Sentinum: un esempio di integrazione nell'Italia romana

At a short distance from the town of Sassoferrato (AN) are the vestiges of Roman Sentinum. The present essay proposes a connection of this settlement with the gilt bronzes of Cartoceto, which shows two male figures on horseback and two standing female figures, and is one of the very few equestrian sculptural groups to have come down to us from antiquity. Sandro Stucchi proposed an identification of the four statues, respectively, as Nero Caesar, Drusus III, Livia Drusilla, and Agrippina Maior. More recent scholarship dates this bronze group to the Caesarian age and identifies it as depicting, not members of the imperial domus, but members of the senatorial aristocracy who are often attested in the area between Suasa and Sentinum, namely, M(arcus) Satrius, one of the Caesaricides, his mother, his wife, and L(ucius) Minucius Basilus, his adoptive father. The Cartoceto bronzes are possibly related to the so-called “Azaila Bronzes” (Aragon, Spain), consisting in the remains of a male figure, a female figure, and a horse. Today the Spanish sculptural group, initially identified as showing Augustus and Livia, is commonly ascribed to the middle of the first century BC. According to Beltran Lloris, it depicts Q(uintus) Iunius Hispanus, who fought with Caesar in the bellum Gallicum, offering a horse to Juno, the patron of cavalry. If the bronze groups of Cartoceto and Azaila depict indeed, not members of the imperial domus, but members of the senatorial aristocracy, these two splendid monuments would be proof that as early as the first century BC it was possible for exquisite works to be produced even in “minor” municipal realities such as Sentinum and Azaila.