Day 560: Dacian Fortresses

Back in the car, this time a four hour drive! We headed north into Transylvania, where the next World Heritage site awaited. This is known as the Dacian Fortresses, and they're ruined fortresses of the Dacian people, who lived in this area prior to Roman conquest. Apparently they had quite a thriving civilisation going on, but Trajan destroyed them around 105 AD and it never recovered.

We visited the site of Sarmezugeteusa Regia, which was their capital and largest fortress. Not much to see other than some walls, column bases of temples, and a road, but some archaeology was going on and it was still cool to see. Interesting connection - we had seen Trajan's Column still standing in Rome, just near the Forum when we were there back in January (it even featured in my video). The Column tells the story of Trajan's conquest of Dacia (modern day Romania and a bit north into Ukraine), and much of what we actually know about the Dacians comes directly from the column. Their leader, Decebelus, is still a folk hero to Romanians (though he was heavily pushed as such during the Communist era, a heroic leader fighting against imperialism and all that).

Hotel was about 20 minutes drive from the fortress - nothing special but we're only here for a night. Wifi quite crappy, keeps going on and off line.Read more