ancient Italic people

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The Apulians

The inhabitants of the southeastern extremity of the Italian peninsula formed a definitely characterized group of populations that the ancients often called Iapyges (whence the geographic term Iapygia, in which “Apulia” may be recognized). The territory included the Salentini and the Messapii peoples in the Salentine Peninsula (ancient Calabia) and the Peucetii and the Dauni farther north. (Sometimes the designations Iapyges and Messapii are used with identical reference.) Ancient tradition insists upon an overseas origin for these tribes, held to be Cretan or Illyrian. The Iapygian, or more commonly, Messapian (Messapic) language is known from a considerable series of public funerary, votive, monetary, and other inscriptions written in the Greek alphabet and found in the Apulian area, especially in the Salentine Peninsula, from words reported by the ancient writers, and from toponomastic (local place-name) data. Messapian is without doubt an Indo-European language, distinct from Latin and from the Umbro-Sabellian dialects, with Balkan and central European analogies. This confirms the overseas provenance of the Iapyges from the Balkans, the more so because there existed in Illyria a tribe called the Iapodes and because a people known as the Iapuzkus lived farther north, on the Adriatic coast of Italy. Rather than a true immigration, however, there was a gradual prehistoric penetration of trans-Adriatic elements. The expansion of the Iapyges must have brought them to Lucania and even to what is now Calabria, as would be deduced from traditional and archaeological indications.

The Apulians’ civilization, which was considerably influenced by that of the nearby Greek colonies, developed from the 9th to the 3rd centuries bc. In the most ancient period there were pit graves, sometimes in large stone tumuli. In the Siponto area, near what is now Manfredonia, the graves were accompanied by anthropomorphic stelae with geometric bas-reliefs. Geometrically painted ceramics in linear motifs persisted to the threshold of the Hellenistic age. Later graves took the form of large trunks and of catacombs with paintings on the sides. Burial was the disposition exclusively used.

Beginning in Archaic times, large cities developed, linked to each other by bonds of confederation. These included Herdonea (now Ordona), Canusium (Canosa), Rubi (Ruvo), Gnathia, Brundisium (Brindisi), Uria (Oria), Lupiae (Lecce), Rudiae, and Manduria. They preserved their independence, tenaciously defended against the Greeks, until the age of the Roman conquest.

The Latins

The Latin nation had a relatively limited territory, south of the Tiber, which was reduced, in historic times, by the invasion of the Volsci to the region between the Alban hills and the Aurunci mountains (the so-called Latium Novum). The principal Latin centres included Alba Longa, Tusculum, Lavinium, Ardea, Tibur (now Tivoli), and Praeneste (Palestrina) and the early Volscianized cities of Velitrae (Velletri), Signia (Segni), Cora (Cori), Satricum, Antium (Anzio), and Anxur (Terracina). The importance of the Latins is essentially linked with the fortunes of Rome, the forward bulwark of Latinity in the direction of the Etruscan realm. Intermixtures with the legends of the origin of Rome make the ethnographic traditions of Latium very diverse and complex. The linguistic evidence, which begins with inscriptions of the 7th to 6th century bc, indicates an individuality of the Latin world distinct from the neighbouring Etruscan and eastern Italic peoples.

The Latins had a federal organization, centred at the sanctuary of Jupiter on Albanus Mons. Their religious heritage survived in the beliefs and cults of the Roman world. The most ancient Latin culture (9th–8th century bc) was characterized by cremation as the funeral rite, a practice it had in common with the cultures in the Etruscan and northern Italian territory, and by an iron culture showing affinities with the proto-Villanovan culture and with the cultures of Tyrrhenian southern Italy. Etruscan political control of Latium (probably 7th–6th century) coincided with an evident Etruscan cultural and artistic influence; while, from the south and from the sea, elements of Greek civilization penetrated, beginning with the alphabet.

North of Latium lived tribes ethnically akin to the Latins, with principal centres at Capena, Narce, and Falerii (whence the name Faliscans). Their political and cultural history merges with that of the Etruscans. The Faliscan dialect, known from inscriptions, was originally Latin but was contaminated and modified by eastern Italic and Etruscan elements.

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