Salassi

The Salassi or Salasses were a Gallic or Ligurian tribe dwelling in the upper valley of the Dora Baltea river, near present-day Aosta, Aosta Valley, during the Iron Age and the Roman period.

Name

They are mentioned as dià Salassō̃n (διὰ Σαλασσῶν) by Polybius (2nd c. BC) and Strabo (early 1st c. AD),^[1] as Salassi by Livy (late 1st c. BC),^[2] as Salassos by Pliny (1st c. AD),^[3] as Salasíon (Σαλασίον) by Ptolemy (2nd c. AD),^[4] as Salassoí (Σαλασσοί) by Appian (2nd c. AD).^[5][6]

The origin of the ethnic name Salassi remains unclear. If Celtic, it may derive from the root sal-, with various possible explanations regarding the word-formation.^[6] According to Cato the Elder and Strabo, the Salassi were a Ligurian tribe.^[7][8]

Geography

The Salassi lived in the upper valley of the Dora Baltea river, where they controlled the Great and Little St Bernard passes in the Alps, collecting road tolls, and gold and iron mines.^[9][10] Their territory was located south of the Veragri, north of the Iemerii and Taurini, west of the Lepontii, Montunates and Votodrones, east of the Acitavones.^[11] According to Cato, they were part of the Taurisci.^[9]

History

They were subjugated by the Roman forces of Claudius in 143 BC.^[9] The Roman Republic took over the rich gold deposits, and a colony was later planted in 100 BC at Eporedia (Ivrea) to take control of the Alpine route into the Po Valley and guard over the Salassi.^[10]

Relations with the Romans were not uniformly peaceful; Strabo mentions that the Salassi robbed Julius Caesar's treasury and threw rocks on his legions on the grounds that they were making roads and building bridges.^[12] There may have been a Roman campaign against the Salassi in 35 or 34 BC, launched from the valley of the Isère river under Antistius Vetus^[13] or Marcus Valerius Messalla Corvinus.^[14]

For their last decade of freedom the Salassi – alongside some other, mainly Alpine, tribes subjugated by 14 BC – were almost the only remaining groups not under Roman control in the Mediterranean basin. After the Battle of Actium in 31 BC the Roman world was united under one ruler, Augustus, who could concentrate Roman forces against remaining holdouts.^[15]

They were definitively conquered by Aulus Terentius Varro Murena in 25 BC, and the colony of Augusta Praetoria (modern Aosta) was founded in the following year with 3,000 settlers.^[10] Strabo records that two thousand Salassi were killed and all the survivors, nearly 40,000 men, women, and children, were taken to Eporedia and sold into slavery. However, some remained; an inscription found near the west gate of Augusta Praetoria Salassorum is a dedication to Augustus dated 23 BC of a statue (?) by "the Salassi who had joined the colony from its beginning."^[15]

References

1. Polybius. Historíai, 34:10:18; Strabo. Geōgraphiká, 4:6:5.
2. Livy. Ab Urbe Condita Libri, 5:35:2.
3. Pliny. Naturalis Historia, 3:134.
4. Ptolemy. Geōgraphikḕ Hyphḗgēsis, 3:1:10.
5. Appian. Illyr., 17.
6. Falileyev 2010, s.v. Salassi.
7. Strabo, Geography, Book IV, Chapter 6
8. Pliny, Natural History, Book 3, paragraph 20
9. Graßl 2006.
10. Salway & Potter 2016.
11. Talbert 2000, Map 18: Augustonemetum-Vindonissa, Map 39: Mediolanum.
12. Strabo Geography 4.6.7
13. Rivet 1988, p. 78.
14. Syme R. The Augustan Aristocracy. OUP 1989. pp 204-5
15. "Roman Italy in the North: II—-Aosta". The Nation. New York. 8 August 1907. Retrieved 22 April 2016.

Primary sources

• Appian (2019). Roman History. Loeb Classical Library. Translated by McGing, Brian. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0674996472.
• Livy (2019). History of Rome. Loeb Classical Library. Translated by Yardley, J. C. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0674992566.
• Pliny (1938). Natural History. Loeb Classical Library. Translated by Rackham, H. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0674993648.
• Polybius (2010). The Histories. Loeb Classical Library. Translated by Paton, W. R.; Walbank, F. W.; Habicht, Christian. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-99637-3.
• Strabo (1923). Geography. Loeb Classical Library. Translated by Jones, Horace L. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0674990562.

Bibliography

• Falileyev, Alexander (2010). Dictionary of Continental Celtic Place-names: A Celtic Companion to the Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World. CMCS. ISBN 978-0955718236.
• Graßl, Herbert (2006). "Salassi". Brill's New Pauly. doi:10.1163/1574-9347_bnp_e1027950.
• Salway, Peter; Potter, T. W. (2016). "Salassi". Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Classics. doi:10.1093/acrefore/9780199381135.013.5669. ISBN 9780199381135.
• Rivet, A. L. F. (1988). Gallia Narbonensis: With a Chapter on Alpes Maritimae : Southern France in Roman Times. Batsford. ISBN 978-0-7134-5860-2.
• Talbert, Richard J. A. (2000). Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0691031699.