L'epigrafe di Costanzo I da Baratti. Nuove osservazioni sull'identità civica di Populonia in età imperiale

Abstract

The severe crisis that struck the physical structures of the city of Populonia during the 1st century BC has led to speculation about the end of municipal institutions and the loss of civic identity since the early Imperial Age. However, a re-examination of an honorary dedication to Constantius I, found near the Gulf of Baratti in the 1920s, allows us to outline, albeit in the context of a city that was by then destructured and polycentric, the persistence, even in the Tetrarchic age, of the civic ordo, reflecting a community still capable of expressing its civic identity trough the dedication of an honorary monument.