Earliest sources of reference indicate a pre-Estruscan settlement in Pesaro. The city was founded as Pisaurum by the Romans in 184 BC as a colony of the Picentes, an early Italic people who lived on the northeast coast of Italy during the Iron Age. However, in 1737, 13 ancient votive stones were unearthed in a local Pesaro farm field, each bearing the inscription of a semone or Roman god; these were written in a pre-Estrucan script, indicating a much earlier occupation of the area than the 184 BC Picentes colony.