Nicopolis

Nicopolis, the "city of victory", was founded in 29 BC by Octavian Augustus to commemorate his naval triumph over Mark Antony and Cleopatra at Actium two years earlier. The Romans lavished resources on their new showpiece, with funding from Herod of Judea, and it grew into a vast metropolis of perhaps 100,000 people, complete with temples, an aqueduct and a theatre. Its first defensive wall, some five kilometres long, was a curiously half-hearted affair, built more for show than security, as the Pax Romana made fortification seem unnecessary. The city thrived until the mid-third century, hosting the philosopher Epictetus and serving as provincial capital, before decline set in. Barbarian raids by the Heruli in 267, Alaric's Visigoths in 397 and the Vandals in 474 took their toll. In the mid-sixth century, a much smaller Byzantine wall was built around a reduced area, and the city was finally abandoned in the eighth or ninth century. Its ruins remain a rare survival of both Roman and Byzantine urban fortifications.