Ligures Baebiani

Ligures Baebiani, in ancient geography, a settlement of Ligurians in Samnium, Italy. The towns of Taurasia and Cisauna in Samnium had been captured in 298 B.C. by the consul L. Cornelius Scipio Barbatus, and the territory of the former remained Roman state domain. In 180 B.C. 47,000 Ligurians from the neighbourhood of Luna (Ligures Apuani), with women and children, were transferred to this district, and two settlements were formed taking their names from the consuls of 181 B.C., the Ligures Baebiani and the Ligures Corneliani. The site of the former town lies 15 m. N. of Beneventum, on the road to Saepinum and Aesernia. In its ruins several inscriptions have been found, notably a large bronze tablet discovered in a public building in the Forum bearing the date A.D. 101, and relating to the alimentary institution founded by Trajan here (see Veleia). A sum of money was lent to landed proprietors of the district (whose names and estates are specified in the inscription), and the interest which it produced formed the income of the institution, which, on the model of that of Veleia, would have served to support a little over one hundred children. The capital was 401,800 sesterces, and the annual interest probably at 5%, i.e. 20,090 sesterces (£4018 and £201 respectively). The site of the other settlement—that of the Ligures Corneliani—is unknown.