City
Istonium
Vasto
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Istonium was a coastal settlement of the Frentani, a Samnite people, and lies beneath the Adriatic town of Vasto in Italy. It probably became a Roman municipium only after the Social War, run by a board of four magistrates, though a Roman land-survey book wrongly calls it a colony. Its many inscriptions point to a sizeable community. On the coast near Punta della Penna a milestone turned up bearing the figure four, exactly its distance in Roman miles from the town, about six kilometres. In the sixth and seventh centuries it served as a Byzantine stronghold.