Otricoli is a town and ''

comune The (; plural: ) is a local administrative division of Italy, roughly equivalent to a township or municipality. It is the third-level administrative division of Italy, after regions ('' regioni'') and provinces (''province''). The can also ...

'' in the

province of Terni The Province of Terni ( it, Provincia di Terni) is the smaller of the two provinces in the Umbria region of Italy, comprising one-third of both the area and population of the region. Its capital is the city of Terni. The province came into being ...

Umbria it, Umbro (man) it, Umbra (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , ...

, central

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

. It is located on the Via Flaminia, near the east bank of the

Tiber The Tiber ( ; it, Tevere ; la, Tiberis) is the third-longest List of rivers of Italy, river in Italy and the longest in Central Italy, rising in the Apennine Mountains in Emilia-Romagna and flowing through Tuscany, Umbria, and Lazio, where ...

, some 70 km north of

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

and 20 km south of Narni.

History

Anciently named Ocriculum, the

n city concluded an alliance with

in 308 BC. The modern village lies on the site of the ancient town about two km north of the Roman relocation, which was moved down from the defensible positionThe Roman site was not walled. probably at the end of the Republican era, in order to be closer to the curve of the

and the Via Flaminia, which crossed the river here to enter Umbria. Its river port was the "oil port", signalling the olive culture that supported its economy. A ''pensor lignarius'' ("weigher of wood") noted in a recently unearthed inscription, identifies a trade in timber and perhaps firewood (Soprintendenza per i Beni Culturali).

Main sights

Excavations on the Roman site in 1775 and following years led to the discovery of the baths, a

theatre Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The perform ...

, a

basilica In Ancient Roman architecture, a basilica is a large public building with multiple functions, typically built alongside the town's Forum (Roman), forum. The basilica was in the Latin West equivalent to a stoa in the Greek East. The building ...

and other buildings. In the baths were found a number of works of art, now in the

Vatican Vatican may refer to: Vatican City, the city-state ruled by the pope in Rome, including St. Peter's Basilica, Sistine Chapel, Vatican Museum The Holy See * The Holy See, the governing body of the Catholic Church and sovereign entity recognized ...

, including the mosaic pavement of the Sala della Rotonda, Museo Pio-Clementino, and the celebrated head of

Zeus Zeus or , , ; grc, Δῐός, ''Diós'', label= genitive Boeotian Aeolic and Laconian grc-dor, Δεύς, Deús ; grc, Δέος, ''Déos'', label= genitive el, Δίας, ''Días'' () is the sky and thunder god in ancient Greek reli ...

and the head of Claudius, both also shown in the Sala della Rotonda. A badly-eroded

amphitheatre An amphitheatre (British English) or amphitheater (American English; both ) is an open-air venue used for entertainment, performances, and sports. The term derives from the ancient Greek ('), from ('), meaning "on both sides" or "around" and ...

is still visible, but the other buildings have in the main been covered up again. Lack of consistent archaeological investigation has left the layout and extent of the Roman site unclear, though many works of art have been removed. Some finds are shown in the ''Antiquarium'' on the site.

References

Sources

External links

Official websiteSoprintendenza per i Beni Culturali, Otricoli - Parco archeologico
Hilltowns in Umbria {{Umbria-geo-stub