Submitted for award of PhD September 2006. - King's College London

We have twenty-six iüvilas inscriptions altogether, sixteen of which are made
of terracotta, ten of tufa. 427 It is believed that the tufa inscriptions are more recent
than the terracotta ones. Conway, on the basis of phonetic and morphological
differences and changes in the forms of letters, divided the inscriptions into three
chronological groups. He compared these groups to the forms of letters on legends of
coins minted for Capua, Atella and Calatia, apparently between 268 and
211 BC.
Thus Conway argued that the earliest group of inscriptions was inscribed well before
268 BC, probably in the second half of the fourth century BC, the second group not
long before 268, and the most recent group soon after this date, in the second half of
the third century BC. Buck argued that the earliest inscriptions, the ones which lack
the i and ü, were inscribed at the end of the fourth century BC, while most of the
inscriptions come from the third century BC428. Heurgon and Franchi de Bellis
accepted Conway's groups, with slight corrections, and although they found it
difficult to date the groups, they made no drastic changes to Conway's absolute
chronology. 429 The inscriptions can be therefore divided into the following
chronological groups:
430
1. second part of fourth century BC: ST Cp 8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,
17,19.
2. end of fourth century, beginning of third century BC: ST Cp 18,20,21,22,
23,26,35.
3. Third century: ST Cp 24,25,27,28,29,30,31,32,33,34.
427
Terracotta ones: ST Cp 8-25, tufa ones are: ST Cp 27-35.
428
Buck (1904) 247.
429 Heurgon (1942a) 39-46 cites more recent studies, which suggest that the Capua, Atella and Calatia
minted coins probably only after they revolted from Rome, between 216 and 211, which makes it
difficult to date Conway's groups. Heurgon argued that the forms of letters of the oldest inscriptions
resemble coins minted by Fistelia from the first half of the fourth century. On some of the terracotta
tiles by the side of the text female heads were stamped. Heurgon points out the similarities between
these heads and antefixes from the mid-fourth century BC.
430
Franchi de Bellis (1981) 28.
118