Tag: Trier

Ten More Great Cities of the Ancient World

Heritage Key looks at ten more Great Cities in History. John Julius Norwich’s new book – “The Great Cities in History” – selects a list of major cities that have been hugely influential throughout their eras. The cities that were chosen spanned across the globe, and you can read more about them in my recent article. In addition, you should definitely also watch Heritage Key’s video interview with Lord Norwich himself as he discusses his book, and how he came to choose the cities that made it to the final edition.

But what about cities that didn’t make the cut?There are still several cities in the world which I still consider to be great in terms of the culture they hold, and the history that enriches them. So I offer you 10 more Great Cities of the Ancient World, and if you can think of anymore, then feel free to add them as a comment!

1. Plovdiv

The second largest city in Bulgaria was known in ancient times as Philippoupolis. With a history dating back 6,000 years it is one of the oldest settlements in Europe and a key city in the Roman Empire. Boasting several public buildings, baths, temples and shrines, as well as a city sewage and water system, Plovdiv was an important crossroad and route to the Baltic region.

It was described by the Roman writer Lucien as being “the biggest and loveliest of all towns. Its beauty shines from faraway.” Under the rule of Rome, the city saw huge growth and significant cultural progress and is considered to be one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in history. This beautiful city is often overlooked despite being rich in ancient artefacts and architecture, of which only a small proportion has been excavated by archaeologists.

2. Beirut

With a history going back over 5,000 years, Beirut today is synonymous with war and conflict after the recent Lebanon War. The devastation that Beirut’s city centre was left in opened up the possibility to explore the past, and found remains from the Phoenician, Hellenistic, Roman, Arab and Ottoman eras.

In Roman times, the city of Beirut was developed by Rome with several public buildings and investments, the pearl of which was Beirut’s School of Law. Attracting scholars from across the empire, Beirut became a centre for learning excellence until 551AD when a large earthquake destroyed much of the city, claiming 30,000 lives.

3. Tel Aviv

Israel’s second largest city is Tel Aviv, and is technically only about 100 years old. So why have I classed it as an ancient city?

Well this relatively new city is on the site of Jaffa, and ancient port city with a past stretching back 4,000 years. Although originally Tel Aviv was planned on the outskirts, the city grew rapidly and incorporated Jaffa. In ancient times, Jaffa was conquered by the Egyptians under the rule of Pharaoh Thutmose III. Jaffa also features prominently in the Old Testament of the Bible as the city from which Jonah sets sail to reach Tarshish as well as the port where the wood arrived for Soloman’s Temple, Jerusalem.

4. Lisbon

At roughly 3,200 years old, the Portuguese capital of Lisbon is often overlooked as an ancient city. However, it is believed to have been founded by Phoenicians, and spent the following two millenia trading hands in various wars and conflicts.

Under the Romans, Lisbon saw a transformation which included the construction of a Great Theatre, several temples, the Cassian Baths, a large Roman Forum and many other public buildings, which were discovered by archaeologists in the mid-Eighteenth century.

5. Delhi

One of the most populated cities in the world today, Delhi has a history covering the past 3,000 years and holds many of Asia’s most culturally rich historical sites. It is believed that Delhi is home to the legendary Indraprastha: a grand and sophisticated fortress capital of Pandavas in India’s Mahabharata scripts.

With settlements in Delhi being traced from the Mauryan Empire (about 300BC), so far archaeologists have discovered seven different cities in Delhi. However, the British demolished much of the ancient remains to make way for the new capital city – New Delhi. Today, Delhi is a major cultural, administrative and financial centre of India.

6. Zurich

The vibrant and lively city in Switzerland is a centre of international business, finance and trade, which is fitting considering its ancient past in Roman times as a key city for collecting taxes. Founded in the 2nd Century AD and known as Turicum, the city acted as a gate for all goods entering and leaving Italy. Christianity was introduced in the 3rd century, and continued to heavily influence the city.

Today, the city is a hotspot for tourists, particularly as it is near to the popular Swiss Alps, as well as the home to the Swiss stock exchange, several banks and financial institutions.

7. Palermo

Palermo is famous as the capital of Sicily, and has its roots from the 8000 BC with its first settlement being an ancient Phoenician city. It’s rich history has led to its highly regarded reputation for culture, architecture and food. Under the Greek rule, the city was a centre of commerce and trade, although civil unrest during the Sicilian Wars caused instability and later the Romans would take the city during the First Punic War.

The city has seen itself ruled since by the Byzantine empire, Fascist Italy and (although not officially) the Sicilian Mafia. Today it is popular with tourists for its fantastic culture and unique environment.

8. Gaziantep

Thought to be the site of the historical city Antiochia ad Taurum, and is one of the oldest cities in Turkey, Gaziantep was an important agricultural and industrial hub of the region. Remains of Gaziantep’s rich heritage exist in the centre of the city in the form of a historic fortress and the Ravanda citadel. The ruins of Doliche also lie just a few kilometres north of the city.

Throughout history, the city of Gaziantep has been ruled by several different empires, including the Egyptians, Hittites, Assyrians, Persians, Greeks and Romans.

9. Varanasi

The Indian city of Varanasi lies next to the River Ganges, and legend says it was founded 5,000 years ago by the Hindu god Shiva. Archaeologists date the city back 3,000 years, when it became a major centre for the production of textiles, silk, sculptures and perfumes. Varanasi was also a larger city spanning over 5 kilometres along the river banks, and was famed as a centre for culture, religious worship and education.

Also known as Benares, the city is a popular pilgrimage spot and is held in Hindu religion as the place where the cycle of reincarnation can be broken, if a person were to die there.

10. Trier

One of the oldest cities in Germany, archaeologists have uncovered pottery fragments from Neolithic times in Trier. The city saw major investment and improvements under Roman rule, when Constantine the Great built a new bascilica and baths, and the city had played host to imperial palaces of emperors.

Roman relics still standing today include the amphitheatre, and a Roman fortified gate called Porta Nigra. During the Middle Ages, this structure was converted to a church, but legend has it that when Trier was under the rule of Napoleon’s forces, he ordered it to be destroyed after dissolving the church. Locals informed him of its Roman past in an attempt to save it, and Napoleon gave the order for Porta Nigra to be restored to its original Roman form.

Moving Capitals: Iran’s Plans to Ditch Tehran Echoed in Ancient World

Iran has taken a step closer to its goal of moving its capital away from Tehran to a new, as yet unbuilt location near the town of Qom. This seems like an extreme move but it’s one that has been repeated throughout history – as far back as the Egyptian dynasties of the Middle Kingdom, in ancient China and many times during the Roman empire.

Sometimes there are practical reasons for capital-moving. In Iran’s case it claims that Tehran, a city of 12 million people, sits on 100 seismic fault lines and is therefore a major natural disaster waiting to happen. There have been examples of relocations for practical reasons in history too. Constantine I may have chosen to build his ‘Nova Roma’ at Byzantium on the Bosphorus because it gave access to the Black Sea, and was also a good base for campaigns against the Goths. That the site of Constantinople lacked fresh water – 200km of aqueducts had to be built to provide enough – and that it was vulnerable to attack from the north west, were two weakness that Constantine overlooked.

Moving Capitals in the Ancient World

So moving a capital city isn’t always the wise thing to do. Nevertheless, leaders have been packing up their bags and moving their seats of power as far back as the Egyptian Middle Kingdom in around 3,000 BC (probably long before then too). Several millennia later, it was also a strategy that enabled Roman emperors to keep power as the empire evolved and there was a need to be nearer to areas of commerce or conflict.

Ancient Egypt

In Egypt’s Old Kingdom, Memphis was the capital from 3,100 BC until around 2,040 BC, as well as being the capital of Lower Egypt. But Mephis lost out to Thebes when the Theban kings won a civil war and designated their home city as the capital. This shows another aspect of capital moving that goes beyond practical or strategic considerations and is also present in some modern examples: an authoritarian leader has far more power to decide to uproot a capital city and over-rule any opposition, compared to a democratic government. In fact, according to this article by Sean Williams, ancient Egypt had more than a dozen capital cities throughout its (very long) history.

During the New Kingdom period, Thebes rose to prominence but the capital was to move again – this time to Akhetaten (Amarna) during a period of political instability under the heretic king Akhenaten (1,351-1,337 BC). The new city of Akhetaten was built in honour of Akhenaten’s new-found religious cult of Aten – but the move was not well-received by the general public of ancient Egypt and in particular by the priests of Amun, who viewed Akhenaten’s new one-god religion as heretical. After Akhenaten’s death, the designated capital returned to Thebes and Memphis. By 1319 BC, just 20 years after Amarna was built, the new city was abandoned.

In 331 BC Alexander the Great and his general Ptolemy founded a new capital for Egypt: Alexandria. The city, famous for its ancient lighthouse and library, remained Egypt’s capital throughout the Roman era and until Muslim invasion 1,000 years after its foundation.

The Chinese Empire

The ancient Chinese empire also had its fair share of capital-swapping. Xi’an was the capital from the Qin to the Tang dynasties (221 BC to 904AD). Following the Qin dynasty, the Han dynasty decided to move their capital away from Xi’an to Luoyang in Henan province. There were traditionally four ancient capitals of China (Beijing, Nanjing, Luoyang and Xi’an). Kaifeng, Hangzhou, Anyang and Zhengzhou have been added to the list in the past 100 years (following archaeological discoveries) and many more capital cities have also been identified – not surprising for an empire with such a time-span and geographical reach. To this day, the choice of Beijing as capital has been questioned – with the harsh winters, lack of a nearby fresh water supply and distance from China’s main food sources cited as reasons why Nanjing would make a better capital.

The Romans

Projects of such an enormous scale are easier to pursue in the absence of democratic procedures. In authoritarian political systems, the lite might accept the enormous financial costs of such a move because they anticipate future symbolic, political, and economic gain.

During the third and fourth centuries AD, the Roman emperors moved their seats of power several times. Constantine I finally shifted power eastwards when he moved his court to Constantinople in 330 AD. The Roman empire survived intact with two capitals for another 65 years before it was divided definitively into the West Roman Empire and East Roman Empire in 395 AD.

Before Constantine I, there had been several other capitals including Mediolanum (Milan) and Ravenna. These two cities were chosen because they gave the emperor better access to central and eastern Europe. Nicomedia was also the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire for a while from 293 AD. Colonia Agrippina (Cologne) and Augusta Treverorum (Trier) were both seats of power of the Gallic Empire when it broke away from Rome’s rule (260-275 AD) and Trier also became the capital of the Western Roman Empire until Constantine began building his new capital at Byzantium. The late third and fourth centuries were a time when the shape and power-balance of the empire was shifting new capitals sprung up accordingly as emperors established their new power bases or tried to dominate existing territories.

An Age-old Strategy

So relocating a capital city isn’t new by any means. In modern circumstances it can be a bad sign for democracy in a country, while some examples from antiquity show that a change of capital often signalled a political and cultural sea-change. When Alexandria became the capital of Egypt in 331 BC, it heralded the beginning of the Ptolemaic kingdom and the spread of Hellenic culture to Egypt. The rise of Constantinople 660 years later also coincided with the rise of Christianity as the dominant religion of the Roman Empire and the beginnings of the Byzantine Empire.

Some modern examples of capital relocation are more ominous. In 2005, Burma’s military junta decided to build a new capital at Naypyidaw, in a remote jungle location, far from the traditional centre Rangoon (Yangon as the generals renamed it). Four years later, reports say that Naypyidaw is still a soulless ‘ghost town’ where state officials can live in luxury a stark contrast to the rest of the country.

There have been many other capital moves in the 20th century 13 between 1950 and 1990 according to Edward Schatz, an associate professor in political science at the University of Toronto. In a 2003 paper on why states move their capital cities, Schatz wrote: Projects of such an enormous scale are easier to pursue in the absence of democratic procedures. In authoritarian political systems, the lite might accept the enormous financial costs of such a move because they anticipate future symbolic, political, and economic gain.

In 2000 Malaysia moved its capital from Kuala Lumpur to Putrajaya; Kazakhstan’s capital became Astana instead of Almaty in 1997; Brasilia became the capital of Brazil, rather than Rio de Janeiro, in 1956; while Nigeria chose Abuja over Lagos in 1975. The reasons vary, but often come after political changes, upheavals or power shifts (Germany’s capital Bonn moved to Berlin in 1990). Many capital changes happen under authoritarian regimes such as that of Burma.

So Iran isn’t the only modern country to toy with the idea of trying out a new capital city. In 2000 there was speculation that Russia’s then president, and present prime minister Vladimir Putin, might move the state’s seat of power from Moscow back to St Petersburg. In 2003, Plaid Cymru MP Adam Price suggested that Liverpool should be Britain’s capital, rather than London. Nothing has come of these two suggestions yet but history tells us that our capitals are not as immovable as we imagine them to be.

Photo by .faramarz on Creative Commons License.