The
Aequi were an
Italic tribe of northeast
Latium and the central
Apennines of
Italy who appear in the early history of
ancient Rome. After a long struggle for independence from Rome they were defeated and substantial Roman colonies were placed on their soil. Only two inscriptions believed to be in the
Aequian language remain. No more can be deduced than that the language was
Italic. Otherwise the inscriptions from the region are those of the Latin-speaking colonists in
Latin. The colonial
exonym documented in these inscriptions is Aequi and also
Aequicoli ("colonists of Aequium"). The manuscript variants of the classical authors present
Equic-,
Aequic-,
Aequac-. If the form without the -coli is taken as an original, it may well also be the
endonym, but to date further evidence is lacking.