Page:Collier's New Encyclopedia v. 02.djvu/351

LEFT CAMPAGNA DI ROMA 307 CAMPANIA in the lower parts, though its cultivation is much neglected, owing to the malaria which makes residence there during mid- summer very dangerous; and during the CAMPANIA, anciently a province on the W. coast of Italy, having Capua as its capital (now subdivided into the prov- inces of Benevento, Naples, Salerno, Avellino, and Caserta), lying between Latium, Samnium, and Lucania. Area, 6,277 square miles; pop. about 3,500,000. It was one of the most productive plains in the world, yielding in extraordinary abundance corn, wine, and oil; and by THE "MAURETANIA," CAMOUFLAGED IN THE WORLD WAR months of July, August, and September its inhabitants, chiefly herdsmen and peasants, seek refuge in Rome or the neighboring towns. In ancient times the Campagna, though never a salubrious district, was well cultivated and popu- lated, the villas of the Roman aristocracy being numerous here. But inundations from the Tiber, and the discouragement of agricultural industry in the midst of CAMOUFLAGE ON U. S. DESTROYER both Greek and Roman writers is cele- brated for its soft and genial climate, its landscapes, and its harbors. It was the regio felix of the Romans, who built here many of their most splendid villas, and made Baiae, with its hot springs, the cen- U. S. CRUISER CAMOUFLAGED wars and devastations, left the stagnant waters to become a source of pestilence, and the district became little better than a desert, nothing of its former prosperity being visible but the ruins of great tem- ples, circuses, and monuments, and long rows of crumbling aqueducts overgrown with ivy and other creeping plants. In recent years the government has done much to make it more healthful by im- proved drainage. ter of their fashionable world. The prom- ontory Misenum, Mount Vesuvius, the river Volturnus, the towns Baiae, Cumae, Liternum, Puteoli, Naples, Herculaneum, Pompeii, Nola, Salernum, Capua, etc., belonged to Campania. In very early times the Greeks founded Cumae, from which Puteoli, Naples, and other places were colonized. The district was next conquered by the Etruscans, by whom Capua, Nola, and other towns were