Review article

The Plinian peregrine civitates in the territory of present-day Bosnia-Herzegovina

Salmedin Mesihović

Abstract

The work deals with research into the distribution of indigenous
peregrine civitates in the territory of today’s Bosnia-Herzegovina,
based on the Naturalis historia by the Roman encyclopaedist Pliny
(Gaius Plinius Secundus). First some insight is provided into the
context of the facts mentioned in NH, followed by a brief historical
outline. This in turn is followed by presentation of a list of indigenous
civitates, which, based on data from literary sources or epigraphic
monuments, were or may be supposed with considerable certainty
to have been in the territory of today’s Bosnia-Herzegovina in whole
or in part. This constitutes an attempt to ascertain their geographic
position within the system of the Roman provinces of Illyricum
Superior and Illyricum Inferior. This work is not only restricted to those
civitates which Pliny the Elder cited with the number of decuries.
A separate section is dedicated to an attempt to determine the
AD. The author assumes that the Plinian decury corresponded to ten
families, wherein each family would be the equivalent to a traditional
kinship commune. Based on a comparative analysis, the author
assumes that the size of “families” in Illyricum Superior during the
time of Pliny the Elder was 25 persons, so that the total population
of the indigenous peoples, for whom Pliny the Elder provided the
number of decuries, was approximately 360,000.

Keywords

Pliny the Elder; Illyricum; peregrine civitates; decury; commune

Hrčak ID:

75363

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/75363

Publication date:

30.11.2011.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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