VOLUBILIS. – A Roman city in the interior of Mauretania Tingitana, present-day Morocco.
It was the residence of King Juba and of the Roman governors.
Christianity is attested by a group of sacred funerary inscriptions whose formula is similar to that of Altava, now Lamoricière in Algeria. These begin either with the cross (X) or directly with “memoria” (Iulii Materni, Iulii Principii), followed by an indication of those (fili, fili et mater, or parentes et nepotes) who “fecerunt domum aeternalem”; then comes the duration of life, followed by the phrase “discessit in pace” and the date, which is given as “anno provinciae” (DLX, i.e. 599; or DLXVI, i.e. 605; or DCXVI, i.e. 655 A.D., of which two other examples are known).
A Julius was “vice pr(a)epositus”; a Julia Rogativa was “de Altava cooptativa,” i.e. originally from Altava but co-opted. V. J. Carcopino, *La fin du Maroc romain*, in *Mélanges d’archéologie et d’histoire*, 58 (1940), pp. 349-448; id., *Le Maroc antique*, Paris 1943, pp. 231-304). These inscriptions represent the latest Christian inscriptions of Roman Africa, which was invaded by the Arabs as early as 647. In the Roman quarter of the 3rd century, a rough ivory statuette of the Good Shepherd was discovered in 1937 (R. Thouvenot, in *Bulletin de la Société de géographie et d’archéologie d’Oran*, 60 [1939], p. 80 and pl. 16, 2). As early as 1891 a Christian censer had been discovered (Comptes-rendus de l’Académie des Inscriptions, 1891, pp. 273-74).