CABILLONUM
or Cabilonnum (Chalon) Saône-et-Loire, France.
On the left bank of the Saône,
140 km N of Lugdunum (Lyon) and the Rhone-Saône
confluence. The chief port of the civitas of the Aedui
before the Roman Conquest, it had economic importance: 24,000 amphorae found on the site of the
Roman port, a large number of bronze and silver bowls,
lead ingots from Britain. In the 6th c. A.D. it was one of
the principal cities of the Burgundian kingdom and
minted its own coins.
The mediaeval and modern city retains the plan of
the Roman one, which has never been excavated to any
significant degree. The existence of an amphitheater, attested in the 18th c., is still hypothetical. Some oak posts
with iron tips, from the foundations of the Roman
bridge, were discovered in the Saône in 1950. Only a few
traces remain of the castrum, which was built at the beginning of the 4th c. A.D. The city wall, backed by the
Saône, is semicircular in shape and 1300 m long, enclosing an area of ca. 15 ha. It was defended by 18 towers
and had three gates. Interspersed in the courses of
masonry, which are 3.5 m thick and made of large
blocks, are many remains, for example, the dedication
offered to the goddess Sauconna (the Saône) by the
inhabitants of the city.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
J. Dechelette,
La collection Millon
(1913)
MPI; L. Armand-Calliat,
Le Chalonnais gallo-romain
(1937)
MPI; id.,
Musée de Chalon, catalogue des collections archéologiques (1950)
I; id., “Le pont romain de Chalon,”
Soc. Hist. et Archéologie 33 (1952)
I.
L. BONNAMOUR
