The article presents archival and survey data pertaining to Crustumerium, the
northernmost of the Latin settlements on the left bank of the Tiber near the Via Salaria. The
archaeological finds are represented on phase maps.
The earliest finds, datable to the early Iron Age, shows a sparse but continuous settlement
in keeping with the proto-urban model introduced into Latium Vetus from southern Etruria.
The density of the finds in the settlement gradually increases over the 7th and 6th centuries
B.C. and decreases over the course of the 5th century B.C. This trend inversion is probably
connected with the definitive conquest (499 B. C.) by Rome, which incorporated the settlement
into the territory of the Clustumina tribe (495 B. C.). The sharp drop in the evidence from
the 4th-3rd centuries B. C. attests the rise of farms on the urban area, which by this time
had become an integral part of the Roman suburbium.
