European Kingdoms

Marrucini (Sabellians) (Italics)

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What are generally known as West Indo-European tribes arrived at the eastern edge of Central Europe around 2500 BC. Their northern group later became the proto-Celts of the Urnfield culture while the southern group seemingly migrated westwards and southwards, reaching Iberia, Illyria, and northern Italy.

Already further divided into semi-isolated tribes, they became more civilised in their habits and available forms of technology due to contact with southern Greeks and Etruscans. In the period between the eleventh to eighth centuries BC some of those groups in Illyria crossed by sea into the Italian peninsula and settled along the south-eastern coast.

Those who had entered peninsular Italy via the north Italian piedmont gradually migrated southwards to occupy much of the rest of eastern and central Italy. These tribes all formed part of a general group which are known as Italics, seemingly part of the main population of West Indo-Europeans prior to the emergence of Celtic culture.

The Marrucini group of Italics during the Italian Iron Age were located in the eastern centre of the Italian peninsula, between the central Apennines and the Adriatic coast. The were neighboured to the north by the Picentes and Vestini, by the Frentani to the south, and by the Samnites and Paeligni to the west.

The Oscan-Umbrian group of which the Marrucini were part are largely accepted as being Indo-Europeans (perhaps proto-Celts) who migrated into the peninsula from the north. They settled in communities which were centred on Teate (modern Chieti), with secondary settlements at Aternum (Pescara, shared with the Vestini), Ceio (modern San Valentino), Civitas Danzica (modern Rapino), and Iterpromium (the ruins survive underneath Casauria's Abbey of San Clemente).

Along with other ancient writers, Strabo and Pliny state that the Picentes and Samnites were originally tribes of the Sabellians. This was a collective of central Italian Iron Age tribes which comprised the Marrucini, Marsi, Sabini, and Vestini.

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(Information by Peter Kessler, with additional information by Edward Dawson and Anne S E Wittelsbürger, from Samnium and the Samnites, E T Salmon, from Researches into the Physical History of Mankind, Vol 3, Issue 1, James Cowles Prichard, from Pliny's Natural History in Thirty-Seven Books, Volumes 1-3, Pliny (the Elder), from An Historical Geography of Europe, Norman J G Pounds (Abridged Version), from The Roman History: From Romulus and the Foundation of Rome to the Reign of the Emperor Tiberius, Velleius Paterculus, J C Yardley, & Anthony A Barrett, from A Genetic Signal of Central European Celtic Ancestry, David K Faux, from The Horse, the Wheel, and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World, David W Anthony, from The History of Rome, Volume 1, Titus Livius (translated by Rev Canon Roberts), from The Histories, Herodotus (Penguin, 1996), from Encyclopaedia Britannica (Eleventh Edition, Cambridge (England), 1910), from Encyclopaedia of the Roman Empire, Matthew Bunson (1994), from Paleo-Balkan Languages, V Neroznak, from Ancient Languages of the Balkans, R Katicic, from The Etymological Dictionary of the Russian Language, M Fasmer, from Basic Romance Linguistics, E Bourcier, from Research in Popular Latin and its links with Romance languages, N Korletyanu, from Brief Historical Grammar of the Latin Language, W Lindsey, from The Corpus of Oscan Inscriptions, I Tsvetaev, from A Historical Grammar of the Latin Language, I Tronsky, and from External Links: The Beaker phenomenon and the genomic transformation of northwest Europe (Nature), and Massive migration from the steppe was a source for Indo-European languages in Europe (Nature.com), and Indo-European Chronology - Countries and Peoples, and Indo-European Etymological Dictionary, J Pokorny, and Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, William Smith (1854, Perseus Digital Library), and The Natural History, Pliny the Elder (John Bostock, Ed), and Geography, Strabo (H C Hamilton & W Falconer, London, 1903, Perseus Online Edition), and L'Arbre Celtique (The Celtic Tree, in French), and Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz or Dictionnaire Historique de la Suisse or Dizionario Storico dell Svizzera (in German, French, and Italian respectively), and Le Alpi (Università di Trento), and Pleiades (Ancient World Mapping Center and Institute for the Study of the Ancient World).)

c.900s BC

The central eastern region of Italy is first settled, by an Italic people who become known as the Picentes. Strabo claims that they are part of a group which is known as the Sabellians (along with the later Marrucini, Marsi, Sabini, Samnites, and Vestini). They possibly eject mixed settlements of Siculi and Liburni to take the land, pushing the former inhabitants southwards.

This map shows not only the greatest extent of Etruscan influence in Italy, during the seventh to fifth centuries BC, but also Gaulish intrusion to the north, which compressed Etruscan borders there (click or tap on map to view on a separate page)

9th - 7th century BC

With the beginning of the Italian Iron Age, signs of territorial variation begin to emerge, although the gradual differentiation between a western area, an eastern area, and an Alpine area will only acquire more consistency in the seventh century BC. This is the Golasecca I A period.

Probably by this period the Frentani have occupied the territory in the modern region of Molise, on the Adriatic coast, immediately north of the Gargano promontory.

Their migration there seems to detach them from the main Samnite body, and gives them a border close to the River Aternus, which places them on the southern flank of the later Marrucini (probably still part of the Sabellian collective at this time).

Objects which have been found in tombs in the Como region of Italy testify to the progressive opening up by the Golasecca people to exchanges with the transalpine world to the north and the central-Italic Etruscan area to the south

c.580 BC

By this stage, the Samnites are undoubted masters of the central southern Apennines, probably having evicted or absorbed any remaining Opici and pushing their remnants towards the Tyrrhenian coast of Italy.

The Opici appear quickly to disintegrate as a recognisable group, although they survive for a few more centuries as a weak and unimportant people who are located between Rome and the Samnites.

Their disintegration appears to be speeded up by their fragmentation into various smaller groups which include the Aequi, Brutii, Hernici, Lucani, Marrucini, Marsi, Picentes, Sabini, Samnites, Vestini, and Volsci. This process occurs between the tenth and sixth centuries BC, and it leaves the core group of Opici with little remaining substance.

325 - 309 BC

The Marsi ally themselves with the Romans as a means of removing Samnite mastery over them, while the Dauni, Iapyges, Lucani, Messapii, and Peucetii side with the Samnites at the start of the Second Samnite War.

The Opici probably dominated much of Campania to start with, but were pushed out of the eastern parts by the Samnites, dominated themselves by the Etruscans, and then defeated by Rome

It is in this period that the Marrucini are first documented historically, when they are recorded as being confederates of the Marsi, Paeligni, and Vestini tribes.

304 BC

The Samnites are defeated by Rome, ending the Second Samnite War. Their confederates, the Frentani, Marrucini, Marsi, and Paeligni, voluntarily accept their reintegration into Roman administrative rule. All the other Samnite allies are also subjugated by Rome. This period proves to be the end for the Golasecca culture within the Italian Iron Age.

218 - 202 BC

The Second Punic War starts at Saguntum (near modern Valencia) in Iberia. Hannibal Barca attacks Roman territory, leading his armies over the Alps into Italy. While encouraging the reluctant Romans to commit to battle, he marches through the country devastating the lands of Rome's Italic allies, including that of the Marrucini, Marsi, and Paeligni.

Despite winning the anticipated battle at Cannae, Hannibal is eventually defeated by Scipio Africanus at the Battle of Zama in 202 BC, thereby ending the war.

The Roman baths at Teate (which survive in the modern city of Chieti) show that this Marrucini city in Italy was developed following the tribe's integration into the Roman republic in the fourth century BC

91 - 89 BC

Along with Etruscans, Lucani, Marsi, Paeligni, Picentes, Samnites, and Vestini, the Marrucini fight the Social War (Italian War, or Marsic War) against Rome. The war is the result of increasing inequality in Roman land ownership, and the spark for conflict is delivered by the assassination of the reforming Marcus Livius Drusus, whose efforts would have led to citizenship for all of Rome's allies.

91 - 89 BC

Marrucini leader during the Social War. Killed in action.

89 - 88 BC

Marrucini leader during the Social War. Killed in action.

89 - 88 BC

Although defeated, the Italic tribes are granted the Roman citizenship which had previously been withheld from them. Little is known about the Marrucini in general, and after the war they appear quickly to fade away, being absorbed into the dominant Latin culture of Rome.