Caesar Augusta
A Roman tribute-exempt colony on the right bank of the Ebro, where the oppidum of Salduie (Salluie, Salduba of Pliny) formerly stood, in Sedetania (Plin. HN 3.24) and not in Edetania, a mistake arising from a misreading of the Leyden Codex. It was founded by veterans of legiones IV Macedonica, VI Victrix, and X Gemina, discharged after the wars against the Cantabri, ca. 24 B.C., as is shown by the coins. It was the chief town of an extensive Conventus luridicus and was of great importance during the time of Pomponius Mela, who stated (3.88) that the most important towns of the interior were Palantia and Numantia in Tarraconensis and, in its time, Caesaraugusta; Strabo (3.4.10, 13) adds that it was on the banks of the Ebro, about 800 stadia from Numantia. Ptolemy calls it Kaisareia Augusta.
The colony was founded as a bridgehead and remains of the stone bridge are preserved in the mediaeval and modern one. The town stood at the intersection of the roads of the Ebro (Hiberus), Gállego (Gallicus, through which passed the C. Benearnum road), Huerva (Orbia), and Salo (Jalón), 20 km away. It was also a river port, as is confirmed by finds of amphorae near the confluence of the Huerva and the Ebro. Its foundation date is controversial: 25, 19, or 15 B.C. The oppidum has also been located at Zaragoza la Vieja (El Burgo, 10 km away) and at Juslibol, on the left bank of the Ebro, but these claims are not soundly based.
The town minted Iberian bronze coins, patterned on Roman coins, and gave its name to a cavalry unit which served under Cn. Pompeius Strabo, son of Sextus and father of the triumvir. Members of the unit were granted Roman citizenship in 89 B.C. during the siege of Ascoli. Their names and the award are preserved on a copper tablet; four of them were from the town.
The plan of the Roman town is preserved in the ancient part of Zaragoza: the entire perimeter or cursum in the Coso, the decumanus maximus in the Calles de Manifestación, Mendez Nuñez, and Mayor; the Calle Don Jaime I approximates the cardo maximus, the forum was at the intersection of the two, and remains of the cloaca maxima are in the N part of the cardo. The rectangular plan had four gateways, preserved until the 19th c., the gates of Toledo and Valencia at the ends of the decumanus, that of El Angel straddling the bridge, and the supposed Cineraria, on the Coso. The wall, still visible in a few curtains flanked by fortified towers, must be a 3d c. reconstruction necessitated by the barbarian invasions; the perimeter of the town was reduced, and many shafts and bases of columns were probably reused in this wall.
There are no other remains in situ; but a number of monuments appear on coins: a statue of Augustus between Gaius and Lucius (4 B.C.), perhaps Livia seated (A.D. 15-16), and a fine hexastyle temple dedicated to the cult of Augustus (28-29), an equestrian statue of Tiberius (31), and another tetrastyle temple dedicated to the cult of Augustus (33). A number of shafts and Corinthian capitals are housed in the museum.
The mosaics of the Plaza de Santa Engracia and the Plaza del Pilar date from the 2d c. and include the triumph of Bacchus and that of Orpheus; there are also statues, one of a man from the Plaza de la Seo, a group of hetairas making music, a drunken faun from a suburban villa, and architectural fragments from the place called Piedras de Coso, almost certainly the site of ancient temples. Inscriptions are rare and of little importance.
Hispano-Roman coins are not continuous with the Iberian coins from Salduie and are the most abundant series in the Peninsula; still unknown are the coins struck when the colony was founded, ca. 24 B.C., on which must have appeared the legate responsible for the deductio and the duoviri quinquennales who conducted the census. Coins of the first series bear the head of Augustus, first bare and later with a laurel wreath, before and after 27 June, 23 B.C., the yoke of oxen led by a priest (on the asses), and a standard, a type also alluding to the foundation (on the semisses). They all bear the names of the duoviri and range from the dupondius to the sextans. The issues continued in the time of Tiberius and Caius Caesar, but other types were added, bearing the standards of the legions with the numbers of the founder legions, the bull, the abbreviated name of the town, CCA, and the statues and temples already mentioned.
Finds are in the Zaragoza Museum, the National Archaeological Museum in Madrid, and a few private collections.
BIBLIOGRAPHYM. Risco, España Sagrada; Santa Iglesia de Zaragoza (2d ed. 1859) passim; A. Beltrán, “Los monumentos en las monedas hispano-romanas,” ArchEspArq 8 (1935) 63; id., “Las monedas antiguas de Zaragoza,” Numisma 6 (1956) 9ff; A. García y Bellido, “Las colonias romanas de Hispania,” Anuario de Historia del Derecho Espanol 29 (1959) 484ff; J. Caro Baroja, “Sobre la fecha de la fundación de Caesar Augusta,” Boletin de la Real Academia de la Historia 168 (1971) 621ff; G. Fatás, La Sedetania y las tierras zaragozanas hasta la fundación de Caesaraugusta (1973).
A. BELTRÁN