Nicopolis ad Nestum
Nicopolis ad Nestum , Nicopolis ad Mestum or Nicopolis ad Nessum was an ancient Roman city that is today in the Blagoewgrad Oblast in southwestern Bulgaria .
location
The ruins of Nicopolis ad Nestum are today near the village of Garmen (Bulgarian Гърмен) in the area of Martschow Tschiflik and Chisarlaka, 7 km east of the town of Goze Deltschew .
The city was built on the right bank of the Mesta (Greek and in ancient times: Nestos ). The original city extended over an area of 25,000–30,000 m². The town's plan was an irregular square. Nikopolis ad Nestum was surrounded on all sides by high city walls. The city walls, which are still preserved today as ruins, date from the 4th century AD. Only ruins remain of the city. Most of the buildings were destroyed by fire.
The Mesta separates the Pirin Mountains in the west from the Western Rhodopes in the east. Nicopolis ad Nestum is located in the northeast of this basin in the upper Mestatal between the two mountains, a little closer to the Western Rhodopes than to the Pirin Mountains.
history
Nicopolis ad Nestum was founded in 106 by the Roman emperor Trajan established (98-117), in honor of his victory over the people of the Dacians in the Second Trajan's Dacian Wars (105-106). There was previously a Thracian settlement on the site . The name of the city Nicopolis ad Nestum means "City of Victory, located on Nestos" after the river Nestos (Bulgarian Места / Mesta).
At the beginning of the 2nd century, the cities of Nicopolis ad Nestum, Nicopolis ad Istrum and Marcianopolis were founded in the Roman province of Thracia , and many other settlements received town charter, including Pautalia (today Kjustendil ), Serdica (today Sofia ), Augusta Traiana (today Stara Sagora ), Traianopolis (Traianopolis in Rhodope, 5 km east of Alexandroupoli ), Plotinopolis (near Didymoticho ) and Hadrianopolis (today Edirne )
The valley of the Mesta was assigned to the Roman province of Thracia as early as 45 AD. Nicopolis ad Nestum was one of three fortified cities that Trajan founded on the occasion of this victory in the Balkan Peninsula, two of them in what is now Bulgaria.
Nicopolis ad Nestum had a good connection to the ancient road network. The city was on the road that led south to the Aegean Sea . This road ended in the south in the city of Drama on Via Egnatia . The Via Egnatia was an important Roman road that ran from west to east on the north coast of the Aegean and connected the Adriatic area with Constantinople.
To the north, the road from Nicopolis ad Nestum leads over the Rhodope Mountains and the Upper Thracian Plain to Philippopolis (today Plovdiv ). Its location on the street encouraged Nicopolis to grow into an economic, political and cultural center during its heyday in late antiquity in the 2nd to 6th centuries. In addition, the Rhodope Road led from the Struma River in the west via Nicopolis ad Nestum to Adrianopolis.
Coin finds and altar reliefs testify to the worship of the gods Zeus , Pluton , Hermes , the Thracian rider , Asclepius and Hygieia , as well as the river god Mesta and Ares and Dionysus, who were worshiped by the Thracians .
At the end of the 6th century the city was destroyed by the Slavs and Avars . In the 9th to 10th centuries the city emerged again under the name Nicopol, existed until the 13th century and went under during the Crusades . In the late Middle Ages there was a Bulgarian settlement on part of the former city and a large Ottoman estate (çiftlik) in the south-eastern part of the fortified city. During the Ottoman rule, the settlement was relocated a few kilometers to the west, whereby the name Nicopolis in the version Newrokop (bulg. Неврокоп) was retained. Newrokop is today's Goze Deltschew .
During excavations, a 280 m long city wall was uncovered as well as the foundations of administrative buildings and buildings with religious functions. A tumulus ( barrow ) can be seen next to the city . The archaeologists have found fragments of votive offerings from the Thracian rider, a small statue of the god Hermes , 95 gold coins and 22 bronze coins from the end of the 6th century, an old Christian tombstone, vessels made of glass and bronze, ceramics and a gold ring.
Some of these finds are exhibited in the Goze Deltschew Historical Museum. The remains of a basilica from the early days of Christianity (4th century) were found near Nicopolis ad Nestum. It is believed that the basilica also belonged to the city. The basilica has mosaic floors with geometric and natural motifs. In this so-called “Basilica No. 1” there are several mosaic floors in opus sectile technique, which are very much influenced by the northern Greek-Macedonian region in terms of motifs and style.
The remains of the city wall, which are up to 6 m high in places, and the ruins of the city wall tower and the houses can still be seen today. Likewise the ruins of the public baths ( thermal baths ) in the southern part of the city center, built in the 3rd or 4th century. The individual rooms of the bathroom can be recognized: changing rooms ( apodyterion ), warm pool ( caldarium ), cooling room ( frigidarium ) and warm air heating ( hypocaust ). The southern city wall with a length of 200 m and the gate guarded by two square towers have been extensively archaeologically examined. The two towers faced a wide-open semicircular exedra . The remains of four round towers were also found on the southern city wall.
A representative residential building with a peristyle (courtyard with colonnade) was found in the south-eastern part of the fortified urban area, in the immediate vicinity of the city walls . The pillars of the peristyle were originally part of another building and have then been adapted for the portico (colonnade).
The archaeologists excavated a round altar table made of white marble. It is only preserved in fragments and was 1.15 m in diameter. It is a representative piece of late antique stone carving. The table shows four scenes - three hunting scenes and one scene with bizarre marine creatures - and four human heads between each scene.
Coins
Nicopolis ad Nestum only minted coins once (as "Nicopolis ad Mestum"), between February 211 (death of Septimius Severus ) and December 211 (assassination of Geta ), with the heads of Caracalla , Geta and Julia Domna and various representations on the reverse ( Tyche , Hygieia , Ares , Nemesis etc.). Coins from other emperors (e.g. Commodus ) mentioned in catalogs are forgeries or coins from other cities (e.g. Nicopolis ad Istrum in Moesien). All real pieces are rare. Holger Komnick, author of the only comprehensive scientific study of the city's coins to date, describes a total of 237 specimens. In his review of the book, Francis Jarman speaks of a "grand total of about 300 [known coins]". Images can also be found in Ivan Varbanov's well-known catalog, although the coin descriptions are not always correct and the rarity and value information given there is dubious.
Titular bishopric
Nicopolis ad Nestum belonged to the diocese of Thracia. The city was the seat of an archbishop. The Roman Catholic Church still appoints a titular bishop for the Archdiocese of Nicopolis ad Nestum . See titular Archbishopric Nicopolis ad Nestum .
tourism
Nicopolis ad Nestum is the only ancient Roman city in the Rhodope Mountains. It has been declared an archaeological and architectural monument of antiquity and the Middle Ages by Bulgaria.
In 2004, EU funds were made available for excavations, restoration work, conservation work and renovation work on the tourist infrastructure within the framework of the PHARE program for the promotion of cross-border cooperation between Bulgaria and Greece ("Promotion of cultural, tourist and human resources in the border region"). The work was carried out from 2006. By the end of the tourism project in 2014, 1.17 million euros had been invested.
literature
- Iris von Bredow : Nikopolis 1. In: The New Pauly (DNP). Volume 8, Metzler, Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-476-01478-9 , column 935 f.
- Aleksandra Dimitrova: Nicopolis ad Nestum during the late antique and early Byzantine epoch. In: The Roman and late Roman city. The international conference, Veliko Turnovo 26-30 July 2000. Prof. Marin Drinov Academic Publishing House, Sofia 2002. ISBN 954-430-845-8 , pp. 311-325.
- Svetla Petrova: Nicopolis ad Nestum / Mestum. In: Rumen Ivanov (ed.): Roman Cities in Bulgaria. Corpus of Ancient and Medieval settlements in modern Bulgaria. Vol. 1, Prof. Marin Drinov Academic Publishing House, Sofia 2012, pp. 289-361
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Holger Komnick: The coinage of Nicopolis ad Mestum. Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 2003. ISBN 3-05-003792-X .
- ^ Francis Jarman: A Review of a new catalog for Nicopolis ad Mestum . In: The Celator , 18, 3, March 2004, pp. 34-36.
- ↑ Ivan Varbanov: Greek Imperial Coins and Their Values (The Local Coinage of the Roman Empire), volume II: Thrace (from Abdera to Pautalia) . Adicom, Burgas, 2005, pp. 362-273.
- ↑ Restored Ancient Roman City Nicopolis ad Nestum in Bulgaria's Garmen Enjoys Tourism Boom. Archeology in Bulgaria, March 29, 2015
Coordinates: 41 ° 36 ' N , 23 ° 48' E