Cannae

This article is about the town in southern Italy. For other uses, see Cannae (disambiguation).

Remains of Cannae.

Cannae (now Canne della Battaglia) is an ancient village of the Apulia region of south east Italy. It is a frazione (civil parish) of the comune (municipality) of Barletta, a former bishopric and presently a Latin Catholic titular see.

Geography

It is situated near the river Aufidus (the modern Ofanto), on a hill on the right (i.e., south) bank, 9.6 kilometers (6 mi) southwest from its mouth, and 9 km southwest from Barletta.

History

It is primarily known for the Battle of Cannae, in which the numerically superior Roman army suffered a disastrous defeat by Hannibal in 216 BC (see Punic Wars). There is a considerable controversy as to whether the battle took place on the right or the left bank of the river.

In later times the place became a municipium, and remains of an unimportant Roman town still exist upon the hill known as Monte di Canne. In the Middle Ages, probably after the destruction of Canosa di Puglia in the 9th century, it became a bishopric, and again saw military action in the second battle of Cannae, twelve centuries after the more famous one (1018). The town was wrecked in 1083 by Robert Guiscard, who left only the cathedral and bishop's residence, and was ultimately destroyed in 1276.

See also

• Battle of Cannae (216 BC)
• Battle of Cannae (1018)
• Battle of Montemaggiore
• List of Catholic dioceses in Italy

Sources and external links

• GCatholic - data on former and titular bishopric
• This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Cannae". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.

Bibliography

• Hammond, N.G.L. & Scullard, H.H. (Eds.) (1970). The Oxford Classical Dictionary (p. 201). Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-869117-3.
• Berry, Small, Talbert, Elliott, Gillies, Becker, 'Cannae' in Pleiades Gazetteer: http://pleiades.stoa.org/places/442523
• Giuseppe Cappelletti, Le Chiese d'Italia dalla loro origine sino ai nostri giorni, Venice, 1870, vol. XXI, pp. 66–69
• Pius Bonifacius Gams, Series episcoporum Ecclesiae Catholicae, Leipzig 1931, pp. 865–866
• Konrad Eubel, 'Hierarchia Catholica Medii Aevi, vol. 1, p. 162; vol. 2, p. 117
• Bolla De utiliori, in Bullarii romani continuatio, Vol. XV, Rome 1853, pp. 56–61