1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Gnatia

by Thomas Ashby

GNATIA (also Egnatia or Ignatia, mod. Anazzo, near Fasano), an ancient city of the Peucetii, and their frontier town towards the Sallentini (i.e. of Apulia towards Calabria), in Roman times of importance for its trade, lying as it did on the sea, at the point where the Via Traiana joined the coast road,^[1] 38 m. S.E. of Barium. The ancient city walls have been almost entirely destroyed in recent times to provide building material,^[2] and the place is famous for the discoveries made in its tombs. A considerable collection of antiquities from Gnatia is preserved at Fasano, though the best are in the museum at Bari. Gnatia was the scene of the prodigy at which Horace mocks (Sat. i. 5. 97). Near Fasano are two small subterranean chapels with paintings of the 11th century A.D. (E. Bertaux, L’Art dans l’Italie méridionale, Paris, 1904, 135). (T. As.) 

1. There is no authority for calling the latter Via Egnatia.
2. H. Swinburne, Travels in the Two Sicilies (London, 1790), ii. 15, mentions the walls as being 8 yds. thick and 16 courses high.