The rise and fall of the Roman fort in Apsaros: recent numismatic evidence

Abstract

Archaeological discoveries made since 2014 at the site of the Roman fort in Apsaros/Gonio (Georgia) have shed more light on the earliest as well as later stages of the presence of the Roman army on the Colchis coast and on the history of the Apsaros fort itself. The paper reports on the new findings concerning the chronology of the Roman fort, and an essential part of the conclusions draws upon the results of numismatic research on recent coin finds from the site. Six years of fieldwork by a Polish-Georgian team have uncovered the remains of a possible horreum, built in the last decade of Nero’s reign, underlying a balneum constructed probably during Trajan’s Parthian war and rebuilt under Hadrian into a praetorium; a fine mosaic floor decorated with geometric motifs was found in one of the rooms of this early 2nd-century structure.

Keywords

• Georgia
• Colchis
• Apsaros
• Gonio
• numismatics
• coins