Marcianopolis

MARCIANO´POLIS(Μαρκιανούπολις, Procop. de Aed. 4.7), a city of Moesia, 18 M. P. from Odessus ( Varna) ( Itin. Anton.; Peut. Tab.;Hierocl.), which derived its name from Marciana, sister of Trajan. (Ammian. 27.6.12; Jornand. de Reb. Get. 16.) Claudius II. signally defeated the Goths in several battles near this town. (Trebell. Poll. Claud. 9; Zozim. 1.42.) Gibbon (c. xxvi.; comp. Le Beau, Bas Empire, vol. 4. p. 106; Greenwood, History of the Germans, London, 1836, p. 329; Art de Vér. les Dates, vol. 1. p. 358) has told the story of the accidental quarrel between the Visigoth Fritigern and the Roman governor of Marcianopolis, Lupicinus,—which became the signal of a long and destructive war. (Ammian. 31.5.4, Zozim. 4.10, 11.) Marcianopolis afterwards became Peristhlava or Presthlava (Περισθλάβα), the capital of the Bulgarian kingdom, which was taken A.D. 971 by Swiatoslaff the Russian, and again reduced by John Zimisces, when 8500 Russians were put to the sword, and the sons of the Bulgarian king rescued from an ignominious prison, and invested with a nominal diadem. (Gibbon, c. lv.; Schafarik, Slav. Alt. vol. ii. pp. 187, foll. 216; Finlay, Byzantine Empire, pp. 408—413.) The site of the ancient town must be sought for in the neighbourhood of Pravadi. For coins of Marcianopolis, both autonomous and imperial, see Eckhel, vol. 2. p. 15. [E.B.J]