Sexaginta Prista

Auxiliary FortMoesia Inferior · Ruse, BulgariaBuilt 85 CE

About

Its name means 'port of sixty ships,' and Domitian made it headquarters of the Classis Flavia Moesica river fleet around 85 CE before Trajan's Dacian conquest shifted the fleet base to Noviodunum. A temple to Apollo and the principia headquarters building were later uncovered on site. A 7-meter stretch of fortress wall from a later Diocletianic rebuild still stands in Ruse today. The Roman city was finally destroyed by Avar and Slavic raids after 596 CE.

What happened here

Five hundred men, sometimes a thousand, recruited from a province rather than from citizens, and often stationed a long way from where they were raised. Cavalry units get a bigger fort and far more stabling; the smell tells you which kind you are in before the plan does. The layout copies a legionary fortress at a quarter of the size — headquarters, commander's house, granaries, barracks, a bath house usually built outside the walls because of the fire risk. Duties are patrolling, escorting, customs, and policing rather than pitched battle. After twenty-five years a man is discharged with citizenship for himself and his children, recorded on a bronze diploma he keeps for life. A village grows outside the gate within a decade.