Ruscino
- a town of Gallia Narbonensis, on the Pyrenees, now Perpignan, Liv. 21, 24; Mel. 2, 5, 8; Plin. 3, 4, 5, § 32.
RUSCINO(Ῥουσκινόν, Ῥουσκινών), a city of the Volcae Tectosages in Gallia Narbonensis. (Ptol. 2.10.9.) When Hannibal entered Gallia by the Pyrenees, he came to Illiberis (Elne), and thence marched past Ruscino (Liv. 21.24). Ruscino stood on a river of the same name (Ptol. Strab.): There was a lake near Ruscino, and a swampy place a little above the sea full of salt and containing mullets (κεστρεῖς), which are dug out; for if a man digs down two or three feet, and drives a trident into the muddy water, he may spear the fish, which is of considerable size: and it feeds on the mud like the eels. (Strab. 4. p. 182.) Polybius (Plb. 34.10, ed. Bekker) has the same about the river and the fish, which, however, he says, feed on the plant agrostis. (Athen. 8. p. 332.) The low tract which was divided by the Ruscino is the Cyneticum Littus of Avienus (Or. Mar. 5.565):-- post Pyrenaeum jugum,Jacent arenae littoris Cynetici,Easque late sulcat amnis Roschinus.
Mela (2.5) names the place a Colonia, and so the title appears on coins, COL. RUS. LEG. VI.Pliny calls it Oppidum Latinorum.It seems to have been a Colonia Latina.
The name is incorrectly written Ruscione in the Antonine Itin. and in the Table. It is placed between Combusta [COMBUSTA] and Illiberis, and it is represented by Castel-Roussillonor the Tour de Roussillonon the Tet, the ancient Ruscino, a short distance from Perpignan, the capital of the French department of the Pyrénées Orientales. Perpignanlies on the high-road from France into Spain, and there is no other great road in this part of the Pyrenees.
Ruscino is named Rosciliona in middle age documents, and from this name the modern name Roussillonis derived. Roussillonwas a province of the ante-revolutionary history of France, and it corresponds to the modern department of Pyrénées Orientales.
The river Ruscino or Ruscinus is the Telis of Mela (2.5), the Tet;and we may probably conclude that the true reading in Mela is Tetis. The Tetrises in the Pyrenees, and flows past Perpignaninto the Mediterranean, after a course of about 70 miles. Sometimes it brings down a great quantity of water from the mountains.
[G.L]A town of the Sordones or Sordi, in the southeastern part of Gallia Narbonensis, at the foot of the Pyrenees. It is now Rousillon.
Important Iberian oppidum and subsequently a town of Narbonese Gaul. In antiquity it was the prestigious and active political, commercial, and religious capital of the province of Roussillon, to which it gave its name. The position of this easily defensible hill was an economically effective one, for it lay behind the coastal basins and near the sea, as well as on the formerly navigable river Têt. Thus it was a natural way station on the great route that in prehistoric times was the Heraklean Way, and in Roman times the Via Domitiana, an international route which joined Italy to Iberia and served all of S Gaul.
The city was founded at the beginning of the 6th c. B.C. on a spur overlooking the river Ruscinon, from which Polybios and Strabo say it took its name; it was almost continuously occupied until the Early Middle Ages, when it was supplanted by Perpignan. The spur has steep W, N, and E flanks, and to the S a deep manmade trench separated the settlement from the plateau. The ancient city covered almost 10 ha. Its wealth and historical importance are attested by discoveries, made both by chance and as the result of regular exploration, since the end of the 18th c.
Recent excavations, to be recommenced on a larger scale, have revealed the major periods of occupation. In the 6th c. B.C., a village of modest huts covered the hill. The inhabitants lived by agriculture, fishing, and handicrafts. They already, however, had regular commercial relations with Italy, Greece, Iberia, and the interior of Gaul. In the 4th c. the huts were replaced by houses of dry stones and cobwork, and the use of storage pits dug in the earth became general. This period of occupation was characterized by luxury ceramics imported from Greece. From the 3d to the 1st c. B.C. Iberian was the common language at Ruscino, as is indicated by numerous graffiti on ceramics and the abundance of coins with Iberian inscriptions which circulated in the region along with Massalian and Celtic money.
From the end of the 2d c. B.C. on, with Roman colonization, the settlement underwent a radical transformation. Beautiful houses replaced the earlier, modest dwellings and the luxury items came from Italy. Finally, towards the end of the 1st c. B.C. the town benefited from considerable urban planning: a forum, baths, and other edifices have been located but not yet excavated. The clearing of a large public monument (forum) has yielded some 40 dedications to members of the Julio-Claudian dynasty and to high provincial officials. The finds made on the site since the beginning of the century (sculptures, bronzes, inscriptions, ceramics of every sort, coins) are preserved in the public collections of the town of Perpignan.
BIBLIOGRAPHYR. Lantier, “Antiquités du Roussillon,” REA 21 (1919) 271-89; E. Espérandieu, Inscriptions latines de Gaule Narbonnaise (1929) nos. 614-41; id., Répertoire archéologique des Pyrénées-Orientales (1936) 21-26; G. Claustres, “Stratigraphie de Ruscino,” Etudes Roussillonnaises 1 (1951) 135-95PI; “Informations,” Gallia 8 (1950) 108-10; 11 (1953) 90-93; 12 (1954) 411-12; 14 (1956) 203-5; 17 (1959) 449-50; 20 (1962) 611-12; 22 (1964) 473-74; 24 (1966) 449-50; 27 (1969) 381-82.
G. BARRUOL