Larinum
Larinum is an ancient town located in Italy, approximately fourteen miles from the Adriatic Sea and east of Rome, situated on Mount Arenio. Historically, it was part of the region known as Daunia and is currently within the boundaries of Molise. The town had a significant connection to the Oscan-speaking Frentani tribe and exhibited a degree of political independence. During the third century BC, Larinum emerged as a center for the wool trade and minted bronze coins featuring Greek and local designs. The town played a role in military conflicts during the Second Punic War, and it is particularly noted for a high-profile legal case involving Aulus Cluentius Habitus, defended by the famous orator Cicero in 66 BC. This trial, along with Cicero's oration Pro Cluentio, highlights the social dynamics and violent tendencies of Larinum's citizens. Additionally, archaeological findings, including a bronze tablet from AD 19, reveal insights into Roman senate decrees regarding public performances, thus contributing to our understanding of the cultural and political landscape of the time.
Subject Terms
Larinum
(Larino), an Italian town due east of Rome, fourteen miles from the Adriatic situated on Mount Arenio (Arone) and dominating the valley of the Biferno; it was at one time in Daunia, and is now in Molise
The inhabitants were closely related to the neighboring Oscan-speaking tribe of the Frentani, from which, however, they retained their political independence. A center of the wool trade, Larinum during the third century BC issued bronze coins with Greek and Italian inscriptions and Campanian, Apulian and local designs.
It was involved in some of the military operations of the Second Punic War (218–201 BC), but gained undying notoriety from the trial of a member of one of its leading families, Aulus Cluentius Habitus (66), accused of murdering his stepfather Statius Abbius Oppianicus but successfully defended by Cicero. The orator's speech Pro Cluentio casts a unique and lurid light on a small Italian town during the first century BC, where the citizens (even allowing for a certain exaggeration) appear to have led lives of unceasing acquisitiveness resulting in frequent violent crimes and assassinations.
A bronze tablet found at Larinum, and published in 1978, carries part of a decree of the Roman senate in AD 19 embodying measures directed against public performances on stage or in the arena by members of the senatorial class and equites (knights). The inscription thus confirms and corrects accounts by Suetonius and Tacitus of partly comparable enactments.