Baetulo
In: Hispania Antigua. Arqueológica: 14, 2022
DOI: 10.48255/9788891327734.04
Baetulo was settled in the NE of Hipania Citerior. The town was an ex-novo foundation that could be part of an urban foundation program promoted by Rome at the end of the II century and the beginning of the I century BC. Pliny mention Baetulo as an oppidum civium romanorum, which means a fortified urban settlement with a consolidated presence of Roman citizens. Its location had the specific purpose to be one of the main structures on the new territorial organisation in the Laietanian region. The foundational chronology has been set around the eighties and the seventies of the I century BC by context of early archaeological levels inside the urban limits and the first occupation on the surroundings.
By the time of its foundation, Baetulo was surrounded by a wall which delimited a perimeter of 14 hectares in an orthogonal urban grid and one irregular outline on the western flank to adapt the boundaries to the topography. Regarding interior distribution, recently has been published a new hypothetical plan that establishes 10 decumani and 4 cardines which delimitated 43 insulae with three different measures: on the upper side they measure 60 by 36 m, and in the lower side, caused by steepest slope, they have the opposite orientation and two different measures on its short side between 27m and 60 m.
The forum location has been established based on the analysis of internal distribution and orientation. The estimate space would occupy two insulae, with an articulating function that allowed the transition between the upper and the lower sides. The forum emplacement on the promontory southern limit would reinforce its scenic vision and would be magnified with a theatre built at the beginning of the II century AD.
The republican town experienced a first transformation in Augustan Age and last until the end of Julio-Claudian Age, when evidence of urban and architectonical developments increased. In the Flavian Age it has been recorded another transformation term that might be related with the grant of the Ius Latii. Although most of the archaeological works show a diminution of occupation in the urban plot, a new building impulse has been documented both in public and private constructions at the beginning of the II century AD. The most relevant buildings from this period were the theatre, for the public area, and Quintus Licinius domus articulated around a large rectangular perystilum probably over 1000 m2, for the private area.
There is also epigraphic evidence that indicate municipal activity, a pedestal with an honorary inscription, the first testimony from municipal organization, dedicated to Antoninus Pius with the formula Decreto Decurionum. From this moment, municipal institutions and their magistrates have been documented epigraphically in Baetulo. That fact stands the town flourishing during the II and the III century AD, when epigraphic honorary inscriptions dedicated to emperors Gordian III, his wife Sabina Tranquilina and Philip I shown proves of vitality and municipal power in full activity even though it has been recorded more evidence of abandonment especially in the town lower side.
In the IV century AD, important transformations took place with new occupations, whereas they had been irregular in terms of spatial and functional distribution, without orthogonal distribution inside insulae or connections between them. In addition, between IV and V centuries AD, funerary structures are documented intramuros, sharing space with habitat areas. Finally, in the VI century AD, some findings proved that Baetulo had become a small, inhabited nucleus around a place of Christian worship.
Regarding the suburban areas, archaeological works allowed to understand the occupation and settlement in the western suburbium where it was found some areas near the via Augusta as habitat, craft/productive areas, and necropolis. This evidence confirms the occupation of suburban areas before the foundational chronology of Baetulo until the VI centuries AD.