Listed 19 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for wider area of: "CONSTANTA Town ROMANIA" .
TOMI (Ancient city) ROMANIA
Tomis or Tomi (Tomis, Strab. vii. p. 319; Ov. Tr. iii. 9 33; Geogr.
Rav. iv. 6, &c.: Tomai, Ptol. iii. 10. § 8; Tomi, Plin. iv. 11. s. 18; Stat. S.
i. 2, 255; Itin. Ant. p. 227, &c.; in Mela, ii. 2, Tomoe: we also find the Greek
form Tomeus, Steph. B. s. v.; Arrian, Per. P. Eux. p. 24), a town of Lower Moesia,
on the Euxine, and the capital of the district of Scythia Minor (Sozom. H. Eccl.
vii. 25; Hierocl. p. 637). It was situated at a distance of about 300 stadia or
36 miles from Istros or Istropolis (Anon. Per. P. Eux. p. 12; Itin. Ant. p. 227),
but according to the Tab. Peut. 40 miles. It was a Milesian colony, and according
to the legend the place where Medea cut up her brother's body, or where their
father Aeetes got together and buried the pieces (Ov. l. c.; Apollod. i. 9, 25;
Hygin. Fab. 13.) The legend is no doubt connected with the name of the town, which,
however, is still better known as the place of banishment of Ovid. Now Tomisvar
or Jeni Pangola.
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited September 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
ALMYRIS (Ancient city) ROMANIA
A bay of Moesia formed by the southern mouth of the Danube. Upon it was situated a town of the same name.
ISTROS (Ancient city) ROMANIA
(Istropolis), Istros, or Istria (Istrie). A town in Lower Moesia, not far from the mouth of the Danube; a colony from Miletus. Its modern name is Istere.
KALLATIS (Ancient city) ROMANIA
(Kallatis). A town of Moesia, on the Black Sea, originally a colony of Miletus, and afterwards of Heraclea.
TOMI (Ancient city) ROMANIA
Now Tomiswar or Jegni Pangola; a town of Thrace (subsequently Moesia), situated on the western shore of the Euxine, and at a later time the capital of Scythia Minor. It is renowned as the place of Ovid's banishment.
TOMI (Ancient city) ROMANIA
Apsyrtus (Apsurtos). The son of Aeetes, king of Colchis, whom Medea took with her when she fled with Iason. Being pursued by her father, she murdered her brother, cut his body in pieces, and threw them into the sea, that her father might be detained by gathering the limbs of his child. Tomi, the place where this horror was committed, was believed to have derived its name from temno, "cut".
TOMI (Ancient city) ROMANIA
A titular metropolitan see in the Province of Scythia, on the Black Sea. It was a Greek colony from Miletus. In 29 B.C. the Romans captured the country from the Odryses, and annexed it as far as the Danube, under the name of Limes Scythicus. The city was afterwards included in the Province of Moesia, and, from the time of Diocletian, in Scythia Minor, of which it was the metropolis. In A.D. 10 Ovid was exiled thither by Augustus, and died there eight years later, celebrating the town of Tomi in his poems. Few places had so many Christian memories as this town, in the barbarous country of the Getae; e.g. Sts. Macrobius, Gordianus, and their companions, exiled to Scythia and slain in 319, venerated on 13 Sept.; Sts. Argeus, Narcissus, and Marcellinus, also slain under Licinius and venerated 2 Jan.; a great many others whose names only are known, and who are mentioned in the Roman Martyrology for 3 April, 20 June, 5 July, and 1 October. The first bishop may have been Evangelicus, mentioned in the Acts of Sts. Epictetus and Action (8 July), and who must have lived at the end of the third century. Eusebius (De Vita Constantini, III, 7) mentions a Scythian bishop at Nicaea who may have belonged to Tomi. Mention should be made of St. Bretanion, martyred under Valens, and whose feast is observed 25 Jan.; Gerontius, at the Council of Constantinople, in 381; St. Theotimus, writer and friend of St. John Chrysostom, venerated 20 April; Timotheus, at Ephesus in 431; John, ecclesiastical writer, d. about 448; Alexander, at Chalcedon in 451; Theotimus II, in 458; Paternus, in 519; and Valentinian, in 550. The Province of Scythia formed a single diocese, that of Tomi, and autocephalous archdiocese, subject to the patriarch of Constantinople. It is mentioned in 640 in the Ecthesis of Pseudo-Epiphanius (Gelzer, "Ungedruckte . . . Texte der Notitiae episcopatuum", 535). Shortly afterwards the Bulgarians invaded the region and the Archdiocese of Tomi was suppressed. The city subsequently belonged to the Byzantines, again to the Bulgarians, then to the Turks, and finally to the Rumanians since the Treaty of Berlin in 1878. The town of Tomi is near Constantza, the capital of Dobroudja and a port on the Black Sea, which has about 15,000 inhabitants. There is a Catholic parish. A statue of the poet Ovid stands in the chief square.
S. Vailhe, ed.
Transcribed by: Thomas M. Barrett
This text is cited July 2004 from The Catholic Encyclopedia, New Advent online edition URL below.
ALMYRIS (Ancient city) ROMANIA
Station on the right bank of the lower Danube, 9 km E of Salsovia
(Mahmudia). Recent research has identified here two Traco-Getic cemeteries containing
cremation graves from the 3d and 2d c. B.C. At 2 km E of the village are the ruins
of a Roman city with strong walls of stone and a defense ditch. In the interior
are traces of stone buildings, tiles, pottery fragments, and coins from the Roman
Republican and Imperial periods. The ancient name of the settlement is not known
but both Halmyris (It. Ant. 226.4) at 8 Roman miles from Salsovia, and Gratiana
(Procop. De aed. 4.11) have been suggested.
E. Dorutiu-Boila, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Sep 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
ISTROS (Ancient city) ROMANIA
Situated on the W coast of the Black Sea, about halfway between the
mouth of the Danube and the present-day city of ConstanTa. The city was founded
in the 7th c. B.C. by the Milesians within a gulf that was later made into a lagoon.
Lasting until the beginning of the 7th c. A.D., it apparently was abandoned by
its inhabitants, probably as a result of the invasion of the Avari in 587. The
site has never been reoccupied. In the course of its long history Istros experienced
periods of prosperity interrupted by crises that more than once imperiled its
existence. Laid waste for the first time at the end of the 6th c. B.C. (probably
by the Scythians), it was again sacked at the end of the 4th c. (perhaps by Lysimachos),
then about the middle of the 1st c. by the Getae of Byrebistas and once more about
the middle of the 3d c. A.D. by the Goths. Made part of the Roman Empire toward
the end of the 1st c. B.C., it later was included in the imperial province of
Moesia and, from Docletian's reign, in the new province of Scythia.
Excavations have revealed the latest circuit walls, erected after
the Goths had laid waste the city. Since then other walls have been found and
more or less completely uncovered: the first one dating from the archaic period,
the second from the Hellenistic period, and the third from Early Roman times.
To this last period of its existence (4th-6th c.) belong most of the monuments
excavated inside the late circuit wall. The rampart itself, which is fairly well
preserved on its W and S sides, recalls the dramatic conditions in which it was
built: all along the walls can be seen architrave blocks, columns, architectural
fragments, even inscriptions used as building materials.
A seemingly official quarter of the city has been excavated inside
the rampart, to the right of the main gate. It contains several large civic basilicas,
a commercial pavilion, a small porticoed square and a bath building, fairly well
preserved. Farther off, to the S and SE, can be seen a section containing poor
dwellings and workshops, probably a later addition to the city. This section of
Istros is linked by a street paved with broad slabs to a residential quarter set
at the highest point of the city. Here can be seen several large houses with inner
courtyard and more than one story; one of them (which has a private apsed chapel)
seems to have been a bishop's residence. All these remains (including those of
several Christian basilicas, with or without crypt) belong to the last phase of
the city (4th-6th c.). Far more ancient are those monuments found in what is now
known as Istros' Sacred Zone, situated on the water in the NE part of the city.
Excavations have revealed the foundations of a temple dedicated to Zeus Polieus
(built in the 6th c. B.C. and rebuilt in the first half of the 5th); a few anonymous
altars dating from the same period; important fragments of a small Doric temple
of Thasos marble, dedicated to Theos Megas (3d c. B.C.); and sizable fragments
of a Temple of Aphrodite (Hellenistic period), still being excavated.
Other scattered ruins have been uncovered on different occasions
outside the city to the W in the area between the early rampart and the first
Roman rampart. Among these ruins is a second bath building, dating from the 2d-3d
c., a Christian basilica with a cemetery around it (5th-6th c.), and remains of
scattered houses and fragments of streets from the Hellenistic period.
Farther off, in the same direction, on the other side of the neck
of water separating the ancient site and the cultivated areas, is a large cemetery.
In addition to Greek tombs (6th c. B.C-3d c. A.D.), it was found to contain several
tombs belonging to chiefs of the Getae who were buried according to barbarian
ritual, surrounded by human victims and skeletons of horses.
D. M. Pippidi, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Sep 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
KALLATIS (Ancient city) ROMANIA
A Greek colony on the left bank of the Black Sea ca. 43 km S of ConstanTa
in a fertile area where cereal grains were grown. Ancient sources (Prudent. c.
Symm. 761-64) indicate the Megaran origin of the colony and the date of its foundation.
Colonists from Heraklea Pontica founded the Doric city in the 6th c. B.C. On the
spot where Kallatis developed there must have been an earlier center of Getaean
origin (Plin. HN 4.18.5), the name of which is preserved in the form of Acervetis
or Carbatis. Some scholars date the foundation of the city to the middle of the
7th c. B.C., but the earliest archaeological indications found thus far go back
only to the 4th c. B.C. There has been, however, a lack of systematic excavation
and the modern center of Mangalia is superimposed on the perimeter of the ancient
city. Several stretches of fortifications are preserved on the N side of the city,
but they date to the 2d-3d c.
Several necropoleis (4th-2d c.) have large tumuli containing chambered
tombs. They contain rich grave gifts including well-preserved clay statuettes
of the Tanagra type. The necropoleis occupy such a large area around the colony
that they may be considered, as at Histria, to have belonged to indigenous or
Greek settlements in the environs of the city. From inscriptions it is known that
in addition to public buildings intended for meetings of the various public bodies,
the city also had a theater, which has not yet been identified.
In the 4th c. B.C. the city struck coins that bore the head of Herakles
and the symbols of his power, as well as an ear of grain or barley. These coins
clearly indicate that the city supplied grain, put aside for Athens in the name
of the whole League, not only from the Bosphoran kingdoms but also from the other
colonies rich in cereals and in possession of their own vast territories or dominating
the local populations of those territories.
During the expansion of Macedonian power the city suffered the same
fate as all the other colonies of the Pontus Sinistrus. They were subject to heavy
contributions required by Lysimachos from which they could escape only at the
end of the reign of the Diadochi. Both in 313 and in 310 B.C., the city posed
the major resistance to the troops of Lysimachos.
In the 3d and 2d c. there was pressure from the indigenous peoples
of the area, with repercussions that involved all the colonies of Pontus Sinistrus
and of N Pontus. The inscriptions and the ancient text, such as Polybios (Hist.
5.6; 4.45.7-8), indicate the changed conditions of life here and in other colonies.
They were obliged by native rulers to put themselves under the protection of their
naval forces. For this protection they had to pay sums that were rather large
for cities already weakened by wars, domestic struggles, and the uncertainty of
the harvests. In Kallatis we now know of a number of Scythian tribes under the
command of a whole series of princes mentioned on a series of coins. But even
under these conditions Kallatis was able to maintain a high economic and cultural
level, as is documented by numerous inscriptions found in the city or in other
cultural or religious centers of the metropolitan Greek world.
When the city joined in the struggles of Mithridates against the
Romans and in the consequent Roman siege, the period of its splendor waned. The
foedus Kallatianum signaled the passage of the city from a free state to an ordinary
Roman civitas. The conquest by Burebistas of all the colonies of the Pontus Sinistrus
was a further blow. Later the city became part of Moesia Inferior, and under Diocletian,
of Scythia Minor.
After the invasion of the Costoboci, Kallatis fortified itself ca.
172; but the subsequent invasions, which lasted throughout Moesia until the time
of Trebonianus Gallus, weakened the city more and more. A period of revival is
evident only during the era of Diocletian and his successors. In the Byzantine
age, under Anastasius, the fortifications and other public buildings were reconstructed.
The same buildings were reconstructed under Justinian (Procop. De aed. 4.11).
To the 4th-6th c. belongs a Christian basilica of Syrian type which
indicates the relations of the city with that distant region at a very difficult
time not only for the city itself, but for the whole area. After this period,
following more invasions, it began to decline, as did all the other coastal and
internal cities.
D. Adamesteanu, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Sep 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
TOMI (Ancient city) ROMANIA
A Milesian colony on the Romanian coast of the Black Sea, between
Istros (to the N) and Kallatis (to the S). It was probably founded in the 6th
c., although its name does not appear in the texts until the 3d c. In the Hellenistic
period, the only known phase of its history, it was involved in the war between
Byzantium and Kallatis (allied to Istros), which in fact was fought for control
of the Tomis emporium (Memnon, fr. 21 = FHG 3, p. 537). Tomis was a member of
the Pontic koinon created toward the end of the 1st c. B.C. and immediately annexed
by Rome (the period when Ovid, sent into exile by Augustus, came to Tomis to die),
and quickly became the chief city of the Dobruja region as well as the metropolis
of the whole W part of Pontus.
This prosperity was gravely threatened in the 3d c. A.D. by the invasions
of the Goths, and was not reaffirmed until the time of the Tetrarchy, when Tomis
was made chief city of the new province of Scythia. Under the protection of Constantine
and his successors, Tomis, now Christianized and the seat of a bishop, was to
flourish for the last time. Toward the end of the 7th c. it was abandoned by its
inhabitants as were all the Scythian cities.
The ancient Milesian colony has not been excavated systematically
because it lies under the modern city. However, there have been chance finds of
epigraphic and architectural monuments. The most important of these monuments
is the circuit wall that protected Tomis on the N-NW and S-SW sides by closing
off the promontory on which the city was built. This wall seems to have been built
in the 2d c. A.D., but it was rebuilt several times up to the end of antiquity.
Roughly 3 m thick, it has an external facing of large squared blocks; semicircular
towers flank the gates. One of these towers apparently dates from Justinian's
reign, but constructions of the same type are attested in the reigns of Diocletian
and Anastasius.
Another significant monument, unearthed in 1959, is the so-called
mosaic building. This is a huge complex of commercial buildings designed on three
levels, which also served to cover and support the cliff, which is 20 m high at
this point. The upper terrace, which overlooked the sea, had a mosaic floor surrounded
on three sides by walls faced with polychrome marble. The mosaic covers an area
of roughly 2000 sq. m and is fairly well preserved. It gives the impression of
a brightly colored carpet decorated with geometric and plant motifs. The story
below consists of 11 vaulted rooms designed to be used as warehouses. Some of
them were found to contain dozens of amphorae along with several anchors and some
iron clamps. On the first floor up from ground level, which gives directly onto
the nearby quays, a certain number of warehouses were found, also filled with
amphorae; others are in the process of excavation. Close by this fine complex
several warehouses designed for storing grain are being excavated, along with
the ruins of a bath building (one large room that has been uncovered measures
not less than 300 sq. m).
The port installations date from the 4th c. A.D. By this time Tomis
had been Christianized and its four basilicas date to the 4th and 5th c. One,
on the W cliff, is small and somewhat poorly preserved. A second is in the courtyard
of No. 2 secondary school. It has not been possible to excavate this building
completely, but it is larger than the first basilica and more carefully built.
Near the altar is a rectangular crypt, its walls covered with paintings. The third,
in the W section of the city, is ca. 35 m long and 18.8 m wide; it has an apse
8 m in diameter and a vaulted crypt, poorly preserved. The fourth is the largest
in the whole of Dobruja. It had three naves, separated by marble columns and a
huge crypt divided into seven interconnecting rooms arranged in the shape of a
cross. Close by this great basilica a cache of 23 statues and reliefs was found,
no doubt a remnant of the religious war that raged throughout the Empire in the
4th c.
D. M. Pippidi, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Sep 2002 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
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