Italica
This article is about the city. Italica is also the name of the cultivar group of the species Brassica oleracea, commonly known as Broccoli. |
The Roman amphitheatre at Italica seated 25,000 |
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Italica's amphitheatre pit |
The city of
Italica (north of modern day
Santiponce, 9 km NW of
Seville,
Spain) was founded in
206 BC by the
Roman general
Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus in order to settle Roman soldiers wounded in the
Battle of Ilipa, where the
Carthaginian army was defeated during the
Second Punic War. The name Italica bound the
colonia to their Italian origins.
Italica was the birthplace of the
Roman Emperors
Trajan and
Hadrian. Hadrian's generosity to his home town, which he made a
colonia, added temples, including a
Trajaneum venerating Trajan, and he rebuilt public buildings. Italica's amphitheater seated 25,000 spectators—half as many as the
Flavian Amphitheatre in Rome— and was the third largest in the Roman Empire. The city's Roman population is estimated at 8000. The games and theatrical performances funded by the local aristocracy, who filled the positions of magistrate, were a means of establishing status: the size of the amphitheater shows that the local elite was maintaining status far beyond Italica itself.
The modern town of Santiponce overlies the "old city" of Republican times founded by Scipio and pre-Roman Iberian city. The well-preserved city is the
nova urbs magnificently laid out under Hadrian's patronage.
A shift of the
Guadalquivir in its bed, probably as a result of
siltation— a widespread problem in Antiquity that followed
removal of the forest cover—left Italica isolated, high and dry. The city started to dwindle as early as the 3rd century. Later
Seville grew nearby, and no modern city covered most of Italica's foundations. The result is an unusually well-preserved Roman city of
Hispania Baetica, and unexpected riches in the
Museo Arqueologico of Seville, with its famous marble colossus of Trajan. In Italica, cobbled Roman streets are visible, and mosaic floors still
in situ. The excavation of Italica began in 1781 and continues.
*
Italica in Spain*
Italica: Roman city
