NAPOCA
(Cluj) Romania.
An important
Roman town on the Someş river. The mediaeval and
modern towns built over the ancient ruins have almost
entirely destroyed them.
The name, mentioned in ancient sources (Ptol. 3.8.9;
Tab.Peut.; Rav.Cosm. 4.7), indicates that Roman Napoca developed on the site of a Dacian settlement.
The Roman settlement has been epigraphically attested
since the time of Trajan (
CIL III, 1627). Situated in the
middle of a fertile agricultural area and on the main
commercial and strategic road which crossed Dacia from
S to N, Napoca developed as a commercial and handicrafts center. Hadrian, on the occasion of his visit to Dacia, made it a municipium (
CIL III, 1454), and Marcus Aurelius, or Commodus made it a colonia (
CIL III, 963).
After the administrative reform of Hadrian in 124, Napoca became the capital of Dacia Porolissensis. The inhabitants were given the ius Italicum.
In the course of modern construction, the topography
of the ancient town was clarified. Part of the town
inside wall (2.20 m thick) was discovered to the S. The
town covered an area of 32 ha and the forum coincides
with the present center of the town.
Archaeological, epigraphic, and numismatic material
discovered over the centuries may be seen at the History
Museum of Transylvania in Cluj.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
I. Mitrofan, “Contributii la cunoaşterea
oraşului Napoca,”
Acta Musei Napocensis 1 (1964) 197-214; D. Tudor,
Oraşe, tîrguri şi sate în Dacia romană (1968) 222-42; M. Macrea,
Viaţa romană in Dacia (1969) 123-25.
L. MARINESCU
