mail: Bill Thayer

Italiano

Help

Up

Home

An article from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica, now in the public domain.
Any color photos are mine, © William P. Thayer.

Vol. VII
p637 Cures

Cures, a Sabine town between the left bank of the Tiber and the Via Salaria, •about 26 m. from Rome. According to the legend, it was from Cures that Titus Tatius led to the Quirinal the Sabine settlers, from whom, after their union with the settlers on the Palatine, the whole Roman people took the name Quirites.​a It was also renowned as the birthplace of Numa,​b and its importance among the Sabines at an early period is indicated by the fact that its territory is often called simply ager Sabinus. At the beginning of the imperial period it is spoken of as an unimportant place,​c but seems to have risen to greater prosperity in the 2nd century. It appears as the seat of a bishop in the 5th century, but seems to have been destroyed by the Lombards in A.D. 589. The site​d consists of a hill with two summits, round the base of which runs the Fosso Corese: the western summit was occupied by the necropolis, the eastern by the citadel, and the lower ground between the two by the city itself. A temple, the forum, the baths, &c., were excavated in 1874‑1877.

[T. As.]

---

Thayer's Notes:

a Livy, I.13; Dionys. Hal. II.36, 48; Plutarch, Life of Romulus, 19.7.

❦

b Livy, I.18, 34; Dionys. Hal. II.58; Florus, Epit. I.2.

❦

c Strabo, V.3.

❦

d The scant ruins of Cures are at Arci, a named place between the village of Talocci and the hamlet of Corese Terra, both frazioni of Fara in Sabina. On the map below, I've tagged what seems to me may be some of the ruins, but you should not take the marker too seriously, though it's based on photos and intersecting information, including the claim made on the website of the Agriturismo Borghetto d'Arci that Cures is on their property. Notice that the road leading to this area from the SE corner of the map bears the name Via Città di Curi: we're definitely close.

Some very brief additional information, although with a sketch plan of "a building of the archaic period", could once be found on a now vanished website; and a slightly fuller webpage on yet another site once gave us a few details on Cures and even showed us thumbnail photos of the ruins, but with the continuing constriction of the Web, it too has vanished, not to be replaced; from it we learned that the Roman town and its area have been treated in Da Cures Sabini all' Abbazia di Farfa • Trasformazioni del paesaggio tra Tevere, Corese e Farfa dall' età romana al medioevo, by Tersilio Leggio (Passo Corese, 1992). Cures seems to have had its own amphitheatre, or at least an inscription has been so interpreted: it records a show of five pairs of gladiators given to its inhabitants by a wealthy citizen.

Images with borders lead to more information. The thicker the border, the more information. (Details here.)
UP TO:			Britannica 1911
			LacusCurtius	Home
			Italy
A page or image on this site is in the public domain ONLY if its URL has a total of one *asterisk. If the URL has two **asterisks, the item is copyright someone else, and used by permission or fair use. If the URL has none the item is © Bill Thayer. See my copyright page for details and contact information.