin. fixes it.
The alteration of the name Noviomagus to
Noyon is made clearer when we know that in a middle age document the name is Noviomum, from which to
Noyon the change is easy. [
G.L]
