Vinkovci

Excavation in Vinkovci has produced an unbroken sequence of occupation running back some eight thousand years, which is why the town is regularly described as one of the longest continuously inhabited settlements in Europe - the layers are stacked under the modern streets. The town museum holds the finds, among them the Orion vessel, a Vucedol culture pot from around 2600 BC incised with bands of symbols that a Croatian researcher interpreted as a seasonal star calendar; the reading is discussed rather than settled, and the museum presents it as an interpretation. Two Roman emperors, Valentinian I and Valens, were born here when the place was Cibalae.

History

The area has been lived in without a break since the Neolithic: the eponymous site of the Sopot culture, near Vinkovci, dates from 5480-3790 BC, and among the Vučedol finds of 3000-2500 BC is a pot of about 2600 BC bearing what is read as an astral calendar, the first found in Europe to show the year beginning at the start of spring. In the 2nd century Hadrian made the town a municipium, and under Caracalla it became Colonia Aurelia Cibalae; the emperors Valentinian I and Valens were born here, a Roman bath survives underground with other Roman buildings near the centre, and in 2012 a 4th-century hoard, the Vinkovci Treasure, was found in the town. In the Middle Ages it was a site of the Bijelo Brdo culture. The Ottomans held it from 1526 until the Habsburgs took it in 1687, confirmed by the Treaty of Karlowitz in 1699; it then lay in the Slavonian Military Frontier until 1881, and in the late 19th and early 20th century it was a district capital of Syrmia County (Wikipedia, Vinkovci).

What's there

• Eight thousand years of occupation - stacked layers under the modern town.
• The Orion vessel - a Vucedol pot read as a star calendar, still debated.
• Roman Cibalae - birthplace of the emperors Valentinian I and Valens.
• An autumn folklore festival - the town's main event in September.

When to go

May to October; the folklore festival is in September. Half a day.

Practical notes

The archaeology is mostly in the museum rather than visible in the streets. The calendar reading of the Orion vessel is one scholar's interpretation and is contested. The town itself is a plain Slavonian centre.

Nearby

Vukovar and the Danube are north-east; Osijek is north-west.

Key facts