Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/467

 NUBAE. the Blemmyes, and reinforced by their kindred from SW., civilised also in some measure by the intro- duction of Christianity among them, these wander- ing nejjroes became an agricultural race, maintained themselves against the ruder tribes of the eastern deserts, and in the sixth century a. d. were firmly established as far S. perhaps as the Second Cataract. (Procop. Bell. Persic, i. c. 15.) In the following century the Nubae were for a time overwhelmed by the Arabs, and their growing civilisation was checked. Their employment as caravan-guides wa.s diminished by the introduction of the camel, and their numbers were thinned by the increased activity of the slave-trade ; since the Arabian invaders found these sturdy and docile negroes a marketable com- modity on the opposite shore of the Red Sea. But within a century and a half the Nubae again appear as the predominant race on the Upper Nile and its tributaries. The entire valley of the Nile, from Dongola inclusive down to the frontier of Aegypt, is in their hands, and the name Nubia appears for the first time in geography. The more ancient Nubae were settled in the hills of Kordofan, SW. of Jleroe. (Riippell, Reisen in Nubien, p. 32.) The language of tlie Nubians of the Nile at this day is radically the same with that of northern Kordofan ; and their numbers were possibly underrated by the Greeks, who were acquainted with such tribes only as wandered north- ward in quest of service with the caravans from Coptos and Philae to the harbours of the Ked Sea. The ancient geographers, indeed, mention the Nu- bae as a scattered race. Pliny, Strabo, and Ptolemy each assign to them a different position. Ptolemy (iv. 6. § 16) dissevers them from the Nile, doubtless erroneously, and places them W. of the Abyssinian mountains, near the river Gir and in close contact with the Garamantes. Strabo (.xvii. p. 819) speaks of them as a great nation of Lybia, dwelling in nu- merous independent communities between the lati- tude of Meroe and the great bends of the Nile, — i. e. in Dungola. Lastly, Pliny (vi. 30. s. 34) sets them 8 days W. of the island of the Semberritae (^Sennaar). All these accounts, however, may be reconciled by assuming Kordofan to have been the original home of the Nubae, whence they stretched themselves N. and W. accordingly as they found room for tillage, caravan routes, or weaker tribes of nomades. The Pharaohs made many settlements in Nubia, and a considerable Aegyptian population was intro- duced among the native Aethiopian tribes as far S. as the island of Gagaudes {Argo), or even Gebel- el-Birkel. (Lat. 18° 25' N.) It is not certain whether any of the present races of Nubia can be regarded as descendants of these colonists. Their presence, however, is attested by a series of monu- ments embracing nearly the whole period of Aegyptian architecture. These monuments represent three eras in architectural history. (1) The first com- prehends the temples cut in the sides of the mount- ains ; (2) the second, the temples which are de- tached from the rocks, but emulate in their massive proportions their original types; (3) the third embraces those smaller and more graceful edifices, such as are those of Gartaas and Dandour, in which the solid masses of the first style are wholly laid aside. ^ Of the.se structures, however, though seated in their land, the Nubae were not the authors ; and they must be regarded either as the works of a race cognate with the Aegyptians, who spread their civi- NUCERIA. 45] lisation northward through the Nile-valley, or of colonists from the Thebaid, who carved upon the walls of Ipsambul, Semneh, and Suleh the titles and victories of R.ameses the Great. [W. B. I).] NUCE'RIA (yiovKepla: Eth. iiovKepluos or Nou- Kp7yos : Nucerinus). 1. Surnamed Ai.fatekna {Nocera dei Pagani), a consideiable city of Campa- nia, situated 16 miles SE. from Nola, on the banks of the river Sarnus. about 9 miles from its mouth. (Strab. v. p. 247 ; Plin. iii. 5. s. 9 ; Itin. Ant. p. 109.) The origin of its distinctive appellation is unknown; the analogous cases of Teanum Sidicinum and others would lead us to suppose that the Alfaterni were a tribe or people of which Nuceria was the chief town; but no mention is found of them as such. Pliny, however, notices the Alfaterni among the " populi" of Campania, apart from Nuceria (Plin. iii. 5. s. 9); and we learn from their coins that the inhabitants themselves, who were of Oscan race, used the desig- nation of Nucerini Alfaterni ('■ Nufkiinum Alafa- ternum"), which we find applied to tliem both by Greek and Reman writers (Nou/cfpi'a t] 'A(paTfpvr) KaouiJ.'-vn, Died. xix. 65; Nuceria Alfiteina, Liv. ix. 41; Eriedliinder, Oskhche Aliinzen, ^i.'i.X). The first mention of Nuceria in history occurs in B.C. 315, during the Second Samnite War, when its citizens, who were at this time on friendly terms with the Romans, were induced to abandon their all ance, and make common cause with the Samnites (Didd. xix. 65). In B.C. 308 they were punished for their de- fection by the consul Fabius, who invaded their ter- ritory, and laid siege to their city, till he compelled them to an unqualified submission. (Liv. ix. 41.) No subsequent notice of it occurs till the Second Punic War, when, in B.C. 216, Hannibal, having been foiled in his attempt upon Nola, turned his arms against Nuceria, and with much better success; for though the citizens at first offered a vigorous resist- ance, they were soon compelled by famine to sur- render: the city was given up to plunder and totally destroyed, while the surviving inhabitants took re- fuge in the other cities of Campania. (Liv. xxiii. 15; Appian, Pun. 63.) After Hannibal had been compelled to abandon his hold on Campania, the fu- gitive Nucerians were restored (b. c. 210); but, in- stead of being again established in their native city, they were, at their own request, settled at Atella, the inhabitants of that city being transferred to Ca- latia. (Liv. xxvii. 3 ; Ajjpian. Annib. 49.) How Nuceria itself was repeopled we are not ijifonned, but it is certain that it again became a fluuiishing nmnicipal town, with a territory extending down to the sea-coast (Pol. iii. 91), and is mentioned by Cicero as in his day one of the ini'ijortant towns of Campania. (Cic. de Leg. Agr. ii. 31.) Its territory was ravaged by C.Papius in the Social War, B.C. 90 (Appian, B. C. i. 42); and if we may trust the state- ment of Florus, the city itself wa.s taken and plun- dered in the same war. (Flor. iii. 18. §11.) It again suffered a similar calamity in B.C. 73, at the hands of Spartacus (Id. iii. 20. § 5); and, according to Appian, it was one of the towns which the 'J'ri- umvirs assigned to their veterans for their occu- pation (Appian, 5. C. iv. 3): but from the Liber Coloniarum it would appear that the actual colony was not settled there until after the establishment of the Empire under Augustus. {Lib. Colon. p. 235.) It is there termed Nuceria Constantia, an epithet found also in the Itinerary. {Itin. Ant. p. 129.) Ptolemy also attests its colonial rank (Ptol. iii. 1. § 69); and we learn from Tacitua o o 2