Armira Roman Villa

 archaeological site, Roman Empire, interesting place, listed building / architectural heritage, archaeology museum, 100 Tourist Sites of Bulgaria, 1st century construction

Villa Armira (Bulgarian: Вила „Армира“) is a 1st century suburban Roman villa in Southeastern Bulgaria, located in the proximity of Ivaylovgrad, Haskovo Province.
In 1964, while building a dam, developers accidentally stumbled upon traces of an ancient building. The archaeological excavations that followed revealed the remains of a suburban villa, dated from the period when the Roman Empire reigned over what is now a Bulgarian territory. It was named Armira Villa, after the small tributary of the River Arda whose bank the villa was built on.
The villa was luxurious, with remarkable design, magnificent marble decorations and original floor mosaics. It is one of the oldest and most precisely dated Roman villa complexes studied so far in Bulgaria, and also the most luxurious private palace from the Roman period discovered on the territory of modern-day Bulgaria. It was built in the second half of the 1st century AD by a renowned Thracian aristocrat as a centre of a large estate in the valley of Armira River. An impressive 3,600 sq. m two-storey building with a panoramic terrace and many different rooms and premises surrounding an outdoor pool from three sides used to stand in a beautiful garden suited for walks. The first floor alone had 22 rooms.
Gradually, the villa grew too small for its owners and at the beginning of the 3rd century, it was extended to the east by adding a spacious guest hall – triclinium and service premises. Part of the building had a hypocaust – a Roman heating system, traces of which can still be seen today.
A studio for arts with the white marble produced in the region was founded at Armira Villa as early as the first half of the 2nd century. Masters from the town of Aphrodisias in Asia Minor, where the biggest sculpture school in the world in Roman times was set up, were invited to work in the studio. Thanks to them, the villa gradually took on the brilliant and splendid look of a real Roman palace.
The entire first floor was clad with perfectly shaped marble tiles and panels. They used to cover the walls of the corridors and all the rooms accessible to guests from floor to ceiling, as well as the pool itself which was surrounded by a wall colonnade and a beautiful fence. Nearly 3000 very well preserved marble fragments were discovered during the excavations.
Site № 72b of the Discover Bulgaria National Movement - 100 national tourist sites of the Bulgarian Tourist Union - Armira Roman Era Villa.

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