Benevento

Benevento (ancient Beneventum), a city of Southern Italy, capital of a Campanian province of the same name, is situated on a hill near the confluence of the Calore and Sabato, 61 miles NE. of Naples by rail. It occupies the site of the ancient city, out of the materials of which it is entirely built, and is surrounded by walls about 2 miles in circumference. It has a citadel, a fine old cathedral, some noteworthy churches, and a magnificent arch, erected in 114 A.D. to the honour of the Emperor Trajan, which, with the single exception of that of Ancona, is the best preserved specimen of Roman architecture in Italy. It is an archiepiscopal see, and has a population of (1891) 26,000, chiefly engaged in the manufacture of leather, parchment, and plated goods. The town was in the possession of the Samnites when history first takes notice of it, and it appears to have been captured from them by the Romans some time during the third Samnite war (298-290 B.C.). It was certainly in the hands of the Romans in 274 B.C.; and six years later they changed its name from Maleventum to Beneventum, and made it a Roman colony. The Carthaginians under Hanno were twice decisively defeated in the immediate neighbourhood during the second Punic war. It rapidly rose to be a place of importance under the Roman empire; under the Lombards, who conquered it in the 6th century, it continued to flourish; and at length it became capital of a duchy which included nearly the half of the late kingdom of Naples. This was seized by the Normans; the town was given (1053) to the pope by the Emperor Henry III. Thenceforward, until 1860, when it was united with the kingdom of Italy, Benevento continued, with slight intervals, to be governed through a resident cardinal with the title of Legate. In 1806 it was bestowed by Napoleon, with the title of prince, on Talleyrand; but it was restored to the pope in 1815.—The province of Benevento has an area of 834 sq. m.; pop. (estimated 1892) 245,834.