AQUINCUM
or Acincum, Acinco (Budapest) Hungary.
At the important Danube crossing (
It. Ant. 245.7; 263.9) there was an ala camp from the time of
Tiberius, a castrum for legions from the time of Domitian. Aquincum was the capital of Pannonia inferior
from A.D. 106. The civilian settlement rose to the rank
of municipium in 124, to that of colonia in 194. At the
end of the 2d c. two facing fortresses were built on the
left bank of the Danube across from the camp of Legio
II adiutrix, Transaquincum and Contra-Aquincum; the
latter was reconstructed during the time of Diocletian
(Hydatius Easti a 294). In the middle of the 4th c. the
territory of Aquincum was under constant Sarmatian
attacks. In 374-75, when Valentinian I put up fortifications with guard towers all along the banks of the Danube, he could not find adequate winter quarters in the suffering city (Amm.Marc. 19.11.8). Between 395 and
398 the formation was transferred to Gallia (
Not.Dig.
occ. 33.54). In the first decade of the 5th c. the Germans,
arriving with the Huns, overran the town, but the remnants of the romanized population still remained (Sid.
Apoll. 5.107). In the early Middle Ages Buda developed
from the legionary camp of Aquincum, Pest from the
fort of Contra-Aquincum.
The ruins of the legionary camp extend under a thickly
populated section of Óbuda (ancient Buda). Of the buildings of the castrum, today only the ruins of the legion's
bath are visible under a modern building. Among the
cannabae relics the ruined complex of the amphitheater
can be seen, and in a small museum in its vicinity are
preserved the ruins of a house with wall paintings, and
the rooms of a balneum with bathtubs. The mosaic floors
of a Roman villa, decorated with mythological scenes,
can be seen in situ. The foundations of a tripartite cella
decorate the small square of a new housing development.
The remains of Aquincum's wall and its two bastions
were preserved in the park under the approach to the
Elizabeth bridge on the Pest side.
The center of the civilian city was opened up during
the last decades of the 19th c.; in the W section of town
excavations were started during the 1960s. The Roman
buildings were destroyed to such an extent that today
the order of the industrial and commercial settlement
emerges only in outline. A fairly long section of the
cardo and decumanus is visible with a portico and rows
of shops, a sanctuary on the forum, a basilica, a bath and
the buildings of the macellum. Along the smaller streets
are the headquarters of the collegium, two more public
baths, two Mithraea, a sanctuary of Fortuna, ruins of
dwellings and workshops. In a Roman hall are placed
on exhibit mosaics, wall paintings, and statues. Among
the ruins on exhibit at the Museum of Aquincum are the
bronze parts of a portable organ, a wooden barrel with
customs stamp, a tomb with mummy and a man's portrait painted on wood. In the lapidarium, connected to
the museum, there are statues, altar stones, tombstones.
Outside the city walls are visible the ruins of Aquincum's smaller amphitheater, that of the civilian town.
From here the pillar stumps of the aqueduct lead N to
a modern beach, where the Roman works of the springs
that fed the waterworks are now preserved, with a few
relics of the sanctuary circle discovered there.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
B. Kuzsinszky,
Aquincum, Ausgrabungen und Funde (1934); L. Nagy,
Az Aquincumi orgona
(1936); id.,
Az Eskü-téri erőd Pest város őse (1946); id.,
Budapest Mülékei 2 (1962); A. Alföldi et al.,
Budapest Története I-II. Budapest az ókorban (1942); J. Szilágyi,
Aquincum (1956); A. Mócsy,
Die Bevölkerung von Pannonien bis zu den Markomannenkriegen (1959); id.,
RE Suppl. IX (1962); L. Barkóczi,
Acta Arch H. 16 (1964) 256ff; É. Bónis,
Die spätkeltisehe Siedlung Gellérthegy-Tabán in Budapest (1969); J. Szilágyi,
RE Suppl.
XI (1969);
Budapest Régiségei I-XXI passim.
SZ. K. PÓCZY
