IOVILAE, or JOVILAE  , a latinized form of iuvilas, the name given by the Oscan-speaking Campanians in the 5th, 4th and 3rd centuries B.C. to an interesting class of monuments, not yet fully understood . They all bear crests or heraldic emblems proper to some family or group of families, and inscriptions directing the annual performance of certain ceremonies on fixed days . While some of them are dedicated to Jupiter (in a special capacity, which our present knowledge of Oscan is insufficient to determine), others were certainly found attached to graves . See the articles OSCA LINGUA, CAPUA, CUMAE and MESSAPII . The text of all those yet discovered (at Capua and Cumae), with particulars of similar usages elsewhere in Italy and other historical and archaeological detail, is given by R . S . Conway in The Italic Dialects (Cambridge, 1897, pp . 101 ff.) . A briefer but valuable discussion of the chief characteristics of the group will be found in R. von Planta's Oskisch-umbrische Grammalik, .i . 631 if., and a summary description in C . D . Buck's Osco- Umbrian Grammar, 247 .

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