Troesmis Fortress

Troesmis Fortress lies at the place called "Iglița", about 2.5 km north of Turcoaia village, the seat of Turcoaia commune in north-western Tulcea County, on the right bank of the Măcin branch of the Danube. The ancient town covered a large area, between Iglița marsh, Piatra Râioasă hill and the present-day village. The earliest mention of the place is in Ovid's "Epistulae ex Ponto". The Getic fortress was captured around 15 AD by Lucius Pomponius Flaccus. After the Dacian wars, Trajan brought the Fifth Legion Macedonica here, which was stationed at Troesmis until the 160s; two civilian settlements grew up next to the legionary camp. Around 177 to 180, under Marcus Aurelius and Commodus, Troesmis received the rank of municipium. Destroyed in the Gothic invasions of the 3rd century, the town was rebuilt, and under Diocletian it became the headquarters of the Second Legion Herculia; it was rebuilt again under Justinian. The place appears in the Antonine Itinerary, the Tabula Peutingeriana and the Notitia Dignitatum. Two late Roman fortresses can be seen on the ground: the late Roman eastern fortress (4th to 6th centuries), almost square in plan (about 120 x 145 m), with horseshoe-shaped corner towers and early Christian basilicas, and the trapezoidal western fortress, on a promontory 36 m above sea level, visible from far away on the Danube. Between them lay the civilian settlement, bounded by ramparts and ditches. Because the stone was quarried and sold as building material in the 19th century, mostly the core of the walls survives. The site lies in open country, and a tourist sign points the way to the "Troesmis Fortress archaeological site". From the plateau there are views of the Danube and the Măcin Mountains. The "Troesmis Fortress" archaeological site is a category A historic monument, LMI code TL-I-s-A-05952 (RAN code 161473.01), with these components: the Troesmis fortress complex, the Roman settlement, the flat and tumulus necropolis (1st to 7th centuries) and the medieval settlement of the 8th to 12th centuries. Did you know that the law of the municipium of Troesmis survived on bronze tablets? Two of them, stolen and put up for auction in London, were recovered in 2002 by the Romanian authorities working with the British ones. They preserve rules on electing the town's magistrates and its official name from the reign of Marcus Aurelius and Commodus.