Mediomatrici
{{short description|Belgic tribe}}
{{Location mark
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|caption=Map of Gaul with tribes, 1st century BC; the Mediomatrici are circled.|position=right
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File:Mediomatrici from Spruner map.jpg
File:Maquette GalloRomainMetz.jpg, capital of the Mediomatrici.]]
The Mediomatrici (Gaulish: *Medio-māteres) were according to Caesar a Gaulish tribe at the frontier to the Belgicae dwelling in the present-day regions Lorraine, Upper Moselle during the Iron Age and the Roman period.
Name
They are mentioned as Mediomatricorum and Mediomatricis (dat.) by Caesar (mid-1st c. BC),Caesar. Commentarii de Bello Gallico. 4:10, 7:75. Mediomatrikoì (Μεδιοματρικοὶ ) by Strabo (early 1st c. AD),Strabo. Geōgraphiká, 4:3:4. Mediomatrici by Pliny (1st c. AD),Pliny. Naturalis Historia, 4:106. Mediomatricos (acc.) by Tacitus (early 2nd c. AD),Tacitus. Historiae, 4:70. and as Mediomátrikes (Μεδιομάτρικες) by Ptolemy (2nd c. AD).Ptolemy. Geōgraphikḕ Hyphḗgēsis, 2:9:7.{{Harvnb|Falileyev|2010}}, s.v. Mediomatrici.
The ethnonym Mediomatrici is a Latinized form of the Gaulish *Medio-māteres, which literally means 'Middle-Mothers'. It is formed with the stem medio- ('in the middle, central') attached to a plural form of mātīr ('mother'). The name could be interpreted as meaning 'those who live between the Matrona (Marne) and the Matra rivers' (i.e. the mother-rivers), or possibly as the 'Mothers of the Middle-World' (i.e. between the heaven and the underworld).{{Sfn|Delamarre|2003|pp=220, 222}}
The city of Metz, attested ca. 400 AD as civitas Mediomatricorum ('civitas of the Mediomatrici'), is named after the Celtic tribe.{{Sfn|Nègre|1990|p=155}}
Geography
= Territory =
File:Mediomatrici quater stater Gallica celtiques 832 revers.jpg
The territory of the Mediomatrici comprised the upper basins of the rivers Maas, Moselle and Saar, and extended eastwards as far as the Rhine in the mid-first century BC.{{Sfn|Schön|2006|p=}}{{Sfn|Demougin|1995|p=193}} Ptolemy places them south of the Treviri, between the Remi and the Leuci.{{Cite book|last1=Berggren|first1=J. L.|title=Ptolemy's Geography: An Annotated Translation of the Theoretical Chapters|last2=Jones|first2=Alexander|date=2000|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-0-691-01042-7|pages=103}}
= Settlements =
Their chief town was Divodurum ('place of the gods, divine enclosure'),{{Refn|From Gaulish deuos 'god' attached to duron 'gates' > 'enclosed town, market town').{{Sfn|Delamarre|2003|p=156}}|group=note}} mentioned by Tacitus in the early 1st century AD.{{Sfn|Nègre|1990|p=175}}{{Sfn|Delamarre|2003|p=156}}{{Sfn|Schön|2006|p=}}
A secondary agglomeration, whose original name is unknown, was located in Bliesbruck, in the eastern part of their civitas.{{Sfn|Petit|Santoro|2016|p=}}{{Sfn|Antonelli|Petit|2017|p=}}
History
During the Gallic Wars (58–50 BC), the Mediomatrici sent 5,000 men to support Vercingetorix who was besieged in Alesia in 52.{{Sfn|Demougin|1995|p=183}}{{Sfn|Schön|2006|p=}} In 69–70 of the Common Era, their capital Divodurum was sacked by the armies of Vitellius, and 4,000 of its inhabitants massacred.{{Sfn|Demougin|1995|p=183}} The Romanization of the Metromatrici was apparently slower compared to their neighbours the Treviri.{{Sfn|Wightman|1985|pp=73–74}}{{Sfn|Demougin|1995|p=193}}
Elements of the Mediomatrici may have settled near Novara, in northwestern Italy, where place-names allude to their presence, such as Mezzomerico, attested as Mediomadrigo in 980.{{Cite book|title=Nomi d'Italia : origine e significato dei nomi geografici e di tutti i comuni|date=2006|publisher=Istituto geografico De Agostini|isbn=88-511-0983-4|editor-last=Ambrogio|editor-first=Renzo|pages=384|oclc=605741780}}
References
{{reflist}}
=Footnotes=
{{reflist|group="note"}}
= Bibliography =
{{refbegin|30em|indent=yes}}
- {{Cite journal|last1=Antonelli|first1=Sonia|last2=Petit|first2=Jean-Paul|date=2017|title=L'agglomération de Bliesbruck (Moselle) durant l'Antiquité tardive : entre ruptures et continuités|journal=Gallia. Archéologie des Gaules|volume=74|issue=74–1|pages=149–164|doi=10.4000/gallia.2428|issn=0016-4119|doi-access=free|url=https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01918561/file/Gallia_74-1_149-164_ANTONELLI.pdf}}
- {{Cite book|last=Delamarre|first=Xavier|title=Dictionnaire de la langue gauloise: Une approche linguistique du vieux-celtique continental|date=2003|publisher=Errance|isbn=9782877723695|author-link=Xavier Delamarre}}
- {{Cite journal|last=Demougin|first=Ségolène|date=1995|title=À propos des Médiomatriques|journal=Cahiers du Centre Gustave Glotz|volume=6|pages=183–194|doi=10.3406/ccgg.1995.1608|jstor=24359561|issn=1016-9008}}
- {{Cite book|last=Falileyev|first=Alexander|title=Dictionary of Continental Celtic Place-names: A Celtic Companion to the Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World|publisher=CMCS|year=2010|isbn=978-0955718236}}
- {{Cite book|last=Nègre|first=Ernest|title=Toponymie générale de la France|date=1990|publisher=Librairie Droz|isbn=978-2-600-02883-7|author-link=Ernest Nègre}}
- {{Cite journal|last1=Petit|first1=Jean-Paul|last2=Santoro|first2=Sara|date=2016|title=Le centre public d'une agglomération secondaire de la cité des Médiomatriques : Bliesbruck (Moselle)|journal=Gallia. Archéologie des Gaules|volume=73|issue=73–2|pages=213–283|doi=10.4000/gallia.2734|issn=0016-4119|doi-access=free|url=https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01918939/file/Gallia_73-2_213-283_PETIT.pdf}}
- {{Cite journal|last=Schön|first=Franz|date=2006|title=Mediomatrici|journal=Brill's New Pauly|doi=10.1163/1574-9347_bnp_e728280}}
- {{Cite book|last=Wightman|first=Edith M.|title=Gallia Belgica|date=1985|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=978-0-520-05297-0|author-link=Edith Mary Wightman}}
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{{Peoples of Gaul}}
Category:Historical Celtic peoples