City
Ancone
Ancona
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Ancona takes its name from the Greek word for elbow, after the promontory that curves out into the Adriatic like a bent arm and shelters the harbour. Settlers from Syracuse founded the town around 390 BC, and its coins carried the image as a kind of emblem: a bent arm holding a palm branch. Rome later used it as a naval base, and in AD 115 Trajan gave it a new harbour, honoured by an arch that still stands. The map shows a curious gap here. The roads running south from the town lack their drawn lines, although the distance figures, such as the twelve miles to Osimo, are written in.
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