On the Apennine watershed at the locality of Sant’ Eleuterio in Ariano Irpino, the remains of the ancient center of Aequum Tuticum are visitable. This was a road junction from which numerous roads radiated, connecting north to south the Samnium with Campania, and east to west the Tyrrhenian side with the Adriatic side. In the Republican era, a Via Aemilia linked Aequum Tuticum with Fioccaglia of Flumeri and Aeclanum. In 109 AD, the town was crossed by the Via Traiana and later by the Herculia. Although the toponym Aequum Tuticum alludes to a Samnite settlement, the earliest phase attested by excavations refers to the Imperial age. The most representative structure is a thermal building dating back to the 1st century AD, whose central room was decorated with a black and white tessellated mosaic floor with a pelta motif. A series of rooms arranged in a row, probably interpretable as horrea (warehouses) or tabernae (shops), date to the second half of the 2nd century AD. Behind these, a large rectangular room emerged, likely belonging to a villa with a fine polychrome mosaic floor featuring a complex ornamental motif. The vicus shows continuous habitation at least until the mid-4th century AD, when it was struck by the earthquake of 346 AD, followed by a revival of building activity documented by the mosaic-floored room. In the late antiquity and early medieval period, it was known as S. Eleuterio, identified with the Roman martyr highly venerated in Rome in the 8th century AD. The medieval settlement appears divided into blocks gathered around a courtyard with a well. These rooms incorporate and overlap the Roman and late antique structures, changing their orientation (they rotate by 45°). The study of the medieval ceramic class (glazed, enamelled, and scratched) has suggested a residential presence from the 13th to the 14th century, when the site was once again devastated by an earthquake.
Information on the Archaeological Area of Ancient Aequum Tuticum
locality Sant’Eleuterio
83031 Ariano Irpino (Avellino)
0825.824839
sar-cam.avellino@beniculturali.it
https://www.archeosa.beniculturali.it
Source: MIBACT
