topographically outside Praeneste's domain, in order to say more
forcibly that one must cross still another valley and stream before
reaching the territory of Cave, and so Cave, although dependent upon
Praeneste, by reason of its size and interests, was not a dependent city
of Praeneste, nor was it a part of her domain.[30]

In short, to describe Praeneste, that famous town of Latium, and her
domain in a true if homely way, she was an ancient and proud city whose
territory was a commanding mountain and a number of ridges running out
from it, which spread out like a fan all the way from the Fosso
dell'Ospedalato (the depression shown in plate II) to the Sabine
mountains on the north.


THE CITY, ITS WALLS AND GATES.

The general supposition has been that the earliest inhabitants of
Praeneste lived only in the citadel on top of the hill. This theory is
supported by the fact that there is room enough, and, as will be shown
below, there was in early times plenty of water there; nevertheless it
is certain that this was not the whole of the site of the early city.

The earliest inhabitants of Praeneste needed first of all, safety, then
a place for pasturage, and withal, to be as close to the fertile land at
the foot of the mountain as possible. The first thing the inhabitants of
the new city did was to build a wall. There is still a little of this
oldest wall in the circuit about the citadel, and it was built at
exactly the same time as the lower part of the double walls that extend
down the southern slope of the mountain on each side of the upper part
of the modern town. It happens that by following the edges of the slope