Razkopki v razširenijeto na Nove (Nove II) i v iztočnata čast na canabae legionis

A 3-year excavation project in the eastern part of the Late Roman Novae (so called annex or Novae II) started in 2017. The area adjacent to the legionary fortress from the east was a part of the canabae legionis in the early Roman period, and during the Late Antiquity became part of the fortified town. The Late Roman fortifications were excavated by the Bulgarian archaeologists in 1961-1969, and in 2012-2014 non-destructive surveys were made in the annex. Based on the previous archaeological surveys, four places were chosen for further investigations (Fig. 1.1-4). Sector 1 was excavated in 2016, in the place where the remains of walls were unearthed by illegal trenching. Three other sectors were located in places which were chosen as potentially not destroyed. The excavations in Sector 1 revealed quite large building of ca. 5.70 x more than 7.50 m (Fig. 2). Six layers were identified there. The layer attributed to the period when the building was in use can be dated to the 4th c. AD. Among the finds, there were coins of Constantine I (issued in AD 336-337) and Constantius II (355-361). The preceding layers are dated to the 2nd-3rd cc. and the 1st c. AD. In Sector 2 (Fig. 1.2), we found traces of robbing activities which destroyed stratigraphy almost completely. Still, the investigations produced a few interesting finds, including a brooch dated to the 4th-6th century and two coins from the 4th-5th century AD. In Sector 3 (Fig. 1.3) the excavations revealed the fragmentarily preserved wall and the canal made of large roof tiles. The latest layers are dated to the 5th-6th cc, by coins of Arcadius (401-403) and Honorius (408-423). A fragment of the clay floor level was preserved on the northern side of the wall, and the layers above it produced coins dated to the 4th century AD. The earliest unearthed layers contained a coin of Carinus (282-285?). Sector 4 was placed 80 m to the north-east from Sector 1 and 35 m to the south-west from Tower no. 2 (Fig. 1.4). The latest layers contained silver Romanian leu 1877 r. which was possibly lost during the Russo-Turkish War. Below, we unearthed a layer of compacted earth with stones (perhaps remains of a road or a pavement) and a fragment of a wall which may have belonged to some building (Fig. 3). The layer with stones produced broadly dated coins, from A. Pius (145-(147?)) to Mauricius (588/589), but majority dated to the 4th-6th cc. The first observations indicate that this part of the site was intensively used in the Late Antiquity (4th-6th cc.). The remains of the uncovered walls certainly did not belong to any public buildings. So far, no solid walls have been found in the earliest layers dated to the 1st-3rd cc., however, traces of a pithole unearthed in 2016 may indicate wooden constructions during the existence of the canabae.