Argentoratum or Argentorate was the

ancient Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history through late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the development of Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient h ...

name of the city of

Strasbourg Strasbourg ( , ; ; ) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est Regions of France, region of Geography of France, eastern France, in the historic region of Alsace. It is the prefecture of the Bas-Rhin Departmen ...

. The name was first mentioned in 12 BC, when it was a Roman military outpost established by

Nero Claudius Drusus Nero Claudius Drusus Germanicus (38–9 BC), commonly known in English as Drusus the Elder, was a Roman general and politician. He was a patrician Claudian but his mother was from a plebeian family. He was the son of Livia Drusilla and the s ...

. From 90 AD the Legio VIII Augusta was permanently stationed there.

History

The Romans under

established a military outpost belonging to the

Germania Superior Germania Superior ("Upper Germania") was an imperial province of the Roman Empire. It comprised an area of today's western Switzerland, the French Jura and Alsace regions, and southwestern Germany. Important cities were Besançon ('' Vesont ...

Roman province The Roman provinces (, pl. ) were the administrative regions of Ancient Rome outside Roman Italy that were controlled by the Romans under the Roman Republic and later the Roman Empire. Each province was ruled by a Roman appointed as Roman g ...

close to a

Gaulish Gaulish is an extinct Celtic languages, Celtic language spoken in parts of Continental Europe before and during the period of the Roman Empire. In the narrow sense, Gaulish was the language of the Celts of Gaul (now France, Luxembourg, Belgium, ...

village near the banks of the

Rhine The Rhine ( ) is one of the List of rivers of Europe, major rivers in Europe. The river begins in the Swiss canton of Graubünden in the southeastern Swiss Alps. It forms part of the Swiss-Liechtenstein border, then part of the Austria–Swit ...

, at the current location of

, and named it Argentoratum. Its name was first mentioned in 12 BC but "Argentorate" is the

toponym Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of ''wikt:toponym, toponyms'' (proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage, and types. ''Toponym'' is the general term for ...

of the Gaulish settlement that preceded it before being

latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

ised, though it is not known by how long. From 90 AD the Legio VIII Augusta permanently stationed in Argentoratum. The Roman camp of Argentoratum then included a

cavalry Historically, cavalry (from the French word ''cavalerie'', itself derived from ''cheval'' meaning "horse") are groups of soldiers or warriors who Horses in warfare, fight mounted on horseback. Until the 20th century, cavalry were the most mob ...

section and covered an area of approximately , from approximately in Tiberian times. Other Roman legions temporarily stationed in Argentoratum were the Legio XIV Gemina and the Legio XXI Rapax, the latter during the reign of

Nero Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus ( ; born Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus; 15 December AD 37 – 9 June AD 68) was a Roman emperor and the final emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, reigning from AD 54 until his ...

. The

Alemanni The Alemanni or Alamanni were a confederation of Germanic peoples, Germanic tribes * * * on the Upper Rhine River during the first millennium. First mentioned by Cassius Dio in the context of the campaign of Roman emperor Caracalla of 213 CE ...

fought a Battle of Argentoratum against Rome in 357 AD. They were defeated by Julian, later Emperor of Rome, and their king Chnodomar was taken prisoner. On 2 January 366 the Alemanni crossed the frozen

in large numbers, to invade the Roman Empire. From the 4th century, Strasbourg was the seat of the Bishopric of Strasbourg (made an Archbishopric in 1988). Early in the 5th century the Alemanni appear to have crossed the Rhine, conquered, and then settled what is today Alsace and a large part of

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

. From this period on Argentoratum disappears from historical records and is replaced by the

"Stratisburgum".

The site

The centre of the camp of Argentoratum proper was situated on the Grande Île, with the

cardo A ''cardo'' (: ''cardines'') was a north–south street in Ancient Rome, ancient Roman cities and military castra, camps as an integral component of Urban planning, city planning. The ''cardo maximus'', or most often the ''cardo'', was the main ...

being the current Rue du Dôme and the

decumanus In Roman urban planning, a ''decumanus'' was an east–west-oriented road in a Ancient Rome, Roman city or ''Castra, castrum'' (military camp). The main ''decumanus'' of a particular city was the ''decumanus maximus'', or most often simply "the ...

, the current Rue des Hallebardes. As systematic archaeological studies between 1947 and 1953, conducted by Jean-Jacques Hatt, archaeologist and director of the Musée archéologique de Strasbourg, have shown, Argentoratum was destroyed by fire and rebuilt six times between the first and the 5th century AD: in 70, 97, 235, 355, in the last quarter of the 4th century, and in the early years of the 5th century. It was under

Trajan Trajan ( ; born Marcus Ulpius Traianus, 18 September 53) was a Roman emperor from AD 98 to 117, remembered as the second of the Five Good Emperors of the Nerva–Antonine dynasty. He was a philanthropic ruler and a successful soldier ...

and after the fire of 97 that Argentoratum received its most extended and fortified shape. Many Roman artifacts have also been found along the road that led to the camp, the current Route des Romains in the suburb of Koenigshoffen, such as the stele of Caius Largennius. This was where the largest burial places ( necropoli) were situated, as well as the densest concentration of civilian dwelling places ( vici) and commerces next to the camp. Among the most outstanding finds in Koenigshoffen were the fragments of a grand

Mithraeum A Mithraeum , sometimes spelled Mithreum and Mithraion (), is a Roman temple, temple erected in classical antiquity by the Mithraism, worshippers of Mithras. Most Mithraea can be dated between 100 BC and 300 AD, mostly in the Roman ...

that had been shattered by early Christians in the 4th century (found in 1911–12 by Robert Forrer, Hatt's predecessor at the head of the Musée archéologique). Archaeological digs by J.-J. Hatt below the current Saint Stephen's Church in 1948 and 1956 have unearthed the

apse In architecture, an apse (: apses; from Latin , 'arch, vault'; from Ancient Greek , , 'arch'; sometimes written apsis; : apsides) is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical Vault (architecture), vault or semi-dome, also known as an ' ...

of a church dating back to the late 4th century or early 5th century, and considered the oldest church in

Alsace Alsace (, ; ) is a cultural region and a territorial collectivity in the Grand Est administrative region of northeastern France, on the west bank of the upper Rhine, next to Germany and Switzerland. In January 2021, it had a population of 1,9 ...

. It is supposed that this was the first seat of the Catholic Diocese of Strasbourg.Fouilles romaines sous l'église Saint-Étienne à Strasbourg

References

External links

Argentoratum (Strasbourg)
on Livius.org
www.argentoratum.com

Histoire de Strasbourg : quand Strasbourg était Argentorate

Argentorate, Strasbourg
by Jean-Jacques Hatt {{coord, 48.5827, 7.7510, type:city_region:FR, display=title History of Strasbourg 12 BC establishments Roman legionary fortresses in France Roman fortifications in Germania Superior Roman towns in Germania Nero Claudius Drusus