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'Ameria' is a city of Umbria, situated about 65 miles north of Rome on the Via Amerina (which approached it from the South starting from Falerii and passing through Castellum Amerinum, probably mod. Orte, where it crossed the Tiber). The modern town, below the fortified city walls, is called Amelia.
It has a fine position, 1332 feet above sea-level, and still retains considerable remains of the city wall, built in polygonal masonry of carefully jointed blocks of limestone, some 12 feet in total thickness, and showing traces of reconstruction at different periods. Various remains of the Roman period exist between the walls, including a large water reservoir divided into ten chambers. After the Roman conquest the town gained political status as a ''municipium''. The citizens were assigned to the ''tribus Clustumina''.
Pliny the Elder (''Historia Naturalis'' 3.114 reports that Cato stated that Ameria had been founded 963 years before the war with Perseus (171-167 B.C.) or in 1134 B.C. This date cannot be considered accurate in any case.
The lofty campanile of the cathedral was erected in 1050 with fragments of Roman buildings. Ameria is not mentioned in the history of the Roman conquest of Umbria, but is alluded to as a flourishing place, with a fertile territory extending to the Tiber, by Cicero in his speech in defence of Sextus Roscius Amerinus, and its fruit is often extolled by Roman writers.
Augustus divided its lands among his veterans, but did not plant a colony here. The bishopric of Ameria was founded in the middle of the 4th century.