Hadrumetum, also known by many variant spellings and names, was a Phoenician colony that pre-dated Carthage. It subsequently became one of the most important cities in Roman Africa before Vandal and Umayyad conquerors left it ruined. In the early modern period, it was the village of Hammeim, now part of Sousse, Tunisia.
A number of punic steles were found during excavations at the site of the modern day Église Notre-Dame-de-l'Immaculée-Conception de Sousse.
Names
The Phoenician and Punic name for the place was (), "Southern", or (), "The Southern". A similar structure appears in the Phoenician name for old Cadiz, which appears as Gadir ("Stronghold") or Agadir ("The Stronghold").
The ancient transcriptions of the name show a great deal of variation. Different Greeks hellenized the name as Adrýmē (), Adrýmēs (), Adrýmēton (), Adrýmētos (), Adramýtēs (), and Adrámētós (). Surviving Roman inscriptions and coinage standardized its latinization as Hadrumetum but it appears in other sources as Adrumetum, Adrumetus, Adrimetum, Hadrymetum, etc. Upon its notional refounding as a Roman colony, its formal name was emended to Ulpia Trajana Augusta to honor its imperial sponsor.
It was renamed Honoriopolis after the emperor Honorius in the early 5th century, then Hunericopolis after the Vandal king Huneric and Justinianopolis after the Byzantine emperor
Geography
Hadrumetum controlled the mouth of a small river on the Gulf of Hammamet (), an inlet of the Mediterranean along the Tunisian coast.
History
Phoenician colony
In the 9th centuryBC, Tyrians established Hadrumetum as a trading post and waypoint along their trade routes to Italy and the Strait of Gibraltar. Its establishment preceded Carthage's but, like other western Phoenician colonies, it became part of the Carthaginian Empire following 's long siege of Tyre in the 580s and 570sBC.
Carthaginian city
Agathocles of Syracuse captured the town in 310BC during the Third Sicilian War, as part of his failed attempt to move the conflict to Africa. Hadrumetum later provided refuge to Hannibal and other Carthaginian survivors after their 202BC defeat at Zama, which decided the outcome of the Second Punic War. The total length of the Punic fortifications was apparently ; some ruins survive.
Roman city
During the Third Punic War, the government of Hadrumetum supported the Romans against Carthage and, after Carthage's destruction in 146BC, it received additional territory and the status of a free city in thanks. During this period, it chose its own shufets () and minted its own bronze coins with the head of "Neptune" or the Sun.
During the civil war between Pompey and Julius Caesar, G. Considius Longus secured Hadrumetum for the Optimates with forces equivalent to two legions. Despite being reinforced by Gn. Calpurnius Piso's Berber cavalry and footmen from Clupea, however, he was obliged to allow Caesar to land nearby on 28 December 47BC. According to Suetonius, this landing was the occasion of the famously deft recovery, when Caesar tripped while coming ashore but dealt with the poor omen by grabbing handfuls of dirt and proclaiming "I have you now, Africa!" () Caesar's attempts to negotiate with Longus were rejected but the campaign subsequently led to his victory over Metellus Scipio and Juba at Thapsus, after which Longus was killed by his own men for the money he was carrying and the town went over to Caesar.
Hadrumetum was one of the most important communities in Roman North Africa because of the fertility of its hinterland (modern Tunisia's Sahel), which made it an important source of Rome's grain supply. It quarreled with its neighbor Thysdrus over the temple of a goddess equated to Minerva, which stood on their shared border.
Under Augustus, Hadrumetum's coins bore his face obverse and the name (and often face) of Africa's proconsul reverse; after Augustus, the mint was closed. Hadrumetum revolted while Vespasian was proconsul of Africa. It nonetheless continued to prosper; Trajan gave it the rank of a Roman colony, giving its residents Roman citizenship. A breathtaking legacy of intricate mosaics survives from this era, together with many early Christian objects from the catacombs. It was the second city in Roman Africa after Carthage and the birthplace of Clodius Albinus, who attempted to become emperor in the 190s. At the end of the 3rd century, it became the capital of the new province of Byzacena (modern Sahel, Tunisia).