Ancient Greek City of Histria

 ruins, ancient, archaeological site, fortification

On the bank of lake Sinoe, at a distance of 500 stadia from the mouth of river Istros (as Strabo tells us), lies the Ancient City of Histria, the first Greek colony on the west shores of the Black Sea and oldest city within the boundaries of today Romania.
The colony was founded in the middle of the 7th century BC. (year 657 BC according to historian Eusebius) by colonists from Milet, to trade with the native Getae. The city had an uninterrupted growth for 1300 years, beginning with the Greek period and ending with the Roman - Byzantine period.
To the north Sinoe Lake was an open bay and to the south was another bay which served as the port. On the highest point of the coastal plain the acropolis was established with the sanctuaries. The settlement, erected in the 6th century, was 1/2 mile (800 meters) further west. It had a strong defense wall, collected water by aqueducts 12.5 miles (20 km) long, and had streets paved with stones.
In the archaic and classical periods, when Histria flourished, it was situated near good arable land. It served as a port of trade soon after its establishment, with fishing and agriculture additional sources of income. By 100 AD, fishing was almost the only source of Istrian revenue. There is no archaeological evidence indicating that trade with the interior preceded the foundation of Istros. Traders penetrated to the interior through Istros and the valley of the Danube, demonstrated by finds of Attic black-figure pottery, coins, ornamental objects, an Ionian lebes and many fragments of amphoras. Amphoras have been found in great quantity at Histria, some imported but some local – local pottery was produced following establishment of the colony and certainly before mid-6th century.
Around the turn of the millennium, Histria became a Roman town. In the Roman period between the 1st and 3rd centuries AD, temples were built for the Roman gods, as well as a public bath and houses for the wealthy. Altogether, it was in continuous existence for some 14 centuries, starting with the Greek period up to the Roman-Byzantine period. The Halmyris bay where was the city founded was closed by sand deposits and access to the Black Sea gradually was cut. Trade continued until the 6th century AD. The invasion of the Avars and the Slavs in the 7th century AD almost entirely destroyed the fortress, and the Istrians dispersed; the name and the city disappeared.
The ruins of the settlement were first identified in 1868 by French archaeologist Ernest Desjardins. Archaeological excavations were started by Vasile Pârvan in 1914, and continued after his death in 1927 by teams of archaeologists led successively by Scarlat and Marcelle Lambrino (1928–1943), Emil Condurachi (1949–1970), Dionisie Pippidi, Petre Alexandrescu and Alexandru Suceveanu.
The town of Histria was founded in 654 BC. The town wall had a long and complex development over the centuries.
The territory of the Greek colony initially set on the coastal plain was divided into two main distinct areas, following an urban model known in the Greek colonial world. The highest quarter was chosen for the erection of the acropolis, possibly fortified at that time.
The large civil area to the west was surrounded by a 2.5m or less wide precinct wall that encompassed a surface of ca. 50ha. It consisted of a mud-brick and wooden superstructure, plated with square limestone plaques set in the pseudo-isodomic system of masonry on a bed of limestone and green schist ashlars. Both fortified urban cores were seriously modified in the late 6th c. BC.
The demographic and economic progress attested in the Classical period required the building of a new 2.60m, green schist and limestone wide wall, oriented north-south, that enclosed ca. 35ha. It protected the main area of the town and was doubled by a 9m wide defensive ditch at 7-9m to the west of the wall. At least two gates pierced the precinct wall. This surrounding wall was destroyed in the second half of the 4th c. BC. The west edge of the plateau continued to be fortified with a wall similar to that of the archaic period, with minor repairs and a 3m wide ditch to the west.
Two new defence walls were built in the Hellenistic period, one protecting the acropolis, and another, to the west, along the plateau edge, roughly surrounding the same large area as in the Classical period.
The acropolis' 4.50m wide precinct wall encompassed ca. 9ha. The new layout of the defence wall was a continuous line broken at spots which met the need for curtain towers. This wall consists of two trunks each built of well-chiselled large-sized stone ashlars set alternatively on edge and width and bounded with clay and schist boulders. In the late 4th or in the early 3rd c. BC the plateau edge was surrounded by a new 2.20m wide enclosure wall built of schist ashlars bound with earth and mud-bricks set in a rectangular moulds superstructure. The two double precincts ensured the town protection until the late 1st c. AD.
The economic prosperity as well as the demographic and urban development under the 1st c. A. D. Roman administration necessitated the reshuffling of the structure and layout of the entire occupied area. A new town wall was built by the late 1st – early 2nd c. AD, which expanded considerably the activity on the large sandy plateau to the west. It encompassed a large area of ca. 30ha and cut the plateau roughly on a north-south direction. The new precinct, built in opus caementicium of green schist ashlars set in regular horizontal courses bounded with mortar, was 1.80-1.90m wide and set on a ca. 2.10m deep socle-like foundation. The wall had two gates and interior bastions and rectangular towers built at regular intervals. The south gate was flanked by two protruding rectangular towers. The town wall seems to have suffered some damage in the second half of the 2nd c., probably during the Marcommanic wars. Repair works implemented in a less careful technique were identified at some sections of the wall. In the mid-3rd c. Histria was severely damaged, a fact that rendered indispensable the construction of a new surrounding wall from the outset.
The new town wall enclosed a much smaller area compared to the previous ones, which resulted from the intentional abandonment of a large zone on the west plateau. The new precinct was built in several phases in the second half of the 3rd c., beginning during Probus’ reign. A Tetrarchic inscription mentions important repairs and rebuilding. The new 2.10-2.60m thick precinct enclosure consisted of a straight wall line built in opus quadratum of large rectangular ashlars and reused material of the 1st-3rd c. The excavations yielded evidence of 8 bastions and 6 towers that divided the west front line in ten curtain walls. There have been identified five main building phases (A-E), dated between the late 3rd and the late 6th c. In its final layout the town wall had six gates, of which the most important was the so-called ‘big gate’ flanked by two large bastions and two towers. The precinct had two earthen walls and ditches as adjacent elements of fortification.

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