ASCOLI(Asculum Picenum), the chief town and a bishop’s see in the Italian province of Ascoli Piceno, situated on a rising ground on the river Tronto (Truentus), a few miles to the west of the Apennines, and commanding a large and fertile plain. It possesses a citadel, a cathedral, built on the site of a basilica erected by Constantine on the ruins of a temple of Hercules, a number of other churches, that of St Francesco dating from the 14th century, and remains of an ancient theatre, temples, <fcc. The city is built of travertine, and many of its public buildings were designed by Cola dell’ Amatrice. It carries on considerable trade, and manufactures woollen cloth, leather, hats, majolica, glass wares, wax, rosoglio, confections, <fcc. Population, 22,937.

Asculum was the chief city of the Piceni, and a place of great strength. It was captured by P. Sempronius Sophus (268 b.c. ), but afterwards took an important part in the Social War, and defied for a time the Roman consul Pompeius Strabo. It fell 89 b.c.; Judacilius, its gallant defender, put an end to his life; its magistrates were executed, and its inhabitants banished. At a later period it received a Roman colony, and recovered its prosperity. In 545 A.D. it was besieged by Totila. It was under the control of its bishops from the 3d to the 13th century; afterwards passed under the power of the Malatesti of Rimini; and in 1426 was annexed to the Papal States by Pope Martin V.