Senigallia

Senigallia (or Sinigaglia in Old Italian, Romagnol: S’nigaja) is a comune and port town on Italy's Adriatic coast. It is situated in the province of Ancona in the Marche region and lies approximately 30 kilometers north-west of the provincial capital city Ancona. Senigallia's small port is located at the mouth of the river Misa. It is one of the endpoints of the Massa-Senigallia Line, one of the most important dividing lines (isoglosses) in the classification of the Romance languages. History Senigallia was first settled in the 4th century BC by the gallic tribe of the Senones who had settled the coastal area. In 284 BC the area and the settlement were taken over by Romans, who established the colony Sena Gallica there to control the region they called the Ager Gallicus. "Sena" is probably a corrupted form of "Senones" and "Gallica" (meaning "Gaulish") distinguished it from Saena (Siena) in Etruria. In the prelude to the Battle of the Metaurus between Romans and Carthaginians in 207 BC, Sena Gallica was the southernmost point of Carthaginian General Hasdrubal Barca's invasion of Italy. Senigallia was ravaged by Alaric during the decline of the Roman Empire and fortified when it became part of the Byzantine Empire. It was again laid waste by the Lombards in the 8th century and by the Saracens in the 9th. It was one of the five cities of the medieval Adriatic duchy of Pentapolis.