Key to Umbria: Trevi
 


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Stele of Bovara (late 3rd century BC)

This stone was discovered in the 1950s near the Abbazia di San Pietro in Bovara, beside the line of the Roman road that led to Via Flaminia.  Its two-line inscription, written in Latin using an archaic Latin alphabet, cannot be fully deciphered:

------- / [---] Atiete en/ [-]laga dedre

The word Atiete is recognisable and known from the Ikuvine Tablets: it means a college of priests.

The location in which the inscription was found is only about 5 km from Picciche and about 10 km from Castel Ritaldi, the places in which the cippi inscribed with the Lex Spoletina were found.  All three were inscribed in archaic Latin, and it seems likely that all three were associated with the nearby Roman colony at Spoletium.  These inscriptions are described on the page Latin Inscriptions after 295 BC.

Inscription (late 1st century BC)

This Latin funerary inscription (CIL XI 5012) was found in 1864 near Santa Maria di Pietrarossa during work on the construction of the railway line.  It commemorates Caius Lanfrenius son of Publius, who belonged to the Oufentina tribe and was erected by one of his freedman, Philemus.


Base of a Statue (ca. 100 AD)

This inscribed column (CIL XI 5054) was discovered in the 15th century in the valley below Trevi and taken to Montefalco, where it was used as part of an altar in the church of San Fortunato.   It was returned to Trevi in 1840.  The inscription reads:

L(ucio) Succonio L(uci) f(ilio) Pal(atina) 

Prisco IIII vir(o) i(ure) d(icundo) q(uaestori) a(erarii)

omnium corpor(um) patr(ono) 

item Treb(i)is decur(ioni) pont(ifici)

IIIIvir(o) i(ure) d(icundo) patron(o) mun(icipii)

decuriae IIII scabillar(iorum) 

veteres a scaena / amantissimo sui

ex aere conlato h(onore) a(ccepto) i(mpensam) r(emisit)

It commemorates Lucius Succonius Priscus, son of Lucius, who had held a number on important public offices in Trevi, including quattuorviro i(ure) d(icundo).  He had also been the patron of all the corporations of Trevi and of the municipium itself.  (This is the only surviving inscription that names the municipium)

The inscription also records that the statue had been erected by the "scabillares": these were musicians who accompanied themselves on the scabillium, a pair of hinged wooden plates attached to their sandals that they used to beat time, and they belonged to one of the corporations that Lucius Succonius had protected.  The “scaena” was probably the theatre mentioned by Suetonius: "On another occasion, when [the Emperor Tiberius] recommended that the people of Trebia be allowed to use, in making a road, a sum of money which had been left them for the construction of a new theatre, he could not prevent the wish of the testator from being carried out" (De Vita Caesarum: Tiberius, paragraph 31).  No trace of this theatre survives.

There is a second inscription commemorating Lucius Succonius Priscus in the Museo Archeologico, Spoleto.

Busts (2nd century AD)

        

                                                          "Janus"                                                 "Agripina"

These two marble busts came from the collection of Benedetto Valenti and, from the 16th century, adorned the entrance arch in front of Palazzo Valenti (see the Walk around Trevi).

  1. ✴"Janus" seems to be a composite Roman copy of two Greek portrait busts (ca. 480 BC) of Euripedes and Eschinus that are now in the Museo Capitolino, Rome.

  2. ✴"Agrippina" seems to be a Roman copy of the face of a Greek figure (ca. 440 BC) known as the wounded Niobid that is now in the Museo Nazionale Romano, Rome.

Inscription (3rd century AD)

This Latin inscription (AE 2008, 0498) was found in 2004 during the restoration of the pavement of the church of San Francesco.   Its original location is unknown.  It commemorates Caius Licinianus, a doctor and surgeon who died aged only 21:

C(AIUS?) LICINI[AN]VS (?)

CN(AEI) VESENTRONIS

URBANI (SERVUS) MEDICVS

CHIRURGVS 

                                          V(IXIT) A(NNIS) XXI

This is one of only two Latin inscriptions found within the walls of Trevi: the other is embedded in the portal of Sant' Emiliano. 

Funerary inscription (probably 514 AD)

This marble tombstone was found in the 19th century near the church of San Pietro in Pettine, near Trevi.  It is one of very few early Christian inscriptions found near Trevi.  The Latin inscription (CIL XI 5021) commemorates Stefanus, who died aged 18 in the year of the "SENATORE CONSVL".  This almost certainly refers to Senator Magnus Aurelius Cassiodrus, who was Consul in 514 AD.




Grave goods from Pietrarossa (6th and 7th centuries AD) 

The museum includes an interesting presentation on the  Lombard necropolis that was discovered in 2005 near Santa Maria di Pietrarossa, which comprised some 17 graves.   This includes the reconstruction of the tomb of a warrior, complete with skeleton: the grave good that it contained include the iron dagger in a wooded sheath illustrated.

There are interesting illustrations in this page in the website of Protagonista Slow.

Plaster casts from San Francesco

       

These plaster casts were made in the 19th century from the sculpted tympanum and reliefs of a king or emperor and a pope on the original facade of San Francesco.  The inscription along the lower end of the tympanum records that Master Angelo built the church (or at least its facade) in 1268:

MAG(iste)R ANGELO FECIT HOC OP(us)

AN(n)O D(omi)NI MCCLXVIII M(en)SE MAII

AVE MARIA GRA(tia plena) DOMIN(us) TECU(m) B(e)N(e)D(i)CTA TU


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