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

urubla[nu. ant. tiu]rri. 7mefira. faa{m}mant. 81(üvkis). püpid(iis). 1(üvkieis).
m(a)r(a(hi)s). puril(liis). mr
From this amvi[anud eituns ] are so that [ the public house ?] and the Mi[dway
(? ) and the tower]s be defended, which are to the left of the Ga[te Urublan]u.
[From that place to the le]ft of the Urbulanu gate to the Mefira tower
faamant Lucius Popidius son of Lucius (and) Maraeus Purellius son of
Maraeus.
All these eituns dipinti follow the same structure. 746 They begin with the expression
eksuk amvianud, followed by the word eituns and a location usually defined by turri
(tower) or veru (gate), then the only verb faam(m)at (or -ant), and at the end a personal
name or names. The inscriptions were crudely painted in red lettering directly onto
walls, whether brick or stone. Some were later covered with stucco when the buildings
were redecorated, which helped to preserve them. The palaeographic similarities of the
dipinti suggest that they were painted by the same hand. They were painted in prominent
locations and set high above the ground (higher than the electoral inscriptions).
Mommsen and Conway argued that the dipinti were advertisements of some kind,
while Campanile put forward the idea that they were electoral notices datable to the first
century AD. 747 Conway believed that the eftuns dipinti date from the first century AD
because their preservation is so good. These views were superseded by the arguments
for interpreting the dipinti in the context of defending the town during the Social War.
746
Prosdocimi (1978) 875.
747 For Mommsen and Conway see Conway (1897) 70; Campanile (1996) 375.
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