Paeligni

The Paeligni or Peligni were an Italic tribe who lived in the Valle Peligna, in what is now Abruzzo, central Italy.

History

The Paeligni are first mentioned as a member of a confederacy that included the Marsi, Marrucini, and Vestini, with which the Romans came into conflict in the Second Samnite War, 325 BC. Like other Oscan-Umbrian populations, they were governed by supreme magistrates known as meddices (singular meddix). Their religion included deities, such as the Dioscuri, Cerfum (a water god), and Anaceta (the Roman Angitia), a goddess associated with snakes.

On the submission of the Samnites, they all came into alliance with Rome in 305–302 BC, the Paelignians having fought hard against even this degree of subjection. Each member of the confederacy entered the alliance with Rome as an independent unit, and in none was there any town or community politically separate from the tribe as a whole. Thus the Vestini issued coins of its own in the 3rd century; each of them appears in the list of the allies in the Social War. How purely Italic in sentiment these communities of the mountain country remained appears from the choice of the mountain fortress of Corfinium as the rebel capital. It was renamed Vitellio, the Oscan form of Italia, a name which appears, written in Oscan alphabet, on the coins struck there in 90 BC. The Paeligni were granted Roman citizenship after the Social War, and that was the beginning of the end of their national identity, as they began to adopt Roman culture and language.

Gentes of Paeligni origin

• Ovidia gens

Language

Paelignian
Native to	Samnium, Campania, Lucania, Calabria and Abruzzo
Region	south and south-central Italy
Extinct	1st century BC
Language family	Indo-European Italic Osco-Umbrian Oscan Paelignian
Writing system	Latin alphabet
Language codes
ISO 639-3	pgn
Glottolog	pael1234

The Paelignian language is known from around sixty inscriptions dating to the 2nd and 1st centuries BCE, most of which come from Superaequum, Corfinium, and Sulmo. The majority of Paelignian inscriptions are short, with the longest one only containing thirty-six words. One feature of Paelignian is the use of postpositions, as in Vestine Poimunie-n, "in templo Pomonali"; pritrom-e, i.e. in proximum, "on to what lies before you". Others are the sibilation of consonantal i and the assibilation of -di- to some sound like that of English j (denoted by l- in the local variety of Latin alphabet), as in vidadu, "viamdö," i.e. "ad-viam"; Musesa = Lat. Mussedia; and the possible loss of d (in pronunciation) in the ablative, as in aetatu firata fertlid (i.e. aetate fertili finita).

Paelignian may showcases evidence of medial vowel weakening: The form hospus, which has been compared with hospes ("guest, foreigner"), may have developed from earlier *hostipots, and the term hanustu—which has been connected with Latin honestus ("honorable")—might reflect a pre-form *hanostā. If the etymology of the latter form is accepted, then it would that—unlike Oscan—vowels in Paelignian underwent weakening when not adjacent to a labial. However, the etymology of both terms is uncertain: hospus, for instance, might have been leveled from a hypothetical genitive singular form itself from *-pot-s, which would have undergone weakening of the vowel in a medial syllable. Likewise, the connection between hanustu and Latin honestus is doubtful on account of the oscillation between the o and a vocalism.

However, the term aetatu exists in contrast the equivalent form aetate found in another Paelignian inscription, perhaps indicating that these texts represent distinct varieties of the language. Various explanations have been offered to explain this discrepancy: the variation aetatu may reflect an archaism, or perhaps a hypercorrection intentionally utilized to distinguish the Paelignian text from Latin writings, which itself may have been motivated by potential anti-Roman sentiments. The epitaph from which the aforementioned phrase is taken was found in Corfinio, the ancient Corfinium, and the perfect style of the Latin alphabet in which it is written shows that it cannot well be earlier than the last century BC: Eite uus pritrome pacris, puus ecic lexe lifar, Latin: ite vos porro pacati (cum bona pace), qui hoc scriptum [hbar, 3rd declination neut.] legistis. The form lexe (2nd plural perfect indicative) is closely parallel to the inflection of the same person in Sanskrit and of quite unique linguistic interest.

The name Paeligni may belong to the NO-class of ethnica (see Marrucini), but the difference that it has no vowel before the suffix suggests that it may rather be parallel with the suffix of Latin privignus. If it has any connection with Latin paelex, "concubine", it is conceivable that it meant “halfbreeds” and was a name coined in contempt by the conquering Sabines, who turned the touta marouca into the community of the Marrucini. But, when unsupported by direct evidence, even the most tempting etymology is an unsafe guide.

Paelignian and this group of inscriptions generally form the most important link in the chain of the Italic dialects, as without them the transition from Oscan to Umbrian would be completely lost. The unique collection of inscriptions and antiquities of Pentima and the museum at Sulmona were both created by Professor Antonio de Nino, whose devotion to the antiquities of his native district rescued every single Paelignian monument that survives.

See also

• List of ancient Italic peoples

References

Bibliography

• Clackson, James (November 11, 2013). "Subgrouping in the Sabellian branch of Indo-European". Transactions of the Philological Society. 113 (1): 4–37. doi:10.1111/1467-968X.12034. ISSN 1467-968X.
• Coleman, Robert (1986). "THE CENTRAL ITALIC LANGUAGES IN THE PERIOD OF ROMAN EXPANSION1". Transactions of the Philological Society. 84 (1): 100–131. doi:10.1111/j.1467-968X.1986.tb01049.x. ISSN 0079-1636.
• Zair, Nicholas (2016-11-01). "Vowel weakening in the Sabellic languages as language contact". Indogermanische Forschungen. 121 (1): 295–316. doi:10.1515/if-2016-0016. ISSN 1613-0405.
• Zair, Nicholas (2017-11-20). Farney, Gary D.; Bradley, Guy (eds.). The Peoples of Ancient Italy. De Gruyter. p. 130. doi:10.1515/9781614513001. ISBN 978-1-61451-300-1.
• This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Paeligni". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 20 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.