The Romanization of Capua was completed by 59 BC, when it was controlled by a colony of veterans who had fought with Julius Caesar. The Roman times were a time of considerable public and private construction, and a substantial number of monuments significantly changed the town-planning aspect of Capua.
In the 4th century AD the city was still flourishing, so much so that the poet Magnus Ausonius AD appointed it among the eight major cities of the Roman Empire. Later, as with the entire Roman empire, Capua suffered from barbarian assaults.
In it was devastated by the Visigoths of Alaric and in by vandals of Geiseric ; in , with the fall of the Roman Empire, the city was conquered by the Heruli of Odoacer and by Theodoric in Under Emperor Justinian Capua had a period of calm thanks to refurbishing works that Emperor brought to the city.
This new found calm ended with the arrival of the Lombards in Italy. In Capua was the seat of a county under the dependencies of the Duchy of Benevento and for approximately three centuries it was at the center of endless struggles and devastation among the Lombard duchies.
During one of these struggles for the succession of the Duchy of Benevento the Saracens plundered and destroyed Capua in , forcing the majority of the citizens to move with the town name and insignia to "Casilinum", where the escapees founded the "New Capua".
The Lombards took the place of the Normans in , then the Swabians and finally the Anjevin The period corresponding to the Spanish and Habsburg domination remains quite obscure.
As with many places in Italy the origins of the name are subject to much dicsussion. Construction materials for the tower were taken from the Amphitheatre of Capua. The production of mozzarella here has a very long tradition, and it is known that it was made here both in Roman times and also from the early Middle Ages. If you are in the region visiting ancient historical monuments you are also likely to want to visit Herculaneum near Naples. Capua is situated about 30km north of Naples in the Campania region of central Italy.
You can find more local travel ideas in the Campania guide. At Policastro Bussentino you can see the large amphitheatre and a frescoed 2nd century temple of the Mithraeum cult. At Caserta it is the vast Royal Palace and its extensive parks and gardens that attracts the crowds.
Montepulciano Montepulciano is one of our favourite Tuscan towns Malcesine Malcesine is a pretty small town on the shores of Lake Garda Bellagio The harbour village of Bellagio is a pretty village on Lake Como Agrigento Agrigento in Sicily has several impressive Greek temples.
Italy This Way - copyright - :: privacy policy. Regions Hotels Search. Lombardy Sicily Tuscany Venice All regions. Capua, Italy: places of interest in the ancient roman town of Capua. It was from ancient Capua that the real Spartacus launched an escape from the main ludus in Capua, and spent nearly three years engaged in war against Rome. It was considered able to provide Rome with thirty thousand infantry and four thousand cavalry in times of war.
But Capua would prove an untrustworthy ally of Rome during the Second Samnite War, so after the conflict, Rome would confiscate the land on the right bank of the River Volturno for the settlement of Romans, while the authority of Medicines singular: Meddix , the native governing officials in Campania, was limited and superseded by the Praefecti Capuam Cumae, who were governing officials appointed by the Roman Senate for the region of Campania.
Capua unsuccessfully petitioned Rome to elect one of its consuls from the city, perhaps in the event of a Carthaginian takeover of Rome itself to ensure the Roman seat of power could be transferred to Capua itself. But Rome's refusal would compel the ruling oligarchy in Capua to voluntarily switch its allegiance and open its gates to Hannibal Barca, who made the city his winter quarters in BCE. Capua would be retaken in a siege by Rome in BCE and its inhabitants punished by the sacking of the city.
After which, the native magistracies Medicines were abolished, the surviving inhabitants were stripped of Roman citizenship and the territory was declared Ager Publicus belonging to the Senate and the People of Rome. The land around Capua was settled by military veterans from Rome and Latium, most of which were settled at the new colonia of Volturnum and Liternum. The aftermath of the Second Punic War would see the development of the Munera from a funerary custom to a popular spectator sport.
Campania was the testing ground for what would become the arena games. While most of ancient Capua was destroyed in the Dark Ages, several parts of it remain standing. The remnants of ancient Capua's city center are located in the modern city of Santa Maria Capua Vetere.
Following its destruction, the city of Capua was rebuilt a short distance north east of the old city center. Later, the modern city of Santa Maria Capua Vetere was built on top of much of the land that included ancient Capua prior to its destruction. Some notable sites from ancient Capua are still standing today, many of which can be toured for a small ticket fee.
The Capua Amphitheater, built either in the 's BC or the 's AD, is still standing and offers tours and a museum. The amphitheater is believed to either have held the real ludus Batiatus from which the real Spartacus and of his fellow gladiators escaped in 73 BC, or was built on top of it.
It is open to visitors for tours and also includes a gladiator museum. The following text is quoted from Plutarch's Lives: Crassus.
The insurrection of the gladiators and the devastation of Italy is commonly called the war of Spartacus. One Lentulus Batiatus trained up great many gladiators in Capua, most of them Gauls and Thracians , who, not for any fault by them committed, but simply through the cruelty of their master, were kept in confinement for this object of fighting one with another.
Two hundred of these formed a plan to escape, but being discovered, those of them who became aware of it in time to anticipate their master, being seventy-eight, got out of a cook's shop chopping-knives and spits and made their way through the city, and lighting by the way on several wagons that were carrying Gladiators ' arms to another city, they seized upon them and armed themselves.
And seizing upon a defensible place, they chose three captains, of whom Spartacus was chief, a Thracian of one of the nomad tribes, and a man not only of high spirit and valiant, but in understanding, also, and in gentleness superior to his condition, and more of a Grecian than the people of his country usually are.
When he first came to be sold at Rome, they say a snake coiled itself upon his face as he lay asleep, and his wife, who at this latter time also accompanied him in his flight, his countrywoman, a kind of prophetess, and one of those possessed with the bacchanal frenzy, declared that it was a sign portending great and formidable power to him with no happy event.
First, then, routing those that came out of Capua against them, and thus procuring a quantity of proper soldiers' arms, they gladly threw away their own as barbarous and dishonorable.
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