Aborigines (mythology) (original) (raw)

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Oldest inhabitants of central Italy in Roman mythology

A map of Latium, claimed homeland of the Aborigines.

The Aborigines in Roman mythology are the oldest inhabitants of central Italy, connected in legendary history with Aeneas, Latinus and Evander. They were supposed to have descended from their mountain home near Reate (an ancient Sabine town) upon Latium, where they expelled the Sicels and subsequently settled down as Latini under a King Latinus.[1][2]

The most generally accepted etymology of the Latin word aborigines is that it derives from _ab origine, according to which they were the original inhabitants of the country, although Cato the Elder regarded them as Hellenic immigrants, not as a native Italian people.[3] For this reason, scholars have argued that the word actually has a pre-Latin origin, which has been lost, and _ab origine is an example of etymological reinterpretation.[4]

Other etymological explanations suggested are _arborigines, meaning "tree-born," and _aberrigines, meaning "nomads". Lycophron calls a people of central Italy _Boreigonoi, meaning "Boreal people".[5]

The Aborigines were possibly descendants of the Pelasgians, the original inhabitants of Greece and surrounding regions,[1][6] or, more precisely, descendants of the Oenotrians, a tribe descended from Pelasgus by Oenotrus, son of Lycaon, primeval king of Arcadia.[7] Their earliest known home was Reate, an ancient Sabine town to the north-east of Latium near Carseoli.[2] These Aborigines were driven from their mountain home by the Sabines and settled on the river Anio.[1] The Sicels, who inhabited Latium at the time, gave way to the Aborigines, and a portion of them emigrated to Sicily, providing the origin for the island's name.[1] The emigration of the Sicels to Sicily is said to have taken place in either 1264 BC[8] or 1035 BC (Thucydides).[1]

The remaining Siculians joined with the Aborigines eventually becoming the people known as Prisci Latini (meaning old Latins), that is Prisci et Latini, or simply Latini.[1] The Aborigines did not become Latini until the reign of their king, Latinus, from whom the Romans attributed their name. This was after the arrival of the Trojans with Aeneas in the aftermath of the Trojan War.[9]

The following list is based on Dionysius of Halicarnassus.[10][11]

All of these cities are claimed to have been taken from the Umbrians.[12] In Latium itself the Aborigines had the cities Antemnae, Caenina, Ficulnea, Tellenae, and Tibur some of which Dionysius attests were taken from the Siculians.[11][13]

  1. ^ a b c d e f Dr. Leonhard Schmitz A History of Rome, From the Earliest Times to the Death of Commodus, A.D. 192. p.8-9
  2. ^ a b Dionysius of Halicarnassus. Roman Antiquities, I.9.
  3. ^ Marcus Porcius Cato. Origines, 5.6.7.
  4. ^ aborigene merriam-webster.com
  5. ^ Lycophron. Alexandra, 1253.
  6. ^ Barthold Georg Niebuhr Niebuhr's History of Rome, vol I note 47
  7. ^ Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, 1.13
  8. ^ Dionysius of Halicarnassus Roman Antiquities I. 22
  9. ^ Dionysius of Halicarnassus Roman Antiquities I.9, 60
  10. ^ Dionysius of Halicarnassus Roman Antiquities I.14, I.15
  11. ^ a b William Smith Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854)
  12. ^ Dionysius of Halicarnassus Roman Antiquities I.16
  13. ^ Dionysius of Halicarnassus Roman Antiquities I.44, II.35