Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 2.djvu/332

 HIBPINT. of Aecukntlm, was not oftUy himself faithful to the Roman cause, but was able to raise an auxiliary legion amoQji^ his countrymen, with which he sup- ported the Boman generals in Campania. (Veil. Pat. ii. 16.) The Uirpni were undoubtedly ad- mitted to the Roman franchise at the close of the war. and from this time their national existence was at an end. They appear to have suffered less than their neighbours the Samnites from the ravages of the war, but considerable portions of their territory were confiscated, and it would seem, from a passage in Cicero, that a large part of it had passed into the' hands of wealthy Boman nobles. (Cic. de Leg. Agr. iii. 2; Zumpt, de Colon, p. 258.) By the division of Italy under Augustus, the Hir- pini were separated from the other Samnites, and placed in the 2nd B^ion together with Apulia and Calabria, while Samnium itself was included in the 4th Begion. (Plin. iii. 11. s. 16, 12. s. 17.) The same separation was retained also in the later divi- sions of Italy under the Empire, liccording to which Samnium, in the more confined sense of the name, formed a small separate province, while Beneventum and the greater part, if not the whole, of the other towns of the Hirpini, were included in the province of Campania. The Liber Coloniarum, indeed, in- cludes all the towns of Samnium, as well as those of the Hirpini, among the '* Civitates Campaniae;*' hot this is probably a mistake. {Lib. Coi. pp. 229 — ^239; Mommsen, ad Lt^. CoL pp. 159,205,206; llarquardt, Bandb. d. Rom, Alterthimer, vol. iii pp. 62, 63.) The national characteristics oi the Hirpini cannot he separated from those of the other Samnites, which are described under the general article of Sam- KiUM. Under tlie same head is given a more particular description of the physical geography of their country : the mountain chains and groups by which it u intersected being so closely connected with those of the more nortliem districts of Samnium, that it is convenient to consider them both together. Nor is it always easy to separate the limits of the Hirpini from those of the neighbouring Samnite tribes; more especially as our authorities upon this point relate almost ei^^lusively to the Impericd times, when the original distinctions of the tribes had been in great measure obliterated. The rivers and valleys which constitute the main features of the Hirpinian territory, have been already briefly noticed. Pliny's list of the towns in the 2nd B^on is more than TLBually obscure, and those of the Hir]Hni and of Apulia are mixed up together iu a most perplexing manner. The towns which may be assigned with certainty to the Hirpini are: Benevkntum, by far the most important city in this part of Italy, and which is often referred to Samnium, but must have properly been included in theftHirpini, and is ex- pressly called by Pliny the only Boman colony in their territory (Plin. iii. 11. s. 16) ; Aeculamum, also a flourishing and important town, nearly in the heart of their territory ; a!bellimum, on the confines of Campania, and near the sources of the Sabatus; CoMrsA, near the head waters of the Aufidus and bordering on Lucania; Aquilonia and Bomui.ea, near the frontiers of Apulia, in the S£. portion of the Hirpinian territory ; TiuvicuM and Equus TuTicus, also adjoining the Apulian frontiers; and, N. of the last-mentioned city, Murgantia, near the sources of the Frento, which seems to have been the furthest of the Hirpinian towns towards the li£., if at least it be correctly placed at Bcnelice, In the VOL. L HIBBOS. 1073 valley of the Tatnarus, N. of the territorv of Bene> ventum, were situated the Liourks BaIbiami et ( CoRNELiANi, a colony of Ligurians transplanted to the heart of these mountain regions in b.c. 180 (Liv. xl. 38, 41), and which still continued to exist as a separate cou?munity in the days of Pliny. (Plin. iii. 1 1. s. 16 ; Lib. CoL p. 235.) Of the minor towns of the Hirpini, tliree are mentioned by Livy (xxiii. 37) as retaken by the praetor M. Valerius in B.C. 215; but tlie names given in the HISS, (see Alschefski, ad loc. *' Vescellium, Vercellinm, and Sicilinum," are probably corrupt: they are all other- wise unknown, except that the '* Vescellani " are also found in Pliny's hst of towns. (Plin. /. c.) Feren- tinum, mentioned also by Livy (x. 17), in connection with Bomulea, is also wholly unknown. Fratulum (^paroiSoKov, Ptol. iii. 1. § 71), of which the name is found only in Ptolemy, is equally uncertain. Taurasia, mentioned as a town only in the cele- brated epitaph of Scipio Barbatus, had left its name to the Taurasini Campi not far from Beneventum, and must therefore have been itself situated in tJiat neighbourhood. Aletrium, of which the name is found in Pliny (Aletrini, iii. 11. s. 16), has been conjectured to be Co/tVrt, a village in the upper valley of the Aufidus, not fiir from Conza. Of the other obscure names given by the same author, it is impossible (as already observed) to determine which belong to the Hirpini. The most remarkable natural curiosity in the land of the Hirpini was the valley and lake, or rather pool, of Amsanctds, celebrated by Virgil in a manner that shows its fame to have been widely spread through Italy. (Viig. Aen. vii. 563.) It i» remarkable as the only trace of volcanic action re- maining in the central chain of the Apennines* (Daubeny on Volcanoes^ p. 191.) The country of the Hirpini, notwithstanding its rugged and mountainous character, was traversed by several Boman roads, all of whicii may be re- garded as connected with the Via Appia. Th# main line of that celebrated road was carried in the first instance direct from Capaa to Beneventum: here it lu«nched into two, the one leading directly by Aecuhinum, Bomulea, and Aqnilonia, to Veousia; and thence to Tarentum: this was the proper Via Appia ; the other known from the time of tha emperor Trajan (who first rendered it practicable throughout for carriages) as the Via Trajan a^ which proceeded from Beneventum by Forum Novum (Buonalberffo')j and Equus Tnticus (5. £kuterio% to Aecae in Apulia, and thence by Herdonea and Canusinm to Brundusium. The fuller eonsidera^ tion of these two great lines of highway is reserved for the article Via Appia. Their course through the country of the Hirpini has been traced with great care by Mommsen. {Topografia dtgli Irpini^ in the BuUettino delF Inst. ArcktoL 1848, pp. 6—13.) [E. H. B.J HIBBI, a people mentioned by Pliny (iv. 13) along with the Venedae, and who were conneeted with the Heruli. They appear to have come from Scandinavia, and occupied that part d^ the coast of Esthonia^ which was called in the Middle Ages JJarriOj after them. Thus, it seems that the coasts of the Baltic, as far* as the mouth of the Oder, were exposed to the piratical attacks of the Goths, in very early times, as in later ages other European shores were devastated by the Noimans. (Cump. Schafarik, Slav. A U. vol. i. p. 1 1 6.) [E. B. J.] HIBBOS, a river of Asiatic Sarmati^, with i^ dz /