Razed city that rebelled against Rome 'remained uninhabited for over 170 years,' excavations reveal

A city razed by the Romans more than 2,000 years ago after its people rebelled was destroyed so badly that it "remained uninhabited for over 170 years," until it was repurposed into an ancient landfill, according to archaeologists who excavated the ancient site in Italy.

The ruins at Fregellae, about 55 miles (90 kilometers) southeast of Rome, date from the siege and destruction of the city by Roman armies in 125 B.C.

The reason for the rebellion isn't known, but archaeologists think it was because the people of Fregellae had demanded full Roman citizenship, instead of the "second-rate" citizenship — with fewer legal rights, especially regarding the ownership of public lands — that they had been granted by the Roman Republic. This long-running dispute culminated in the Social War roughly a generation later, from 91 to 87 B.C., when many of Rome’s allies in Italy demanded — and received — full Roman citizenship.

But there are few surviving historical records from the time of the Fregellae revolt, so archaeological studies are the best bet for determining what happened there, said Dominik Maschek, a professor of Roman archaeology at the Leibniz Centre for Archaeology and Trier University, both in Germany.

"It is only mentioned in two or three sources," Maschek told Live Science. "We hear about the siege, they tell us these people rebelled against the Romans, but we don't know why."

Related: 'Sensational discovery' of 2,000-year-old Roman Military camp found hidden in the Swiss Alps

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Roman villa

Maschek explained that Italian archaeologists first excavated the site in the 1980s and discovered the remains of murals, floor mosaics, houses and public baths.