Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography/Atre'bates
ATRE'BATES or ATREBATI fATp/^oroi, Streb. p. 194), one of the Belgic nataoos (Caesar, B. G. ii. 4), or a people of Belgium, in the limited sense in which Caesar sometimes uses that term. They were one of the Belgic peojdes rho had sent settlers to Britannia, long before Caesar's time {B. G. V. 12); and their name was retained by the Atre- bates (k Britannia. The Atrebates of Belgium were between the rivers Somme and the Sehdde^ and the position of their chief town Nemetocenna {B. G. viii 46) or Nemetacum, is that of Arras, in the modern French department of Pas de Calais, (m the Scarpe, The Morini were between the Atrebates and the sea. Their country in Caesar's time was marshy and wooded. The name Atrebates is partly preserved in Arras, and in the name of Ariois, one of the ante- revolutionary divisions of France. In the middle- age Latin Artois is caUed Adertisus Pagus. But it Is said that the limits of the Atrebates are not indi- cated by the old province of Artois, bnt by the ex- tent of the old diocese of Arras. Atrecht, the German name of Arras, is stall nearer to the form Atrebates.
In Caesar's Belgic War, b. c. 57, the Atrebates supplied 15,000 men to the native army (£. G. ii. 4), and they were defeated, together with the Nervii, by Caesar, in the battle on the banks of