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Amiternum was an ancient Sabine city, then Roman city and later bishopric and Latin Church titular see in the central Abruzzo region of modern Italy, located from L'Aquila. Amiternum was the birthplace of the historian Sallust (86 BC).
Amiternum was defeated by the Romans in 293 BC.
It lay at the point of junction of four roads: the Via Caecilia, the Via Claudia Nova and two branches of the Via Salaria.
There are considerable remains of an amphitheatre and a theatre, all of which belong to the imperial period, while on the hill of the surrounding village of San Vittorino there are some Christian catacombs.
A well known Roman funerary relief of the first century BC depicts the Roman funeral procession or pompa.
Geophysical surveys revealed an unexpectedly high concentration of public monuments in the valley settlement, including a forum, basilica, sanctuaries, Thermae, theater, and Amphitheatre, contrasted with a relatively small number of residential buildings. Among these is one of the largest known urban domus in Roman Italy, indicating the presence of a wealthy local elite. The settlement appears to have functioned as a regional administrative, religious, and economic center serving a dispersed population living in surrounding Vicus and Villa rustica.
Other bishops of Amiternum include Quodvultdeus, who encouraged the religious veneration of Victorinus by constructing his tomb, Castorius, who is mentioned by Pope Gregory I, Saint Cetteus, martyred by the Lombards in 597, and Leontius, a brother of Pope Stephen II. The last known bishop is Ludovicus, who took part in a synod held in Rome in 1069.
Circa AD 1060, the bishopric was suppressed and its territory merged into the Rieti. In the mid-13th century the population was transferred to the newly founded town of L'Aquila, which was erected as a diocese by Pope Alexander IV on 20 February 1257, and incorporated the territory of the diocese of Amiternum.Giuseppe Cappelletti, Le chiese d'Italia dalla loro origine sino ai nostri giorni, Volume XXI, Venezia, 1870, pp. 417–418Francesco Lanzoni, Le diocesi d'Italia dalle origini al principio del secolo VII (an. 604), vol. I, Faenza 1927, pp. 359–363Pius Bonifacius Gams, Series episcoporum Ecclesiae Catholicae, Leipzig 1931, p. 851
It has had the following incumbents:
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