HONORVM SVORVM.
Of this last inscription M. Renier supplies two additional lines, and gives the following rendering. It was found on an altar, the lower part of which was probably buried when Bruce saw it.
‘Mercurio Augusto sacrum. Marcus Aurelius, Quinti filius, Papiria tribu, Aemilianus quaestor, aedilis, duumvirum, statuam, quam, ob honorem duumviratus, ex sestertium quinque milibus nummum pollicitus est, posuit, inlatis rei publicae legitimis honorum suorum summis et at fori straturam cubis decem, idemque dedicavit.’[40]
As appears from its name, Diana was inhabited, and probably founded, by a colony of veterans of the Third Legion. This remark, that the town is situated at the foot of Djebel Mestowa, which has always served as a centre of resistance under the Berbers, Turks, and French, favours the impression that it was the same under the Romans. This, no doubt, also induced the Byzantines to build a fortress there, 230 feet square, the walls of which are still standing.
Diana existed in A.D. 160, as is proved by a dedication to Antoninus Pius in the last year of his reign. It had the title of Municipium, and, according to Morcelli,[41] was several times favoured by the munificence of the Emperor.
Fidentius, a Donatist bishop of Diana, assisted at the Council of Carthage in 411.
It appears not to have been destroyed, like Lambessa and Timegad, for at the period of the Arab conquest it was the capital of the region. Moula Ahmed[42] thus mentions it:—
‘When Sidi Okba had conquered the people of Lambessa, he asked which was the strongest city in the country. They replied that it was Diana, where there was a king, chief of the Christians of Zab, a country containing 360 bourgades, having each an Emir. El-Yakoubi says that Adanaa was the largest city in the Western Zab. Okba there encountered the people of the country, and a great battle ensued. The Mohammedans triumphed over the Christians, of whom the greatest part were destroyed, and their power ceased in the province.’
Diana disappeared as a city in the tenth century. El-Bekri,[43] who places it at two days’ journey from Tobna, states that it was ruined in 935, by Ali ben Hamdoun El-Andalousi, governor of Zab, and the faithful servant of the Fatemites. The inhabitants had probably taken part in the great religious and political insurrection which began in the Aures, and of which Abou-Yezid was the promoter.
El-Bekri also states that the Haoura, who dwelt near Magra, having carried off the women of Diana, the inhabitants pursued the ravishers and killed a great number and delivered their women. The battle took place on the banks of a river, which took the name of Oued-en-Nissa (the river of women).