Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/103

 ALBA. crileootflfitsints. (SiL ltd. tuL 506 ; PUn. IT. ^. IT. 24.) Dariiig Uw later ages of the Roman empire AJha teems to have decUned and sank into infl^mfiaiice, as it did not become the see of a haOipi DOT is its name mentioned >j Paulas Diaco- BM sBio^g tbe dties of the province of Valeria. At the pnMDt daj the name of A&a is still RUmed bf a poor riOjige of about 150 inhabitants, vUeh oocopes the northern and most elevated snannt of the hill eo whidi stood the ancient city. The icBoains of the latter are extensive and inter- vtJBt:, cspedaDj those of the walls, which present cae oif the most perfiect apedmens of ancient fortifi- csoan to be focmd in It«] j. Their circuit is aboat three nuks, and they endoee three separate heights «r soBUQiU of the hill, each of which appears to htve had its particular defeoces as an arx or citadel, besadei the external waUs which surrounded the vhok They are of diflferent construction, and froUblf belong to difierent periods: the greater fttt flf them being composed of massive, but ir- Rgnlar, polygonal blocks, in the same manner as is fiaadinsomanyotherdtaes of Central Italy: while tfiicr portJoDB, especially a kind of advanced out- vwkfpfeMOt mudi more r^ular polygonal masonry, bot Krrii^ only as st &cing to the wall or rampart, tk fn'MtanfT of which is composed of rubble-work. The fanner class of oonstructioa is generally referred to the anoent or Aequian city: the Utter to the Booao oolooy. (See however on this subject a piper in the Chssical Museum, vol. ii. p. 172.) Ihada these remains there exist also the traces criT SB sDphitheatre, a tlKatre, basilica, and other public hnldi^s, and several temples, one of which has been eoDToted into a church, and preserves its ancient fimat^f^Y^tf^ plui, and odumns. It stands on a hill BBvesUed after it the Cotte cU S. Pietro, which forms «K «f the smnmita already described; the two others «R oovealled the CoOe diPeUorino and CoUe cUAlbe, the latter being the kite of the modem village. (See the annexed plan). Numerous Inscriptions belonging t« ARia have been transported to the neighbounng ALBA. 87 PUUI or ALBA FUCKKSIS. A. CoOe di Albe (site of the modem village). B. CoOe di S. Pietro. C. CoOe di Pettorina ea. Ancient Gates. k Theatre. c Amphitheatre. town of Avezaxtno^ on the banks of the lake Fndnns : while many marbles and other architectural orna- ments were carried off by Charles of Anjon to adorn the convent and church founded by him in com- memoration of his victory at Tagliacozzo^ A. d. 1268. (Promis, ArUichita di Alba Fucmse, 8vo. Roma, 1836; Kramer, Der Fttciner See. p. 55—57; Hoare's Clastkal Tow, vol. i. p. 371). [E. H. B.] ALBA HELVORUM orHELVIORUM(Plin.m. 4. s. 5. xiv. 3. 6. 4.), a dty of the Helvy. a tribe men- tioned by Caesar (A (?. vii. 7, 8) as separated from the Arvemi by the Mons Cevenna. The modem Alpear ApSy which is probably on the site of this Alba, contains Roman remains. An Alba Augusta, mentioned by Ptolemy, is supposed by D'Anville {NoHoe de la GauU Ancienne) and others to be the same as Alba Helviorum ; but some suppose Alba Augusta to be represented by Aup$, [G. L.] ALBA JULIA. [Apulum.] ALBA LONGA ('AA^a: Albani), a very an- cient dty of Latium, situated (m the eastern side of the lake, to which it gave the name of Lacus Al- banus, and on the northern declivity of the mountain, also Imown as Mons Albanus. All ancient writers agree in representing it as at one time the most powerful city in Latium, and the head of a league or confederacy of the Latin dties, over which it exer- cised a kind of supremacy or H^emony ; of many of these it was itself the parent, among others of Rome itself. But it was destroyed at such an early period, and its history is mixed up with so much that is fabulous and poetical, that it is almost impossible to separate from thenee the really historical elements. According to the l^ndaiy history universally adopted by Greek and Roman writers, Alba was founded by Ascanius, the son of Aeneas, who re- moved thither the seat of government from Lavi- nium thirty years after the building of the latter city (Liv. i. 3; Dion. Hal. i. 66; Strab. p. 229) ; and the earliest form of the same tradition appears to have assigned a period of 300 years from its foundation to that of Rome, or 400 years for its total duration till its destraction by Tullus Hostilius. (Liv. i. 29; Justin, xliii. 1 ; Vii^. Aen, i. 272 ; Niebuhr, vol. i. p. 205.) The fonner interval was afterwards ex- tended to 360 yean in order to square with the date assigned by Greek chronologers to the Trojan war, and the space of time thus assumed was portioned out among the pretended kings of Alba. There can be no doubt that the series of these kings is a clumsy fbi^ery of a late period; but it may probably be ad- mitted as historical that a Silyion house or gens was the reigning family at Alba. (Niebuhr, /. c.) From this house the R(Hnans derived the origin of theii- own founder Romulus; but R(Hne itself was not a colony of Alba in the strict sense of the term ; nor do we find any evidence of those mutual relations Which might be expected to subsist between a metro- polis or parent city and its ofispring. In fact, no mention of Alba occurs in Roman history from the foundation of Rome till the reign of Tullus Hostilius, when the war broke out whi(£ terminated in the de • feat and submission of Alba, and its total destraction a few years afterwards as a punishment for the treachery of its general Metins Fufetius. The details of this war are obviously poetical, but the destraction of Alba may probably be received as on historical event, though there is much reason to suppose that it was the work of the combined forces of the Latinj^ and that Rome had comparatively little share in its I acomplbhment. (Liv. i. 29; Dion. Hal. iii. 31; <i 4