Capena
- a Tuscan town founded by the Veientes, or at least dependent upon them, now S. Martino, Cato ap. Serv. ad Verg. A. 7, 697; Liv. 22, 1, 10; in their territory were the grove and temple of Feronia, id. 27, 4, 14; 33, 26, 8.—
- II Derivv.
- A Căpēnas, ātis, adj. (old form Căpēnā-tis lūcus, Cato ap. Prisc. p. 629 P.), of Capena: fundus, Cic. Verr. 2, 2, 12, § 31: ager, id. Fam. 9, 17, 2: bellum, Liv. 5, 24, 3. —Abl. Capenati bello, Liv. 5, 16, 2: in agro Capenate, id. 27, 4, 14; and absol.: in Capenate, id. 33, 26, 8.—In plur.: Capenates, the inhabitants of Capena, Liv. 5, 8, 4; 26, 11, 9; Plin. 3, 5, 8, § 52.—In sing.: Capenas, also a little stream in the grove of Feronia, Sil. 13, 84.—
- B Căpēnus, a, um, adj., of Capena: luci, Verg. A. 7, 697: Porta Capena, a gate in Rome, in the eastern district, now Porta S. Sebastiano, Cic. Tusc. 1, 7, 13; id. Att. 4, 1, 5; Mart. 3, 47; Juv. 3, 11.
CAPE´NA (Eth. Capenas,--ātis), an ancient city of Etruria, which is repeatedly mentioned during the early history of Rome. It was situated to the NE. of Veii, and SE. of Falerii, about 8 miles from the foot of Mt. Soracte. From an imperfect passage of Cato, cited by Servius (ad Aen. 7.697), it would seem that Capena was a colony of Veii, sent out in pursuance of the vow of a sacred spring. (Niebuhr, vol. 1. p. 120; Müller, Etrusker, vol. 1. p. 112.) It however appears, when we first find it mentioned in history, as an independent city, possessing a considerable extent of territory. It is not till the last war of the Romans with the Veientines, that the name of the Capenates appears in the Roman annals; but upon that occasion they took up arms, together with the Faliscans, in defence of Veii, and strongly urged upon the rest of the Etruscan confederation the necessity of combining their forces to arrest the fall of that city. (Liv. 5.8, 17.) Their efforts were, however, unsuccessful, and they were unable to compel the Romans to raise the siege, while their own lands were several times ravaged by Roman armies. After the fall of Veii (B.C. 393), the two cities who had been her allies became the next object of hostilities on the part of the Romans; and Q. Servilius invaded the territory of Capena, which he ravaged in the most unsparing manner, and by this means, without attempting to attack the city itself, reduced the people to submission. (Liv. 5.12, 13, 14, 18, 19, 24.) The blow seems to have been decisive, for we hear no more of Capena until after the Gaulish War, when the right of Roman citizenship was conferred upon the citizens of Veii, Falerii, and Capena (or such of them at least as had taken part with the Romans), and the conquered territory divided among them. Four new tribes were created out of these new citizens, and of these we know that the Stellatine tribe occupied the territory of Capena. (Liv.6.4,5; Fest. s.v. Stellatina. ) From this time Capena disappears from history as an independent community, and only a few incidental notices attest the continued existence of the city. Cicero mentions the Capenas agera s remarkable for its fertility, probably meaning the tract along the right bank of the Tiber (pro Flacc. 29); and on this account it was one of those which the tribune Rullus proposed by his agrarian law to portion out among the Roman people. (Cic. de Leg. Agr. 2.2. 5) This design was not carried out; but at a later period it did not escape the rapacity of the veterans, and all the more fertile parts of the plain adjoining the river were allotted to military colonists. (Cic. ad Fam. 9.1. 7; Lib. Colon. p. 216, where it is, by a strange corruption, called Colonia Capys.) Numerous inscriptions attest the continued existence and municipal rank of Capena under the Roman empire down to the time of Aurelian (Orell. Inscr. 3687, 3688, 3690; Nibby, Dintorni, vol. 1. p. 377), but from this date all trace of it is lost: it probably was altogether abandoned, and the very name became for. gotten. Hence its site was for a long while unknown; but in 1756 a Roman antiquarian of the name of Galetti was the first to fix it at a spot still called Civitucola (now more frequently known as S. Martino, from a ruined church of that name), about 24 miles from Rome, between the Via Flaminia and the Tiber. The ancient city appears, like those of Alba Longa and Gabii, to have occupied a steep ridge, forming part of the edge of an ancient crater or volcanic basin, now called Il Logo, and must have been a place of great strength from its natural position. No remains are visible, except some traces and foundations of the ancient walls; but these, together with the natural conformation of the ground, and the discovery of the inscriptions already cited, clearly identify the spot as the site of Capena. It was about 4 miles on the right of the Via Flaminia, from which a side road seems to have branched off between 19 and 20 miles from Rome, and led directly to the ancient city. It was situated on the banks of a small river now called the Grammiccia, which appears to have been known in ancient times as the Capenas. (Sil. Ital..) Concerning the site and remains of Capena, see Galetti, Capena Municipio dei Romani, 4to., Roma, 1756; Gell, Top. of Rome, pp. 149--151; Nibby, Dintorni, vol. i. pp. 375--380; Dennis's Etruria, vol. i. pp. 183--185.
In the territory of Capena, and near the foot of Mount Soracte, was situated the celebrated sanctuary and grove of FERONIA called by Roman writers Lucus Feroniae and Fanum Feroniae, which seems to have in later times grown up into a considerable town. [FERONIA]
[E.H.B](1) A gate of Rome, now the gate of St. Sebastian, in the southeast part of modern Rome.
(2) A city of Etruria, southeast of Mount Soracté.
An ancient city between the Via Flaminia and the Tiber, S of Soracte on the NE rim of Lago Vecchio, an extinct crater, between two tributaries of Fosso di San Martino, the river Capenas of Silius (13.85), which flows S of Capena to Lucus Feroniae (Sacrofano) and the Tiber. The discovery in 1952 of a number of honorary inscriptions of Imperial date set up by the Capenates foederati has identified the site. Cato (ap. Serv. Aen. 7.697) says that Capena was a colony of Veii and that the Capenates considered themselves Etruscans but spoke a Latin dialect, like the Faliscans. Capena sided with Veii in her war with Rome but was forced to make peace in 395 B.C. (Livy 5.24.3); the Capenates who had deserted to Rome were given full citizenship (Livy 6.4). Subsequently Capena became a municipium foederatum, governed by a single praetor even in Imperial times.
Some traces of the city walls remain, presumably built during the Veientine war. The site is surrounded by necropoleis; the earliest burials are of the 8th c.; the richest, of the 7th and 6th c., have produced a wealth of fantastic impasto vases with incised decoration in an exuberant local style. The tomb goods have connections with Italic material rather than Etruscan; the Tiber highway and the Lucus Feroniae in Capena's territory may explain this.
Feronia is an Italic goddess (Varro Ling. 5.74 calls her Sabine), and her grove by the Tiber, honored by Latins and Sabines alike (Livy 1.30; Dion. Hal. 3.32) was the site of a great annual fair. The sanctuary was sacked by Hannibal in 211 B.C. (Livy 26.11.8). In 47-46 B.C. a colony of Caesar's veterans, Colonia Iulia Felix Lucoferoniensis, was settled here (Cic. Fam. 9.17.2).
The site was identified in 1952; the long Italic forum with its adjacent buildings and a small amphitheater have been excavated, and excavations are in progress. Almost everything is of Augustan date except the foundations of a large Republican temple found in 1961.
BIBLIOGRAPHYR. Paribeni, MonAnt 16 (1906) 277-490; L. R. Taylor, Local Cults in Etruria (PAAR 2, 1923) 40-59; G. Foti, NSc (1953) 13-17; G. Mancini, NSc (1953) 18-28; G.D.B. Jones, BSR 30 (1962) 116-207, 194-95; 31 (1963) 100-58MPI.
E. RICHARDSON