List of Dacian towns and fortresses

Dacian towns and fortresses with the dava ending, covering Dacia, Moesia, Thrace and Dalmatia
Dacian towns and fortresses with the dava ending, covering Dacia, Moesia, Thrace and Dalmatia

This is a list of ancient Dacian towns and fortresses from all the territories once inhabited by Dacians, Getae and Moesi. The large majority of them are located in the traditional territory of the Dacian Kingdom at the time of Burebista. This area includes the present-day countries of Romania and Moldova, as well as parts of mostly southern and eastern Ukraine, Slovakia,[1] Poland and Hungary, as well as ancient Moesia (Eastern Serbia, Northern Bulgaria). However some isolated settlements are located in Dalmatia (modern Albania and Croatia) as is the case of Thermidava,[2][3] or in Dardania (Kosovo) as is Quemedava.[3]

The Dacian towns are also called davae (singular dava) since many names were composed of an initial lexical element affixed to -dava, -daua, -deva, -deba, -daba, or -dova, which meant "city", "town" or "fortress"" in the Dacian language (<PIE *dhe-, "to set, place"[4] or *dhewa, "settlement"[5]). Generally, the name indicated a tribal center or an important settlement, usually fortified.

The known towns names have been are attested by Ptolemy (1st century AD) and other ancient writers, but many have not been identified in the field yet. Conversely, there are many recent discoveries of Dacian settlements and fortresses, but most of them have no assigned names yet.

Some of the Dacian settlements and the fortresses employed the traditional Murus Dacicus (Dacian Wall) construction technique.

Table

Picture Name Tribe Founded Attested by Area (ha) Discovery Location Country
Acidava[6] (Acidaua[7][4]) ? ? Tabula Peutingeriana[7][8] ? ? Enoșești[9]  Romania
Acmonia (Ancient Greek: Ἀκμωνία Akmonia;[10][11] Agnaviae;[12][13] Agmonia[14][13]) ? ? Ptolemy's Geographia;[10][11] Tabula Peutingeriana;[12][13] Ravenna Cosmography[14][13] ? ? between Marga and Zăvoi[15]  Romania
Aedava[16] (Ancient Greek: Ἀέδαβα[17][4]) ? Unknown; Justinian (r. 527–565) restored the damaged portion of the town defenses[17] Procopius, De Aedificiis[17][4] ? ? on the Danubian road between Augustae and Variana[17][4]  Bulgaria
Aiadava ? ? ? ? ? Bela Palanka  Serbia
Aizis ? ? ? ? ? Fârliug  Romania
Amutria ? ? ? ? ? ?  Romania
Apulon ? ? ? ? ? Alba Iulia  Romania
Arcina ? ? ? ? ? ?  Romania
Arcobadara ? ? ? ? ? ?  Romania
(Mala Kopania) ? ? ? ? ? Mala Kopania  Ukraine
(Zemplín) ? ? ? ? ? Zemplín  Slovakia

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Husovská (1998) 13
  2. ↑ Five Roman emperors: Vespasian, Titus, Domitian, Nerva, Trajan, A.D. 69-117 - by Bernard William Henderson - 1969, page 278,"At Thermidava he was warmly greeted by folk quite obviously Dacians"
  3. 1 2 Illyés 1988, p. 223.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 Olteanu, LTDM - Toponyms.
  5. ↑ Polomé 1982, p. 886.
  6. ↑ Grumeza 2009, p. 13.
  7. 1 2 Tabula Peutingeriana, Segmentum VII,5.
  8. ↑ Schütte 1917, p. 81.
  9. ↑ Bowman, Garnsey & Cameron 2005, p. 745.
  10. 1 2 Ptolemy & 140 AD, III 8,4.
  11. 1 2 Olteanu, LTDM - Ptolemy's Dacia.
  12. 1 2 Tabula Peutingeriana, Segmentum VII,4.
  13. 1 2 3 4 Olteanu, LTDM - IPA.
  14. 1 2 Ravenna Cosmography, IV 14,203.
  15. ↑ Rusu 1997, p. 191.
  16. ↑ Velkov 1977, p. 92.
  17. 1 2 3 4 Procopius & 550 AD, IV 2,6.

References

Ancient

Modern

Further reading

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