Ralph Van Deman Magoffin

“ The rapid development, however, of the Latin towns, and the necessity of mutual protection and advancement soon brought Rome and Præneste into a league with the other towns of Latium. Præneste because of her position and wealth was the haughtiest member of the newly made confederation, and with the more rapid growth of Rome became her most hated rival. Later, when Rome passed from a position of first among equals to that of mistress of her former allies, Præneste was her proudest and most turbulent subject. ”

“ Præneste would never have asked for a return to the name municipium if it had not meant something. At the very best she could not have been a real municipium with Roman citizenship longer than seven years, 89 to 82 B.C., and that at a very unsettled time, nor would an enforced taking of the status of a municipium, not to mention the ridiculously short period which it would have lasted, have been anything to look back to with such pride that the inhabitants would ask the emperor Tiberius for it again. ”

“ At the east, instead of the lower solid wall of opus quadratum, there is a series of fine tufa arches built to serve as a substructure for something. It is to be remembered again that between the arches on the east and the solid wall on the west is a stretch of 200 feet of opus incertum, and a space where there is no wall at all. This lower wall of Præneste occupies the same line as the ancient wall and escarpment, but the most of what survives was restored in Sulla's time. The opus quadratum is exactly the same style as that in the Tabularium in Rome. ”

“ What they did ask for was the name municipium as they used and understood it, for it meant to them everything or anything but colonia.
Let us now sum up the municipal history of Præneste down to 82 B.C. when she was made a Roman colony by Sulla. Præneste, from the earliest times, like Rome, Tusculum, and Aricia, was one of the chief cities in the territory known as Ancient Latium. Like these other cities, Præneste made herself head of a small league, [229] but unlike the others, offers nothing but comparative probability that she was ever ruled by kings or dictators. ”

“ Sulla was one of the most famous of the family of the Cornelii, and men of the gens Cornelia might well have expected preferment during the early years of the colony. That such was the case is shown here by the recurrence of the name Cornelius in the list of municipal officers in two succeeding years. Now if the name "Cornelia" grew to be a name in great disfavor in Præneste, the reason would be plain enough. The destruction of the town, the loss of its ancient liberties, and the change in its government, are more than enough to assure hatred of the man who had been the cause of the disasters. ”

“ One sees at a glance that the whole slope of the mountain from arx to base is continued by a natural depression which would make an ideal boundary for Prænestine territory. Nor is the topographical proof all. No inscriptions of consequence, and no architectural remains of the pre-imperial period have been found across this valley. The road along the top of the ridge beyond it is an ancient one, and ran to Valmontone as it does today, and was undoubtedly often used between Præneste and the towns on the Volscians. ”

“ The whole of the tufa and lava plain that stretches out from Præneste toward the Roman Campagna is flat to the eye, and the towns on the tips of the ridges seem so low that their strong military position is overlooked. ”

“ EXTENT OF THE DOMAIN OF PRÆNESTE.
Just as the modern roads and streets in both country and city of ancient territory are taken as the first and best proof of the presence of ancient boundary lines and thoroughfares, just so the territorial jurisdiction of a city in modern Italy, where tradition has been so constant and so strong, is the best proof for the extent of ancient domain. ”

“ There are a great many reasons why Præneste offers the best opportunity for a study of the municipal officers of a town of the Latin league. She kept a practical autonomy longer than any other of the league towns with the exception of Tibur, but she has a much more varied history than Tibur. The inscriptions of Præneste offer especial advantages, because they are numerous and cover a wide range. The great number of the old pigne inscriptions gives a better list of names of the citizens of the second century B.C. and earlier than can be found in any other Latin town. ”

“ In short, Præneste held the key to Rome from the south.
Monte Glicestro is of limestone pushed up through the tertiary crust by volcanic forces, but the long ridges which run off to the northwest are of lava, while the shorter and wider ones extending toward the southwest are of tufa. These ridges are from three to seven miles in length. It is shown either by remains of roads and foundations or (in three cases) by the actual presence of modern towns that in antiquity the tip of almost every one of these ridges was occupied by a city. ”

“ Below and south of the city stretched fertile land easy of access to the Prænestines, and sufficiently distant from other strong Latin towns to be safe for regular cultivation. Further, there is to be added to the fortunate situation of Præneste with regard to her own territory and that of her contiguous dependencies, her position at a spot which almost forced upon her a wide territorial influence, for Monte Glicestro faces exactly the wide and deep depression between the Volscian mountains and the Alban Hills, and is at the same time at the head of the Trerus-Liris valley. ”

“ Mommsen-Marquardt say [215] that in 90 B.C. under the conditions of the lex Iulia Præneste became a municipium of the type which kept its own citizenship (ut municipes essent suæ cuiusque civitatis) . [216] But if this were true, then Præneste would have come under the jurisdiction of the city prætor (prætor urbanus) in Rome, and there would be præfects to look after cases for him. Præneste has a very large body of inscriptions which extend from the earliest to the latest times, and which are wider in range than those of any other town in Latium outside Rome. ”

“ Two years later, in 87 B.C., when, because of the troubles between the two consuls Cinna and Octavius, Cinna had been driven from Rome, he went out directly to Præneste and Tibur, which had lately been received into citizenship, [213] tried to get them to revolt again from Rome, and collected money for the prosecution of the war. This not only shows that Præneste had lately received Roman citizenship, but implies also that Rome thus far had not dared to assume any control of the city, or the consul would not have felt so sure of his reception. ”

“ Before the time of Sulla there had been a gate in the south wall of the city, approached by one road, which ascended from the east on the arches facing the present Via degli Arconi. After entering the city one went straight up a grade not very steep to the basilica, and to the open square or ancient forum which was the space now occupied by the two modern piazzas, the Garibaldi and the Savoia, and on still farther to the temple. ”

“ In very early times, probably as early as the ninth or tenth century B.C., Præneste was a town on the southern slope of Monte Glicestro, [26] with an arx on the summit. As the town grew, it spread first to the level ground directly below, and out along the ridge west of the Valle di Pepe toward Marcigliano, because it was territory not only fertile and easily defended, being directly under the very eyes of the citizens, but also because it stretched out toward Velitræ, an old and trusted ally. ”

“ The lower temple with its precinct, along the north side of which extends a wall and the ruins of a so-called cryptoporticus which connected two caves hollowed out in the rock, is not so very large a sanctuary, but it occupies a very good position above and behind the ancient forum and basilica on a terrace cut back into the solid rock of the mountain. The temple precinct is a courtyard which extends along the terrace and occupies its whole width from the older cave on the west to the newer one at the east. ”

“ As has been said, in the time of Tiberius she got back an empty title, that of municipium, but it had been nearly forgotten again by Hadrian's time.
There are several unanswered questions which arise at this point. What was the distribution of offices in the colony after its foundation; what regulation, if any, was there as to the proportion of officials to the new make up of the population; and what and who were the quinquennial duovirs? From the proportionately large fragments of municipal fasti left from Præneste it will be possible to reach some conclusions that may be of future value. ”

“ The earliest inhabitants of Præneste needed first of all, safety, then a place for pasturage, and withal, to be as close to the fertile land at the foot of the mountain as possible. The first thing the inhabitants of the new city did was to build a wall. There is still a little of this oldest wall in the circuit about the citadel, and it was built at exactly the same time as the lower part of the double walls that extend down the southern slope of the mountain on each side of the upper part of the modern town. ”

“ If a dictator was ever at the head of the city government in Præneste, there are none of the proofs remaining, such as are found in the towns of the Alban Hills, in Etruria, and in the medix tuticus of the Sabellians. The fact that no trace of the dictator remains either in Tibur or Præneste seems to imply that these two towns had better opportunities for a more rapid development, and that both had prætors at a very early period. ”

“ With dependent towns at Zagarolo and Passerano, which are several miles distant from each other, there must have been at least one more town between them, to guard the road against attack from Tusculum or Gabii. The fact that the Via Prænestina later cut the Colle del Pero-Colle Seloa just below a point where an ancient road ascends the ridge to a place well adapted for a town, and where there are some remains, [15] seems to prove the supposition, and to locate another of the dependent cities of Præneste. ”

“ First, the particular officials who belong to a municipium, præfects and quattuorvirs, are not found at all; [222] second, the use of the word municipium in literature in connection with Præneste is general, and means simply "town"; [223] third, the fact that Præneste, along with Tibur, had clung so jealously to the title of federated state (civitas foederata) from some uncertain date to the time of the Latin rebellion, and more proudly than ever from 338 to 90 B.C., makes it very unlikely that so great a downfall of a city's pride would be passed over in silence ”

“ Porta San Francesco, the modern gate, is above the second tree from the right in the illustration, just where the wall seems to turn suddenly. There is no trace of ancient wall after the gate is passed. The white wall, as one proceeds from the gate to the right, is the modern wall of the Franciscan monastery. All the writers on Præneste say that the ancient wall came on around the town where the lower wall of the monastery now is, and followed the western limit of the present town as far as the Porta San Martino. ”

“ The continuance of the commercial and military rivalry because of Præneste's strategic position as key of Rome, and the religious rivalry due to the great fame of Fortuna Primigenia at Præneste, are continuous and striking historical facts even down into the middle ages. Once in 1297 and again in 1437 the forces of the Pope destroyed the town to crush the great Colonna family which had made Præneste a stronghold against the power of Rome. ”

“ The traditional touchiness and pride of the Prænestines makes it sure that they resisted Roman citizenship as long as they could, and it seems more likely that it was under the provision of the Plautia-Papiria than under those of the Iulia that separate citizenship in Præneste became a thing of the past. ”