Campani

mint probably Neapoli struck in the name of the Campanians (the people of Capua)


Around the mid fifth century BC, Etruscan rule in Campania was challenged by the first attack of Samnite tribes, who swarmed
down from the mountaains and advanced over the Campanian plain, at that time occupied by the Aurunci. This resulted in a
considerable mixing of population ("denizens of the plain" or Campani, as opposed to the "denizens of the mountains" - the Samnites.
According to Diodorus Siculus (Sicilian Greek historian who lived from 90 to 21 BC) this was under the rule of Theodorus (438 or 445 BC),
Titus Livius (421 BC), and under the consulship of C. Sempronius Atratinus and Q. Fabius Vibolanus.
Exact details of the details are unknown, but it seems that Capua was the first to fall, followed by Cumae in 421 BC and perhaps
Dicaerchia (= Pozzuoli).
Strabo (V 4, 4, C 243) wrote around 18 AD "later, when the Campani became established as masters of the city (Cumae), they committed numerous
outrages against the population in general, and, what is more, cohabited with the wives of the citizens". This didrachm, struck during the years 415-400, bears a female head (nymph), head to right on the obverse, hair bound with a ribbon, and a bearded man-headed bull 
advancing r., with a snake between his legs.

[text mostly from the catalogue Numismatica Ars Classica AG Auction 13 1998 no. 28]