Fulginium

Fulginium (Φουλκίνιον, App.: Eth. Fulginas,--ātis: Foligno), a municipal town of Umbria, situated on the Via Flaminia at the western foot of the Apennines. It was distant only 8 miles from Mevania, and 3 from Forum Flaminii. It appears to have been a place of no great importance, at least till a late period, as its name is wholly omitted by Strabo, who enumerates all the other towns on or near the Via Flaminia. But we learn from Cicero that it was a municipal town, though in the subordinate condition of a praefectura. (Municipium Fulginas, Praefectura Fulginas, Cic. Fr. ap. Priscian. 7.14. 70 The notion that it was a foederata civitas rests upon the false reading of Fulginatium for Iguvinatium in Cic. pro Balb. 20 See Orelli, ad loc.) It is mentioned also during the Perusian War in B.C. 41, when it was occupied by Ventidius and Asinius, the generals of Antony. (Appian, App. BC 5.35.) Silius Italicus describes it as situated in an open plain, without walls (8.461): the proximity of the more important towns of Mevania and Hispellum probably kept it from rising to consideration, though its position at the junction of the main line of the Via Flaminia with the same branch which led by Interamna and Spoletium must have been favourable to its development, and it is mentioned as a Civitas in the Jerusalem Itinerary. (Itin. Hier. p. 613.) The modern city of Foligno has risen to importance after the destruction of the neighbouring Forum Flaminii, and is now the most populous and flourishing town in this part of Italy. An inscription discovered here has preserved the name of a local nymph or divinity named Fulginia (Orell. Inscr. 2409): another records the erection of a statue to a certain C. Betuus Cilo, by 15 towns of Umbria, of which lie was the common patron. (Orell. Inscr. 98.) This has been absurdly interpreted as indicating the existence of a league or confederacy of these cities of which Fulginium was the head. (Cramer, Anc. Italy, vol. i. p. 268).

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