River
Fluvius Matava
Metauro
Listen to the story
Hasdrubal, Hannibal's brother, was defeated and killed by the Romans in 207 BC on the banks of Fluvius Matava, the river now called Metauro in the Italian Marche. Its name is written in red at the mouth, on land, because there was no room for it at the source. Right beside it stands a road station bearing the proper form, Mataurum, so the strange reading Matava, found nowhere else, is probably the copyist's misreading of a worn original, and a sign he did not know the region. The map lets the river rise near a temple of Jupiter at Gubbio, which really fits only its tributary, the Burano.