City
Brindisi
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Brundisium already carries its late form Brindisi on the Tabula, the very name the Italian port still bears. The Greek geographer Strabo explains it as the Messapian word for a stag's head, because the branching harbour resembled a set of antlers. The town marked the end of the Via Appia and was the usual place to embark for Greece, and the Roman writer Pliny counted its harbour among the best in Italy. Virgil died here in 19 BC, returning from Greece. On the map, the road line to Spelunis is missing, though its distance figure is written.