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

title. My investigation has led to the view, like that of La Regina, that the Pentri of the
central Apennines formed one touta in the period from which our epigraphic evidence
dates, the third and second centuries BC. A touta in Campania probably denoted an
urban community with its civic territory. It is not plausible that the subdivisions of a
touta were the pagi and I have suggested instead that the local units of a touta may have
been urban or pre-urban settlements, some possibly within hill-forts (Monte Vairano,
Curino).
The office of the meddix tuticus was single, eponymous and annual in all regions.
Among the highland Samnites, a meddix tuticus was the leader of the federal state of the
Pentri. In Campania, a meddix tuticus was the leader of a city-state, as the title of meddix
tuticus Campanus suggests, the political leader of the city of Capua. We also have
attestations of the title in Pompeii and Herculaneum. If the names appearing on tile
stamps at Pompeii are those of the names of the meddices tutici of that town, it may be
argued that the office was open to a wide selection of citizens and was probably elective.
The plain title meddix probably stood for the office of meddix tuticus, in those
places where the meddix luticus acted as a civic magistrate. This is argued in the cases of
meddix campanus and meddix pompeianus. In contrast, among the Pentri it may have
been a local magistrate as the meddix of Fagifulae suggests. The title is sometimes
qualified by adjectives which may express particular functions. Among the functions of
the meddix degetasius of Nola was the demarcation of public land and the collection of
public money from fines. The meddix Minervius was probably the superintendent of the
sanctuary of Minerva at Punta della Campanella. The functions of meddix v and meddix
x are unknown.
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