INTERAMNA LIRENAS

interamna lirenas, an ancient town of italy in the volscian territory near the modern pignataro interamna, 5 m. s.e. of aquinum; the additional name distinguishes it from interamna praetuttianorum (mod. teramo) and interamna nahartium (mod. terni). it was founded by the romans as a latin colony in 312 b.c. as a military base in the war against samnium, no fewer than 4000 colonists being sent thither. it was among the latin colonies which in 209 b.c. refused to supply further contingents or money for the hannibalic war. it became a _municipium_ with the other latin colonies, but we hear no more of it--mainly, no doubt, because it lay off the via latina. livy's description of it as on the via latina is not strictly accurate, and cannot be used as an indication that the former course of the via latina was through interamna. the city lay on a hill on the n. bank of the liris, between two of its tributaries, thus lacking natural defences on the n. side alone. many inscriptions have been found, and there are considerable remains of antiquity. one inscription bears the date a.d. 408, and the site was occupied in the middle ages by a castle called terame or termine. (t. as.) intercalary (from lat. _intercalare_, to proclaim, _calare_, the insertion of a day in the calendar), a term applied to a month, day or days inserted between other months or days in order to adjust the reckoning of time, based on the revolution of the earth round the sun, the day, and of the moon round the earth, the lunar month, to the revolution of the earth round the sun, the solar year (see calendar). from the meaning of something inserted or placed between, intercalary is used for something which interrupts a series, or comes between two types. in botany, the term is used of growth which is not apical but somewhere between the apex and base of an organ, such as the growth in length of an iris leaf, or of the internode of a grass-haulm.