Seuthopolis

Seuthopolis was an ancient city founded by the Thracian king Seuthes III, and the capital of the Odrysian kingdom since 320 BC. It was a small city, built on the site of an earlier settlement, and its ruins are now located at the bottom of the Koprinka Reservoir near Kazanlak, Stara Zagora Province, in central Bulgaria.

Seuthopolis was not a true polis, but rather the seat of Seuthes and his court. His palace had a dual role, functioning also as a sanctuary of the Cabeiri. Most of the space within the city was occupied not by homes but by official structures, the majority of the people living outside the city.

The dual role of Seuthes' palace (royal court and sanctuary) indicates that Seuthes was a priest-king: the high priest of the Cabeiri among the Odrysian Thracians. A hearth altar stood in the center of the Cabeiri sanctuary, the Cabeiri being associated with fire and metallurgy and with the smith-god Hephaestus.

The cemetery of Seuthopolis included a number of brick tholos tombs, some covered by tumuli, in which the upper-class were interred, sometimes along with their horses. The less affluent were cremated, with modest grave goods laid alongside.

The ruins of the city were discovered and excavated in 1948 by Bulgarian archeologists during the construction of the Georgi Dimitrov (later renamed Koprinka) Reservoir. However, it was decided to continue with the construction and flood the dam, leaving Seuthopolis at its bottom.

In 2005, Bulgarian architect Zheko Tilev proposed a project to uncover, preserve and reconstruct the city of Seuthopolis (the best preserved Thracian city in Bulgaria) by means of a dam wall surrounding the ruins in the middle of the dam, enabling the site's inscription as a UNESCO World Heritage Site and making it a tourist destination of world importance. Tourists would be transported to the site by boats. The round wall, 420 metres in diameter, would enable visitors to see the city from 20 metres above and would also feature "hanging gardens", glass lifts, a quay, restaurants, cafés, shops, ateliers, etc. It would be illuminated at night.

The project was donated by the architect to Kazanlak municipality and funds are being raised to begin construction. According to Tilev, it would cost minimum €50 million. ^{[http://imoti.net/news/news.php?id=1800]}

Sevtopolis Peak on Greenwich Island in the South Shetland Islands, Antarctica is named for Seuthopolis.

External links

* [http://www.kazanlak.bg/image/sevtopolis.pdf Zheko Tilev's project to uncover Seuthopolis]
* [http://sevtopolis.suhranibulgarskoto.org Site about the international initiative of National Unity "Treasure the Bulgarian Heritage" about Zheko Tilev's project to uncover Seuthopolis]