Leptis Magna

* This name is listed on the World Heritage List. ª The region is classified by UNESCO.

Leptis Magna ( in inscriptions also Lepcis Magna, today Lebda / لبدة / Labda ) was an ancient city in Libya and one of the three cities of Tripolitania landscape in the province of Africa. The two variants Leptis and Lepcis can be probably explained by different transcriptions of the original Punic name into Latin.

General

Leptis Magna is located near the city of al - Chums, about 120 kilometers east of Tripoli. Within the large ruins of the Severan Arch of Triumph, the thermal baths, the old and new forum, the theater from the Roman period are worth seeing. On the opposite side of the wadi Lebdah the amphitheater very well preserved and restored and the Circus, situated directly on the seafront. It is the largest preserved ancient city in the world.

1912, immediately after it was annexed as a result of the Italo -Turkish War ( 1911-1912 ) the area began archaeological excavations under Italian management. During this time, the Severan Arch of Triumph was reconstructed. In particular, Benito Mussolini, who built a dictatorship in Italy in 1922, then forced the excavations, as he intended to justify the establishment of a colonial empire in North Africa so that the area before the conquest by the Muslims was Roman and therefore once again dominated by Rome should be. As support for this claim the Fascist Leptis Magna and other Roman cities served in the Maghreb; Therefore, the local archaeologists received tremendous public support. With the Second World War they came then to a virtual standstill. After the fighting ended in Italian archaeologists working yet, to a lesser extent than previously continue in Leptis until they were forced by Gaddafi for the time being to leave the country.

1982 was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO Leptis Magna. Only 5 % of the city have been excavated. Due to the unfavorable winds that blow from the desert hot and dry and wet and salty from the sea over the city, the exposed parts of the city, however, decompose, which is why there are voices against further exposure of the city.

History

Leptis was probably the first trading colony of the Phoenicians in Tripolitania ( 8th century BC). They came first under the suzerainty of Carthage and Numidia after the conquest by finally under Roman rule (46 BC). In the Roman Empire won Leptis Magna great importance and wealth as a trading center for exotic animals from Africa, which were supplied by the Garamantes on the trans-Saharan trade. Above all, lions and elephants were needed for the circus games throughout the empire. During the clashes between Pompey and Caesar, the city fought against Caesar and was punished after his victory with a tribute of 100,000 hectoliters of olive oil. In Leptis Magna to have lived in that time already up to 100,000 people. After the city had already been collected under Trajan to colonia ( henceforth possessed all the free inhabitants of the Roman citizenship ), Emperor Septimius Severus (r. 193-211 ), a native of Leptis Magna, the site of the jus italicum, which largely freed meant by taxes. The Emperor also left his hometown magnificently expand. Much of the still impressive building dates from this period.

When Emperor Gordian III. Legio III Augusta disbanded after the Six Emperor year 238, which had been responsible for the protection of the area against marauding nomads, the security situation deteriorated dramatically: In the middle of the 3rd century there was by repeated nomadic incursions to a decline of the city. Although she was appointed again to the provincial capital under Emperor Diocletian in the 4th century and experienced a new boom, but lost the city after its conquest by the Vandals ( 455 ) important. 533 Leptis was reintegrated under Emperor Justinian, the Roman Empire and experienced as the seat of a dux limitis a last second flowering. The decisive factor was then the city's conquest by the Arabs (probably 647 ). Soon after taking the latter Oea (Tripoli ) had become the new center of Tripoli, Leptis Magna was abandoned by the population.

On a late Roman diocese of the city of Leptis Magna, the titular goes back to the Roman Catholic Church.

Mosaic from Leptis Magna

Theater

Market building ( macellum )