Plovdiv
Plovdiv is the second-largest city in Bulgaria and the most populous city in the Bulgarian part of the historic region of Thrace, located 144 km southeast of the capital Sofia. It had a population of 329,489 as of 2024 and 540,000 in its greater metropolitan area. An important economic, transport, cultural, and educational hub of Bulgaria, Plovdiv was the European Capital of Culture in 1999 and 2019, and joined the UNESCO Global Network of Learning Cities in 2016.
Archeological symbols of Plovdiv
Plovdiv is in a fertile region of south-central Bulgaria on the two banks of the Maritsa River. The city has historically developed on seven syenite hills, some of which are high. Because of these hills, Plovdiv is often referred to in Bulgaria as "The City of the Seven Hills". There is evidence of habitation in the area dating back to the 6th millennium BC, when the first Neolithic settlements were established. The city was subsequently a Thracian settlement named Pulpudeva, later being conquered and ruled also by Persians, Ancient Macedonians, Celts, Romans, Byzantines, Goths, Huns, Bulgarians, Thraco-Romans, Bulgars, Slavic tribes, Crusaders, and Ottoman Turks.Philippopolis was founded as a polis by the father of Alexander the Great, Philip the Great, the king of ancient Macedonia, settling there both Thracians and 2,000 Macedonians in 342 BC. Control of the city alternated between the Macedonian kingdom and the Thracian Odrysian kingdom during the Hellenistic period; the Macedonian king Philip V reoccupied the city in 183 BC and his successor Perseus held the city with the Odrysians until the Roman Republic conquered the Macedonian kingdom in 168 BC. Philippopolis became the capital of the Roman province of Thracia. The city was at the centre of the road network of inland Thrace, and the strategic Via Militaris was crossed by several other roads at the site, leading to the Danube, the Aegean Sea, and the Black Sea. The Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius built a new wall around the city.
In Late Antiquity, Philippopolis was an important stronghold, but was sacked in 250 during the Crisis of the Third Century, after the Siege of Philippopolis by the Goths led by Cniva. After this the settlement contracted, though it remained a major city, with the city walls rebuilt and new Christian basilicas and Roman baths constructed in the 4th century. The city was again sacked by the Huns in 441/442, and the walls were again rebuilt. Roman Philippopolis resisted another attack, by the Avars in the 580s, after the walls were renewed yet again by Justinian the Great.
In the Middle Ages, Philippopolis fell to the Bulgars of the First Bulgarian Empire in 863, during the reign of Boris I, having been briefly abandoned by the Christian inhabitants in 813 during a dispute with the khan Krum. During the Byzantine–Bulgarian wars, the emperor Basil the Bulgar-Slayer used Philippopolis as a major strategic fortification, governed by the protospatharios Nikephoros Xiphias. In the middle 11th century, the city was attacked by the Pechenegs, who occupied it briefly around 1090. The city continued to prosper, with the walls restored in the 12th century, during which the historian and politician Niketas Choniates was its governor and the physician Michael Italikos was its metropolitan bishop.
According to the Latin historian of the Fourth Crusade, Geoffrey of Villehardouin, Philippopolis was the third largest city in the Byzantine Empire, after Constantinople and Thessalonica. It suffered damage from the armies passing through the city during the Crusades as well as from sectarian violence between the Eastern Orthodox and the Armenian Orthodox and Paulician denominations. The city was destroyed by Kaloyan of Bulgaria in 1206 and rebuilt thereafter. In 1219, the city became the capital of the Crusader Duchy of Philippopolis, part of the Latin Empire. The Second Bulgarian Empire recovered the city in 1263, but lost it to Byzantine control before recapturing it in 1323. The Ottoman Empire conquered Philippopolis in 1363 or 1364. During the 500 years of Ottoman rule, Filibe served as one of the important commercial and transportation nodes in the Ottoman Balkans. It also played a role as an administrative centre of various sanjaks and eyalets.
On 4 January 1878, at the end of the Russo-Turkish War, Plovdiv was taken away from Ottoman rule by the Russian army. It remained within the borders of Bulgaria until July of the same year, when it became the capital of the autonomous Ottoman region of Eastern Rumelia. In 1885, Plovdiv and Eastern Rumelia joined Bulgaria.
There are many preserved ruins such as the ancient Plovdiv Roman theatre, a Roman odeon, a Roman aqueduct, the Plovdiv Roman Stadium, the archaeological complex Eirene, and others. Plovdiv is host to a huge variety of cultural events such as the International Fair Plovdiv, the international theatrical festival "A stage on a crossroad", the TV festival "The golden chest", and many more novel festivals, such as Night/Plovdiv in September, Kapana Fest, and Opera Open. The oldest American educational institution outside the United States, the American College of Sofia, was founded in Plovdiv in 1860 and later moved to Sofia.
Etymology
Plovdiv has been given various names throughout its long history. The Odrysian capital Odrysa, is suggested to have been modern Plovdiv by numismatic research or Odrin.The Greek historian Theopompus mentioned it in the 4th century BC as a town named Poneropolis "town of villains") in pejorative relation to the conquest by king Philip II of Macedon who is said to have settled the town with 2,000 men who were false-accusers, sycophants, lawyers, and other possible disreputables. According to Plutarch, the town was named by this king after he had populated it with a crew of rogues and vagabonds, but this is possibly a folk name that did not actually exist. The names Dulon polis and possibly Moichopolis likely have similar origins.
The city has been called Philippopolis or "the city of Philip", from "horse-lover", most likely in honor of Philip II of Macedon after his death or in honor of Philip V, as this name was first mentioned in the 2nd century BC by Polybius in connection with the campaign of Philip V. Philippopolis was identified later by Plutarch and Pliny as the former Poneropolis. Strabo identified Philip II's settlement of most "evil, wicked" as Cabyle, whereas Ptolemy considered the location of Poneropolis different from the rest.
Kendrisia was an old name of the city. Its earliest recorded use is on an artifact mentioning that king Beithys, priest of the Syrian goddess, brought gifts to Kendriso Apollo; the deity is recorded to be named multiple times after different cities. Later Roman coins mentioned the name which is possibly derived from Thracian god Kendriso who is equated with Apollo, the cedar forests, or from the Thracian tribe artifacts known as the kendrisi. Another assumed name is the 1st century AD Tiberias in honor of the Roman emperor Tiberius, under whom the Odrysian Kingdom was a client of Rome. After the Romans had taken control of the area, the city was named in, meaning "The Three Hills", and mentioned in the 1st century by Pliny. At times the name was Ulpia, Flavia, Julia after the Roman families.
Ammianus Marcellinus wrote in the 4th century AD that the then city had been the old Eumolpias/''Eumolpiada,, the oldest name chronologically. It was named after the mythical Thracian king Eumolpos, son of Poseidon or Jupiter, who may have founded the city around 1200 BC or 1350 BC. It is also possible that it was named after the Vestal Virgins in the temples – evmolpeya.
In the 6th century AD, Jordanes wrote that the former name of the city was Pulpudeva and that Philip the Arab named the city after himself. This name is most likely a Thracian oral translation of the other as it kept all consonants of the name Philip + deva. Although the two names sound similar, they may not share the same origin as Adrianople does, and Pulpudeva may have predated the other names meaning "lake city" in Thracian. Since the 9th century AD the Slavic name began to appear as Papaldiv/n, Plodiv, Pladiv, Pladin, Plapdiv, Plovdin, which originate from Pulpudeva. As a result, the name has lost any meaning. In British English the Bulgarian variant Пловдив Plòvdiv has become prevalent after World War I. The Crusaders mentioned the city as Prineople, Sinople and Phinepople. The Ottomans called the city Filibe'', a corruption of "Philip", in a document from 1448.
History
Antiquity
The history of the region spans more than eight millennia. Numerous nations have left their traces on the cultural layers of the city. The earliest signs of habitation in the territory of Plovdiv date as far back as the 6th millennium BC. Plovdiv has settlement traces including necropolises dating from the Neolithic era like the mounds Yasa Tepe 1 in the Philipovo district and Yasa Tepe 2 in Lauta park.Archaeologists have discovered fine pottery and objects of everyday life on Nebet Tepe from as early as the Chalcolithic era, showing that at the end of the 4th millennium BC, there was already an established settlement there which was continuously inhabited since then. Thracian necropolises dating back to the 2nd–3rd millennium BC have been discovered, while the Thracian town was established between the 2nd and the 1st millennium BC.
The town was a fort of the independent local Thracian tribe Bessi. In 516 BC during the rule of Darius the Great, Thrace was included in the Persian empire. In 492 BC, the Persian general Mardonius subjugated Thrace again, and it nominally became a vassal of Persia until 479 BC and the early rule of Xerxes I. The town became part of the Odrysian kingdom, a Thracian tribal union. The town was conquered by Philip II of Macedon, and the Odrysian king was deposed in 342 BC. Ten years after the Macedonian invasion, the Thracian kings started to exercise power again after the Odrysian Seuthes III had re-established their kingdom under Macedonian suzerainty as a result of a successful revolt against Alexander the Great's rule resulting in a stalemate. The Odrysian kingdom gradually overcame the Macedonian suzerainty, while the city was destroyed by the Celts as part of the Celtic settlement of Eastern Europe, most likely in the 270s BC. In 183 BC, Philip V of Macedon conquered the city, but shortly after, the Thracians re-conquered it.
In 72 BC, the city was seized by the Roman general Marcus Lucullus but was soon restored to Thracian control. In 46 AD, the city was finally incorporated into the Roman Empire by emperor Claudius; it served as the capital of the province of Thrace. Although it was not the capital of the Province of Thrace, the city was the largest and most important centre in the province. As such, the city was the seat of the Union of Thracians. In those times, the Via Militaris, the most important military road in the Balkans, passed through the city. The Roman times were a period of growth and cultural excellence. The ancient ruins tell a story of a vibrant, growing city with numerous public buildings, shrines, baths, theatres, a stadium, and the only developed ancient water supply system in Bulgaria. The city had an advanced water system and sewerage. In 179 a second wall was built to encompass Trimontium which had already extended out of the Three hills into the valley. Many of those are still preserved and can be seen by tourists. Today only a small part of the ancient city has been excavated.
In 250 the city was captured and looted after the Battle of Philippopolis by the Goths, led by their ruler Cniva. Many of its citizens, 100,000 according to Ammianus Marcellinus, died or were taken captive. It took a century and hard work to recover the city. However, it was destroyed again by Attila's Huns in 441–442 and by the Goths of Teodoric Strabo in 471.
An ancient Roman inscription written in Ancient Greek dated to 253 – 255 AD were discovered in the Great Basilica. The inscription refers to the Dionysian Mysteries and also mentions Roman Emperors Valerian and Gallienus. It has been found on a large stele which was used as construction material during the building of the Great Basilica.
In August 2024, archaeologists from the Regional Archaeological Museum announced the discovery of a well-preserved Thracian temple dated to the third century BC. The 10-metre-long temple is made of dry joints and clay-sand mortar and has two rooms.