Augusta ( or Αὐγοῦστα) was a town in the interior of
ancient Cilicia
Cilicia () is a geographical region in southern Anatolia, extending inland from the northeastern coasts of the Mediterranean Sea. Cilicia has a population ranging over six million, concentrated mostly at the Cilician plain (). The region inclu ...
, inhabited during
Roman
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
*Rome, the capital city of Italy
*Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of Roman civilization
*Epistle to the Romans, shortened to Romans, a letter w ...
and
Byzantine
The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...
times. It was founded in 20 AD and named after
Livia
Livia Drusilla (30 January 59 BC
AD 29) was List of Roman and Byzantine empresses, Roman empress from 27 BC to AD 14 as the wife of Augustus, the first Roman emperor. She was known as Julia Augusta after her formal Adoption ...
, the widow of the Emperor
Augustus
Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian (), was the founder of the Roman Empire, who reigned as the first Roman emperor from 27 BC until his death in A ...
.The Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites, AUGUSTA Cilicia Campestris, Turkey /ref>
Ptolemy
Claudius Ptolemy (; , ; ; – 160s/170s AD) was a Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were important to later Byzantine science, Byzant ...
places this town in a district named Bryelice. The town also bore the name Augustopolis, and possibly Thebae.
The city probably lost its position as an important center after the Muslim invasion of Cilicia in the 7th century.
Its site is located near Gübe in Asiatic Turkey.
In 431 Tarianus, Bishop of Augusta represented the town at the
Council of Ephesus
The Council of Ephesus was a council of Christian bishops convened in Ephesus (near present-day Selçuk in Turkey) in AD 431 by the Roman Emperor Theodosius II. This third ecumenical council, an effort to attain consensus in the church th ...
.
The ancient city was flooded due to the Seyhan Dam in 1955.Ancient city comes to light as water recedes /ref> Before it disappeared under the waters of the dam the researchers managed to partially survey the site and record some buildings of the city. Among these were the foundations of a triumphal arch, two colonnaded streets crossing each other, a theater, a civic basilica, some shops, a bath building and a dam on the river.