ATINA  , the name of three

ancient towns of Italy . 1 . A town (mod . Elena) of Lucania, upon the Via Popillia, 7 M . N. of Tegianum, towards which an ancient road leads, inthe valley of the river now known as Diano . Its ancient importance is vouched for by its walls of rough cyclopean work, which may have had a total extent of some 2 M . (see G . Patron in Notizie degli scavi, 1897, 112; 1901, 498) . The date of these walls has not as yet been ascertained, recent excavations, which led to the discovery of a few tombs in which the earliest objects showing Greek influence may go back to the 7th century B.C., not having produced any decisive evidence on the point . To the Roman period belong the remains of an amphitheatre and numerous inscriptions . 2 . A town (mod .

Atina) of the

Volsci, 12 M . N. of Casinum, and about 14 M . E. of Arpinum, on a hill 1607 ft. above sea-level . The walls, of carefully worked polygonal blocks of stone, are still preserved in parts, and the modern town does not fill the whole area which they enclose . Cicero speaks of it as a prosperous country town, which had not as yet fallen into the hands of large proprietors; and inscriptions show that under the empire it was still flourishing . One of these last is a boundary stone relating to the assignation of lands in the time of the Gracchi, of which six other examples have been found in Campania and Lucania . 3 . A town of the Veneti, mentioned by Pliny, H . N. iii . 131 .