Capena

Capena, an ancient city of southern Etruria, frequently mentioned with Veii and Falerii. Its exact site is, however, uncertain. According to Cato it was a colony of the former, and in the wars between Veii and Rome it appears as dependent upon Veii, after the fall of which town, however, it became subject to Rome. Out of its territory the tribus Stellatina was formed in 367 b.c. In later republican times the city itself is hardly mentioned, but under the empire a municipium Capenatium foederatum is frequently mentioned in inscriptions. Of these several were found upon the hill known as Civitucola, about 4 m. north-east of the post station of ad Vicesimum on the ancient Via Flaminia, a site which is well adapted for an ancient city. It lies on the north side of a dried-up lake, once no doubt a volcanic crater. Remains of buildings of the Roman period also exist there, while, in the sides of the hill of S. Martino which lies on the north-east,1 rock-cut tombs belonging to the 7th and 6th centuries b.c. but used in Roman times for fresh burials, were excavated in 1859-1864, and again in 1904. Inscriptions in early Latin and in local dialect were also found (W. Henzen, Bullettino dell’ Istituto, 1864, 143; R. Paribeni, Notizie degli Scavi, 1905, 301). Similar tombs have also been found on the hills south of Civitucola. G.B. de Rossi, however, supposed that the games of which records (fragments of the fasti ludorum) were also discovered at Civitucola, were those which were celebrated from time immemorial at the Lucus Feroniae, with which he therefore proposed to identify this site, placing Capena itself at S. Oreste, on the south-eastern side of Mount Soracte. But there are difficulties in the way of this assumption, and it is more probable that the Lucus Feroniae is to be sought at or near Nazzano, where, in the excavation of a circular building which some conjecture to have been the actual temple of Feronia, inscriptions relating to a municipality were found. Others, however, propose to place Lucus Feroniae at the church of S. Abbondio, 1 m. east of Rignano and 4 m. north-north-west of Civitucola, which is built out of ancient materials. On the Via Flaminia, 26 m. from Rome, near Rignano, is the Christian cemetery of Theodora.