COLONIA AGRIPPINENSIS
(Cologne) Germany.
Founded on the left bank of the Rhine by
Agrippa (oppidum Ubiorum) in 38 B.C. (not 19) on a
site bearing traces of Neolithic and Iron Age settlements.
Later (8 B.C.? A.D. 5?) an ara Romae et Augusti was
built for the future province of Germania, whence the
city's name (Ara Ubiorum). Nearby was a camp for
two legions, I and XX (A.D. 14; up to A.D. 9, probably
XIX and XVII). Towards the end of Tiberius' reign the
legions were transferred to Neuss and Bonn, but the
Rhine fleet (Classis Germanica) remained near Cologne-Alteburg where its camp has been excavated. In A.D. 50
the city was made a colony (Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium) at the instigation of the empress Agrippina,
and acquired a city wall.
The only fortress involved in the Batavian revolt under
Civilis, it was the seat of the governor of Germania
Inferior, and the residence of the Gallic emperor in the
3d c. A.D., as well as a center of trade and industry
(glass, pottery, goldsmiths' work, the minting of coins).
In 310 Constantine erected the bridge over the Rhine
with a fortified bridgehead, Divitia, on the opposite bank
(now called Deutz). The city did not fall into Frankish
hands until after 450; it became the residence of King
Sigibert the Elder and from A.D. 507 on was part of
Chlodwig's kingdom.
The site of the Roman colony in the center of the
modern city has long been known, especially the city
wall of the period after A.D. 50, large sections of which
are still standing (a Roman tower on the NW corner and
parts of the NW and S wall). Its irregular perimeter
marks the limits of a natural plateau. The present-day
streets correspond in large measure to the Roman ones,
in particular the Hohestrasse, which lies exactly over the
cardo maximus and until the 19th c. also went through
the Roman N gate. The cardines are oriented directly N,
but the decumani diverge several degrees to the NE,
presumably in the direction that the sun rose on the
birthday of the emperor Augustus.
After a peristyle house with a mosaic of Dionysus
was discovered in the NE corner of the colony, at the
Cathedral, further excavations revealed the entire area:
streets, houses, a Mithraeum, subterranean shrines to the
Matrones (indigenous female idols of mother goddess
type), a temple of Mercury-Augustus, and finally the
Roman and Frankish Bishop's Church beneath the cathedral. Much of these remains has been preserved below
ground.
In the SW corner of the colony the capitol temple,
below the church known as Maria im Kapitol, has proved
to be a temple of orthodox type with its own temenos
wall, built shortly after A.D. 50. The praetorium, roughly
in the middle of the city's river front, lies beneath the
Rathaus and may be visited. Adjoining it to the S is
a large hall with a hypocaust and great apse on its long
E side. This structure, which is being included in the
ruins preserved underground, corresponds in size and
purpose to the Palastaula (known as the Basilica) at
Trier, but is ca. 100 years older (early 3d c. A.D.). The
baths in the center of the city include a semicircular
caldarium with a diameter of 25 m, and date from the
1st c. A.D.
The site of the Ara Ubiorum has not yet been found.
The oppidum has been presumed to be close to the
colony (Tac.,
Ann. 12.27: Agrippina . . . in oppidum
Ubiorum, in quo genita erat, veteranos coloniamque deduci impetrat), but the latest excavations have shown
that the two-legion camp may possibly lie under the
town. Discoveries include an embankment, traces of rows
of tents, and the graffito PRIN(ceps) LEG(ionis) XIX.
One monument remaining from the period of the Ubii
is a high pedestal, 9 by 9 m, that originally supported a
column. It may have served as a lighthouse at the harbor
entrance, and is the earliest example of ashlar technique
N of the Alps. In A.D. 50 it was included in the SW
corner of the city wall.
Monuments outside the Roman colony that can still
be seen include: the E gate of the Deutz fort (early 4th
c. A.D.); the extensive excavations under the St. Severin
Church; a pagan and Christian cemetery on the road to
Bonn with a cemetery church that developed through
various stages into the present-day basilica; the St. Ursula
Church on the road to Neuss, originally a cemetery
basilica with 11 loculi; the St. Gereon Church in the NW
part of the city, whose late Roman core can still be seen
but which apparently goes back not to the time of Constantine but to that of his sons; and finally, W of Cologne
on the Roman road to Jülich, the Weiden burial chamber
containing a sarcophagus and busts of the deceased persons.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
R. Schultze et al., “Colonia Agrippinensis,”
BonnJbb 98 (1895); 1. Klinkenberg,
Das römische
Köln, Die Kunstdenkmäler der Stadt Köln 2 vols. (1906);
id., “Die Stadtanlage des römischen Köln und die Limitation des Ubierlandes,”
BonnJbb 140-41 (1936) 259ff;
F. Fremersdorf, “Neue Beiträge zur Topographie des
römischen Köln,”
Romisch-Germanische Forschungen
(RGKomm) 18 (1950); O. Doppelfeld, “Das Praetorium unter dem Kölner Rathaus,”
Neue Ausgrabungen in
Deutschland (1958) 313ff; id., “Die Ausgrabung unter
dem Kölner Dom,” ibid. 322ff; id., ed.,
Römer am Rhein,
Ausstellungskatalog (1967);
Rom am Dom Ausstellungskatalog (1970); P. La Baume,
Colonia Agrippinensis (1965).
O. DOPPELFELD