Adunicates

The Adunicates were a small Gallic tribe dwelling in the upper Durance valley during the Roman era.

Name

They are mentioned as Adunicates by Pliny (1st c. AD).^[1]

The etymology of the name is unclear. If Celtic, it may be interpreted as a haplology (loss of syllable) of Gaulish *Andedunicates, based on the intensifying prefix ande-. In this view, it could be compared to the personal names Andedunis and Atedunus ('big fort').^[2]

Geography

The Adunicates lived in the upper Durance valley.^[3] They are mentioned by Pliny as living near the Suetrii and the Quariates, north of the Oxybii and Ligauni.^[4]

On the coast too are Athenopolis of the Massilians, Fréjus, a colony of the eighth legion, called Pacensis and Classica, a river named Argenteus, the district of the Oxubii and Ligauni, beyond whom come the Suebri, Quariates and Adunicates.

— Pliny 1938, Naturalis Historia, 3.35.