Arecomici


The Arecomici were a Gallic tribe attested by the 1st century BC. They dwelled between the Rhône and the Hérault rivers, around Nemausus.

Name

The meaning of the name Arecomici is unclear. The Gaulish suffix are- meant 'forward', but the translation of the second element, comici, is unknown. The name Volcae stems from Gaulish uolcos.

History

The Volcae Arecomici were probably first officially recognized, or defined, by Rome as an entity around 75 BC. According to anthropologist Michael Dietler, the Roman colonization of the region, which led to the organization of Nemausus as a colonia Latina in the late 1st century AD, "resulted in the ethnogenesis of the Volcae Arecomici out of a formerly fluid coalition of different polities and ethnic groups".
They were indeed part of a political confederation encompassing multiple smaller tribes. In the early first century AD, the Volcae Arecomici were the dominant force of the confederation, ruling over twenty-four subject towns from their new capital Nemausus.

Economy

Coins with the legend "Volcae Arecomici" are dated to 70 BC, after the Roman conquest and the first emissions of coins at Nemausus.