Thrace

Thrace is a historical and geographic area in south-east Europe spread over north-eastern Greece, southern Bulgaria, and European Turkey. Thrace borders on three seas the Black Sea, the Aegean Sea and the Sea of Marmara.

History

Thrace has been under the control of many different rulers. The first Greek colonies in Thrace were founded in the 6th century BC. The indigenous population was an Indo-European people called Thracians, and though they spoke the same language and worshipped the same main deities, the rest of Greeks considered them to be semi-savages. The raving cult of Dionysus played certainly a great role in this.

The area was ruled by Persia for some 30 years, and later conquered by the Macedonians, the Romans, Byzantium, Bulgaria, the Ottoman Turks.

On August 20, 917 during the Battle of Anchialus, Tsar Simeon I of Bulgaria invaded Thrace and drove the Byzantines out.

Thracians have also been called Bistonians, after Biston.

Cities of Thrace

Bulgarian

• Plovdiv
• Stara Zagora
• Kazanlak
• Haskovo

Greek

• Alexandroupolis
• Komotini
• Xanthi

Turkish

• Edirne ("Adrianople") refounded by Hadrian, site of numerous battles, notably the Battle of Adrianople (378) and the Battle of Adrianople (1205)

Famous Thracians

Orpheus, in Greek legend, was the chief representative of the art of song and playing the lyre, and of great importance in the religious history of Greece.

Spartacus was a Thracian enslaved by the Romans, who led a large slave uprising in what is now Italy in (73 - 71 B.C.). His army of escaped gladiators and slaves defeated several Roman legions in what is known as the "Third Servile War".