Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/1277

 VADAVERO. town with a small but secure port about 4 miles N. of Vado. Livy inJeed mentions Savo (undoubtedly the same with Sarona) as a sea-port town of the Ligurians, where JIaso established himself during the Second Punic War (Liv. sxviii. 46) ; but the name does not occur again in any writer, and hence Cluverius supposed that this was the place afterwards called Sabbata. There seems, however, no doubt that Sabbata or Sabatia, Vada Sabbata, or Vada Sabatia, and Vada simply (as the name is written by Cicero), are all only different forms of the same name, and that the Roman town of Vada was situated on, or very near, the same site as the pre- sent Vado, a long straggling fishing village, the bay of which still affords an excellent roadstead. The distinctive epithet of Sabbata or Sabatia was evi- dently derived from its proximity to the original Ligurian town of Savo. [E. H. B.] VADA'VERO, a mountain near Bilbilis in the territory of the Celtiberi, in Hispania Tarraconensis. It appears to be mentioned only by Martial (i. 50. 6), who characterises it by the epithet of " sacred," and adverts to its rutrged character. [T. H. D.] VADA VOLATERRANA. [Volatereae]. VADICASSII (OuaSi/caffCioi), a people of Gallia Lugdunensis, whom Ptolemy (ii. 8. § 16) places on the borders of Belgica, and nest to the Meldae. He assigns to the Vadicassii a city Xoeomagus. D'An- ville concludes that following Ptolemy's data we may place his Vadicassii in Valois, which is between Meaux and Soissons. He remarks that Valois is Vadisus in the c^tpitularies of Charles the Bald, and Vadensis in the later acts. Other geographers have different opinions. In many of the editions of Pliny (iv. 18) wo find enumerated " Andegavi, Viducasses, Vadiocasses, Unelli;" but only one MS. has " Vadio- casses," and the rest have Bodiocasses or Bodicasses, which we must take to be the true reading, and they seem to be the same as the Baiocasses. (D'An- ville. Xotice, tfc; Ukert, C allien.) [G. L.] VADIJIO'NIS LACUS (rj OvdSucov Kifivn, Po- lyb. : Laghetto di Bassano), a small lake of Etruria, between the Ciminian hills and the Tiber, celebrated in histoiy as the scene of two successive defeats of the combined Etruscan forces by the Romans. In the first of these battles, which was fought in b. c. 309, the Etruscans had raised a chosen army, enrolled with peculiar solemnity (lege sacrata) ; but though they fought with the utmost valour and obstinacy, they sustained so severe a defeat at the hands of the Roman Consul Q. Fabius Maximus, that, as Livy remarks, this disastrous day first broke the power of Etruria (Liv. ix. 39). The second battle was fought near 30 years later (b. c. 283), in which the allied forces of the Etruscans and Gauls were totally defeated by the consul P. Cornelius Dolabella. (Polyb. ii. 20 ; Eutrop. ii. 10 ; Flor. i. 13.) But though thus celebrated in history, the Vadimonian lake is a very trifling sheet of water, in fact, a mere pool or stagnant pond, now almost overgrown with reeds and bulrushes. It was doubtless more extensive in ancient times, though it could never have been of any importance, and scarcely deserves the name of a lake. But it is remarkable that the younger Pliny in one of his epistles describes it as a circular basin abounding in floating islands, which have now all disappeared, and probably have contributed to hll up the ancient basin. Its waters are whitish and highly sulphureous, resembling, in this respect, the Aquae Albulae near Tibur, where the phenomenon of float- ing islands still occasionally occurs. (Plin. Ep. viii. VALDASUS. 1253 20.) It enjoyed the reputation, probably on account of this peculiar character, of being a sacred lake. But the apparent singularity of its having been twice the scene of decisive conflicts is sufficiently explained by its situation just in a natural pass between the Tiber and the wooded heights of the Ciminian forest, which (as observed by Jlr. Dennis) must always have constituted a natural pass into the plains of Central Etruria. The lake itself, which is now called the Laghetto di Bassano from a neighbouring village of that name, is only a very short distance fiom the Tiber, and about 4 miles above Orte. the ancient Horta. (Dennis's Etruria, vol. i. pp. ] 67 — 170.) [E. H. B.] VAGA, a town of the Cantii in Britannia Ro- mana (.Xot. Imp.) [T. H. D.] VAGA. [^'ACCA.] VAGEDRUSA, the name of a river in Sicily, men- tioned by Silius Italicus (xiv. 229), according to the old editions of that author; but there can be no doubt that the true reading is that restored by Ru- pert!, " vage Chrysa," and that the river Chry.-as is the one meant. (Ruperti, ad I. c.) [E. H. B.] VAGIEXNI (Bayiivvoi), a Ligurian tribe, who inhabited the region N. of the JIaritime Alps, and S. of the territory of the Taurini. According to Pliny they extended as far to the W. as the Mons Vesulus or Monte Viso, in the main chain of the Alps (Plin. iii. 16. s. 20), while their chief town or capital under the Roman rule, called Augusta Vagiennorum, was situated at Bene, between the rivers Stta-a and Tanaro, so that they must have occupied an extensive territory. But it seems im- possible to receive as correct the statement of Vel- leius (i. 15) that the Roman colony of Eporedia (Ivrea) was included within their limits. [Epo- redia.] It is singular that Pliny more than once speaks of them as being descended from the Gaturiges, while at the same time he distinctly calls them a Ligurian tribe, and the Caturiges are commonly reckoned a Gaulish one. It seems pro- bable, however, that many of the races which in- habited the mountain valleys of the Alps were of Ligurian origin ; and thus the Caturiges and Segusiaui may very possibly have been of a Li- gurian stock like their neighbours the Taurini, ■though subsequently confounded with the Gauls. We have no account of the period at which the Vagienni were reduced under the Roman yoke, and their name is not found in history as an inde- pendent tribe. But Pliny notices them as one of the Ligurian tribes still existing in his time, and their chief town, Augusta, seems to have been a flourishing place under the Roman Empire. Thfir name is sometimes written Bagienni (Orel!. Jnscr. 76), and is found in the Tabula under the corrupt form Bagitenni. (Tab. Pent.) [E. H. B.j VAGNIACAE, a town of the Cantii in Britan- nia Romana, between Noviomagus and Durobrivae. Camden (p. 226) identifies it with Maidstone, Horsley (p. 424), with more probability, with North- fleet. Others have sought it near Loittjflcld, and at Wrotham. [T. II. D.J VAGORITUM {Ova-y6pnov). [Akvii.] VAHALIS. [Batavi; Riiknus.] VALGUM, a jilace near the confines of Up- per and Lower Paiinonia, not far from Lake Peiso (Itin. Ant. p. 233), but its exact site is uncer- tain. [L.S.] VALDASUS, a southern tributaiy of the Savus, flowing from the mountains of lllyricum, and joiu- 4l 3