CASTRUM SALERNI - 200 BC
To indicate the city as a fortified place, Latin uses three words with similar meanings: "castrum", "castellum", and "oppidum". The term "castrum", with the addition of the term to the name of the place, indicated the camp fortified by the legionaries: these were mostly built in wood, and it is for this reason that today we do not find any trace of them. The entry "oppidum" instead has its original meaning in every space surrounded by walls, and consequently the meaning of a fortified place but also of a city is taken up. The original nucleus of the Roman colony of Salernum was a castrum, a military camp. The Roman castrums were not designed to withstand long sieges, as we are used to seeing in films about medieval castles with catapults, towers, fiery arrows, etc., but they had to prevent enemies militarily "primitive" and militarily backward, armed with a sword, shield and ladder, penetrated inside the military camp. A seri...