Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/511

 OAMPANIA. may not improbably have erred as mncli in the con- trary direction. Whatever may have been the ac- toal date, we are told that these Tuscan cities rose to great wealth and prosperity, but gradually became enervated and enfeebled by luxury, so that they were unable to resist the increasing power of their war- like neigfaiMHirs the Samnites. The &te of their chief dtf ef Capua, which was first compelled to admit th« Samnites to the privileges of citizenship and a share -of its fertile lands, and ultimately fell wholly into their power [Capua], was probably soon followed by the minor cities of the confederacy. But neither these, nor the metropolis, became Sam- nite: they seem to have constituted from the first a separate national body, which assumed the name of Campani, '* the peo]Je of the plain." It is evi- dently this -event which is designated by Diodoms as the " firet rise of the Campanian people " (t^ lOwf r&v Kaftrcofity <rw4vnif Diod. jdi. 31), though he places it as early as b. c. 440; while, according to Livy (iv. 37), Capua did not fall into the hands of the Samnites tiii b. c. 423. So rapidly did the new nation rise to power, that only three years after the occupation of Capua they were able to take by storm the Greek city of Cumae, which had mam- tained its independence throughout the period of the Etruscan dominion. (Liv. iv. 44 ; Diod. xii. 76, who, however, gives the date b. a 428.) The people of the Campanians thus constituted was essentUilly of Oscan race. The Samnite or Sa- bellian conquerors appear to have been, like the Etruscans whom they supplanted, a comparatively ■mall body; and it is probable that the original Oscan popi:dation, which had continued to subsist, though in a state of subjection, under the Etruscans, was readily amalgamated with a people of kindred iBoe like their new conquerors, so that the two be^ came completely blended into one nation. It is certain that the hinguage of the Campanians con.> tinned to be Oscan: indeed it is from them that our knowledge of the Oscan language is mainly dfirived. Their nams, as already observed, probably signified only the inhabitants of the plain, and it was at this period confined to that part only of what was after- wards called Campania. Nor does there appear to have been any distinct organisation or nationJEil union among them. The Ausones or Aurund, and the bidicmi, oo the N. of the Vultumus, still continued to exist as distinct and independent tribes. The minor towns around Capua — ^Acerra, Atella, Calatia, and Snessula— -seem to have followed the lead, and probably acknowledged the supremacy of that pow- erful city: but Nola stood aloof, and appears to have preserved a doeer oonnection with Sunnium: while Kuceria in the southern part of the Campanian plain belonged to the Alfatemi, who were probably an independent tribe. Hence the Campanians with whom the Romans came into connection in the fourth century b. c. were only the people of Capua itself with its surrounding plain and dependent cities. They were not the less a numerous and powerful nation: Capua itself was at this time the greatest and most opulent dty of Italy (Liv. vii. 81.): but though scarcely 80 years had elapsed since the establishment of the Samnites in Campania, they wen already so far enervated and corrupted by the luxurious habits engendered by their new abode, as to be wholly unequal to cfmtend in arms with their more hardy brethren in the mountains of Samnium. In b. c 343 the petty people of the Sididni, at- tacked by the powerful Samnitea, applied for aid to CAMPANIA. 493 the Campanians. This was readily furnished them : but their new allies were in thdr turn defeated by the Samnites, in a pitched battle, at tlie very gates of Capua, and shut up within the walls of their city. In this distress they applied to Borne for assistance; and, in order to purchase the aid of that powerful republic, are said to have made an absolute surrender of their dty and territory (dediiio) into the hands of the Bomans. The latter now took up thdr cause, and the victories of Valerius Corvus at Mt Gaums, and Suessula, soon freed the Campanians from all danger from their Samnite foes. (Liv. vii. 29 — 37.) It is very diflfcult to understand the events of the two next years, as related to us; and there can be little doubt that the real course of events has been distorted or concealed by the Boman annalists. The Campanians, thoagh nominally subjects of Bome, appear to act a very independent part; and at length openly espoused the cause of the Latins when these broke out into declared hostilities against Home. The great batUe in which the combined forces of the latins and Campanians were defeated by the Boman consuls T. Mantius and P. Decius was fought near the foot of Mt Vesuvius, b.c. 340; and was quickly followed by the submission of the Campanians. They were punished for theur revolt, by the k)as of thd whde of that portion of their fertile territory which lay N. of the Vultumus, and which was known by the name of the ** Faleraus ager." The knights of Ca{«na (equites Campani), who had throughout op- posied the defection from Borne, were rewarded with the full rights of Boman dtizens; while » the rest of the population obtained only the '* dvitas sine suffragio." The same relations were established with the dties of Cumae, Suessula, and Acerrae. (Liv. viii. 11, 14, 17; Veil. Pat i. 14.) Hence we find during the period that followed this war for above 120 years the closest bcmds of union subsisting be- tween the Campanians and the Boman people: the former were admitted to serve in the regular legions, instead of the auxiliaries : and for this reason Poly- bius, in reckoning up the forces of the Italian nations in B. o. 225, classes the Bomans and Campanians in one body; while he enumerates the Latins and other allies separately. (Pol. ii. 24.) The period from the peace which followed the war of B.C. 340, to the beginning of the Second Punio War, was one of grpat prosperity to the Campanians. Their territory was indeed necessarily the occasional theatre of hostilities during the protracted wars of the Bomans with the Samnites: and some of the dties not immediately connected with Capua were even rash enough to expose themselves to the enmity of the Bomans, by taking part with thdr adversaries. But the capture of the Greek city of PalaepoHs in B. o. 326, led the neighbouring Neapolitans to con- clude a treaty with Bome, which secured them for ever after as its faithful allies; and the conquest of Nola in b.c. 313, and of Nuceria in 308, firmly established the Boman dominion in the southern portion of Cainpania. This seems to have been ad • mitted and secured by the peace of b. o. 304, which terminated the Second Samnite War. (Liv. viiL 22 ^26, ix. 28, 41 ; Niebuhr, vd. ui. p. 259.) In B.G. 280, Campania was traversed by the armies of Pyrrhus, but his attempts to possess himself of dther Capua or Neapolis were ineffectual. (Zonar. viii. 4.) The successes of that monarch do not appear to have for a moment shaken the fidelity of the Campanians. But it was otherwise with those of Hannibal. Immediately after the battle of Cannad