Old Latium was, in antiquity, the part of the
Italian peninsula bounded to the north by the
river Tiber, to the east by the central
Apennine mountains, to the west by the sea and to the south by
Monte Circeo. It covered an area measuring just 50 Roman miles.
Mommsen calculated its area at ca. 1,860 square kilometres. It corresponded to the central part of the modern administrative region of
Lazio (
Italy) and was the traditional territory of the
Italic tribe known as the
Latins, to which the inhabitants of the archaic
city of Rome themselves belonged. Later it was also settled by
Rutulians,
Volscians,
Aequi, and
Hernici. It was referred to as "old" (
vetus) to distinguish it from the expanded region, denoted
Latium by later Romans, that included the region to the south of Old Latium, between Monte Circeo and the river
Garigliano - the so-called
Latium adiectum ("attached Latium").