Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/365

 AUXACII. tmd W. of its mouth was the town of Flaviobriga, which Ptolemy assigns to them, but Pliny to tlie Vsrdoli. [FiJi>ioBRioA.] Pliny states that among their ten cities none were of any cmuteqnenoe, except TunuM and Vibovbsoa. Ptolemy assigns to them the towns of Uxama Barca (Otf(ofux Bapxa, prob. Otma: oomp. Mnratori, p. 1095. 8), Segisa- muncnlnm (ScytO'c^i^KovXoy, prob. S, Maria de Ribartdondd)y Yiroyesga (Ofrxpoo^co-Ka), Ante- qnia (AxrcicovSiB). Deobriga {/M^piyo. : Brmnot or Miranda de Ebro)y Vendeleia (phtv^ia)j and Salinnca (XaktSyKo), The gfeat road finom Astu- rica to Caesaraogosta and the Pyrenees entered the land of the Antrigones, near ViroTesca, and from this {dace it branched ont into three. The N. branch led to the W. pass of the Pyrenees, and on it the towns and distances were: Virovesca, Yindeleia, 11 M.P., Deobriga, 14 M.P. (/& Ant p. 455.) The second road led to Caesaraugnsta, and on it were : Verovesca (sic in /t.), Segasamnndnm (sic in /f.), 1 1 M. P., Libia, 7 M. P. (prob. I^eyva), Tritium, 18 M. P. (/t Ant. p. 394.) The third, farther S., also led to Caesaraugnsta, and on it were : ViroTesca, Atiliana, 30 M. P., Barbariana iAraviana)j 32 M. P. (fL Ant p. 450.) Whether the Borsaones of Livy (Fr. xci.), the Bursaonenses of Pliny, the Bursavolenaes of Hirtius (B.H, 22) belong to the Antrigones or the Berones is vncertain. (Ukert, voL ii. pt 1, pp. 445, 446.) [P. S.] AUXACII, or AUZACII MONTES (tA Ae«{<{- KULj or Aif(dKta 6p7i)y a part of the Altai range, SW. of the ArniSd M, and NW. of the Atmxnui if., having its W. part in Scythia extra Imaum, and its £. ]»rt in Series. Ptolemy places the W. division between 149^ long, and 49^ lat and 165° long. and 55° lat. These mountains contained the sources of the river Oechardes (prob. Sd&ngck). The district K. of them was called Auxacitis (or Auzacitis), with a city Auxacia (or Auzada), whioh was one of Ptolemy's positions of astronomical observatiiHi, having its longest day about 16^ hours, and being distant from Alexandreia 5 hours 36 min. to the east (Ptol vi 15. §§ 2, 3, 4; 16. §§ 2, 3, 4; viii. 24. § 4 : comp. Oxii M.) [P. S.] AU'XIMUM (Ae((ov^v, Strab. Ai^^i/uov, Procop.; Eik, Auximas, -fttis; Onmo), a dty of I4cenum, sitnatod on a lofty hill about 12 miles SW. of Anoooa. It is first mentioned in b.g. 174, when the Koman censorB caused walls to be erected around it, and its fomm to be surrounded with a range of shops. (Liv. xIL 27.) From hence it would appear that it hod then already received the Roman fran- chise; but it did not become a Roman colony till B.C. 157. (Veil. Pat i. 15.) The great strength of its position seems to have soon rendered it a place of importance. During the wars between Sulla and Cari>o, it was here that Pompey first made head against the officers of the latter (Pint Pomp. 6); and on the outbreak of the Civil War in B. c. 49, it was occupied by the partisans of Pompey as one of the chief strongholds of Picenum, but the inha- bitants declared in favour of Caesar, and opened the gates to him. (Caes. B. C L 12 ; Lucan. ii. 466.) Under the Roman Empire it continued to be a dty of importance, and retained its colonial rank, as we learn from numerous inscriptions, though Pliny does not DOtioe it as a colony. (Gruter, Inscr, p. 372. 4, 445. 9, 446. 1, 465. 4, &c.; Orell. Inscr. 3168,3899 ; Plin. iii. 13. s. 18; Strab. v. p. 241 ; Itin. Ant p. 312.) At a later period it rose to a still raoro distingoished position, and is distinctly called by AUXUME. 347 Prooopins the chief city of Pioennm, and the capital of the pro^^oe. Hence it played an Important part in the wars of Belisarius against the Goths, and was not reduced by him till after a long siege, in which he himself very nearly lost his life. (Procop. B. G. iu 10, 1 1, 16, 23—27, iii. 11, &c.) It re- mained afterwards for a long period subject to the Byzantine Empire, and was one of the five cities which constituted what was termed the Pentapolis under the Exarchate of Ravenna. The modem city of Otimo retains the same elevated site as the ancient one; it continued to be a consider^le place through- out the middle ages, and still has a population oS above 5000 inhabitants. Numerous inscriptions, statues, and other ancient relics, have been found there. [E. H. B.] AUXU'ME (Atffow/iiis, At|o«J/A7», Ptol. iv. 7. § 25; "Aliovfus^ St«ph. Byz. s. v.; Eth. 'A^ov/btln^f, Perip. Mar, Eryth, p. 3: *A^»A«fTijj, Procop. B. Pert, i. 1 9), the modem Axwn^ the capital of Tigre^ in Abyssinia, was the metropolis of a pro- vince, or kingdom of the same name (Regio Axiomi- tarom), and is described byStephanus B.(s.v.)a£rthe chief town of the Aethiopes Auxumitae (Ptol. iv. 7. § 29). Auxnme stood in about kt 14^ T N. to tile SE. of Meroe and E. of the river Astaboras or Tacagge, The modem city, which corresponds in site to the ancient one, is described by Salt ** as standing partly in and partly at the mouth of a nook, formed by two hills on ihe NW. end of an ex- tensive and fertile valley, which is watered by a small stream." The kingdom of Anxume was at one time nearly co-extensive with the modem Abys- sinia, and comprised also a portion of the SW. coast of the Bed Sea, and the tribes of the Sabaean and Homerite Arabs on the opposite shore. Its principal haven was Adule {Arkeeko)^ from which it was about 120 miles distant. Anxume and Adule were the chief centres of the trade with the interior of Africa in gold-dust, ivory, leather, hides, and aro- matics. (Nonnosus, ap.Photium, n.3, p. 2, ed.Bck- ker.) The Auxumitae were originally a pure Aethio - pian race, with little admixture from the neighbour- ing Arabians. In the decline of the kingdom the latter seem to have become the principal elonent in the Auxmnite population. The kingdom and its capital attained a high degree of prosperity after the decline of Meroe, in the first or second century of our era. As a city of inferior note, however, Anxume was known much earlier ; and is even supposed by some writera to have been founded by the exiled Egyptian war-caste, in the reign of Psammitichus B.C. 671 — 617 ; by others, as Heeren {Idem ii. 1. p. 431) to have been one of the numerous priest-col(mies from MeroS. The Greek language was spoken at Anxume — a circumstance which adds to the proba- bility that the city did not begin to flourish until the ^laoedonian dynasty was estabUshed in Egypt, and Greek factors and colonists had generally pene- trated the Nile- Valley. Indeed, a Greek inscrip- tion, which will be noticed presently, makes it not unlikely that, as regards the Hellenic element of its population, Anxume was a colony of its haven Adule. That Anxume was a city of great extent its ruins still attest. Travellers, however, vary considerably in their accounts of its vestiges; and the more re- cent visitors of Axum seem to have found the fewest authentic remains. Combes and Tamisier, who visited it in 1836 ( Voyaffe en Ahyssinie^ vol. i. p. 268.), for example, saw much less to describe