Aguntum

The ruins of Aguntum are Roman site in East Tirol, Austria, located approximately 4 km east of Lienz in the Drau valley. The city appears to have been built to exploit the local sources of iron, copper, zinc and gold. During the early Christian era the city was the site of a bishopric, which, having ceased to be a residential diocese, is today listed by the Catholic Church as a titular see.

This area of East Tyrol was the homeland of the Laianci tribe and hilltop settlements, so far hardly investigated, crown many of the hills in the area. A trading vicus developed here at an important intersection in the Drau Valley, with one important road leading to the gold deposits in the Hohe Tauern.

The oldest Roman remains are a two-roomed wooden structure discovered beneath the bath house and dated to the mid-first century BC. According to Pliny the Elder, the emperor Claudius granted Aguntum the status of municipium, a status which is attested by inscriptions, including funerary inscriptions, which refer to cultores Genii municipii Agunti. The official name was Municipium Claudium Aguntum. There does not appear to have been a military camp in this area.

Aguntum was a mining and trading centre which exploited local sources of iron, copper, zinc and gold. Craftsmen in the town processed the metals to produce a range of goods which were then transported along the Roman roads. Other exports included wood, milk products (cheese) and mountain crystals from the Tauern range.

The discovery of a layer of ash, as well as the remains of a man and a child in the bath house, points to the sack of Aguntum by the invading barbarians under Radagaisus and Alaric. The city's decline was marked when the bishopric was transferred to nearby Lavant, a few miles to the south. A second sack by Attila and his Huns is attested by a coin dated to AD 452 found in a higher layer of ash. When the Western Roman Empire collapsed, Aguntum passed under the control of the Ostrogoths and was fought over by Franks, Byzantines and Bavarians. Paul the Deacon write of a major battle fought in 610 between Garibald II of Bavaria and the Avars, in which Garibald was completely defeated. Aguntum was destroyed and even Lavant suffered a major fire. There were no further bishops ordained in the area and the surviving Roman population took refuge in hilltop fortresses while the barbarians settled in the fertile valley.

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