It was founded in 316/5 BC. by King Kassander with the settlement of 26 cities in the area of the Thermaic Gulf and owes its name to the half-sister of Alexander the Great, Thessaloniki. The strategic position of the city and the development of its port resulted in its rapid development into a political and economic center of the Balkans. In 148 BC became the capital of the Roman province of Macedonia and after 42 BC. is declared a "free" city. Although the building remains of the Hellenistic period are relatively limited and fragmentary, as they are located below the modern city, they testify to the existence of an urban center organized on the basis of the "equestrian system". In recent years, the ancient administrative center with public buildings, squares and streets has been revealed in Diikitirio Square. Among them stand out the ruins of a large Roman building (1st century BC) with a peristyle and frescoes, founded on earlier Hellenistic buildings (end of the 4th century BC, with remarkable movable finds). The heyday of the Hellenistic city is highlighted by the cemeteries outside the walls and the Macedonian tombs (4th - 2nd century BC) found in various parts of it. Roman Thessaloniki was organized around a grid of parallel (decumani) and perpendicular (cardines) streets, with the main ones being the via Regia (a little south of Egnatia) and the cardo maximus (on today's Venizelou Street). Intense reconstruction can be seen in the years of the Antonines and the Severus (2nd - 3rd centuries AD). The market consisted of a central paved square with porticos on three sides and an entrance on the fourth, above a double semi-subterranean vaulted portico (cryptoporticus).
The palace complex of Caesar Galerius was built around 300 AD. and includes the palace - in today's Navarino Square - with a peristyle courtyard, vaulted halls and an octagonal throne room (Oktagono), the hippodrome, the triumphal arch (Kamara), a circular temple, the Rotunda, and a procession route. From the arch of Galerius (305 AD), two large pessos are preserved today, out of the four it originally had, and a smaller one. They are connected by brick arches and the first two are decorated with marble reliefs, which chronicle the emperor's campaigns against the Persians.
Various finds (statues, mosaic floors, inscriptions, coins, vases and figurines, etc.) are exhibited in the Museum of Thessaloniki. The Thessaloniki of the early Byzantine period becomes a Christian metropolis. The city walls were built in the 4th century, outside the perimeter of the Roman wall of the 3rd century, while the rampart is later. The Rotunda, part of the Galerian palace complex, was converted into a Christian temple during the reign of Theodosius the Great (379 - 395) and decorated with mosaics. In Agios Dimitrios, a five-aisled basilica with a transversal aisle (5th c., rebuilt in the 7th c.), built on the site where according to tradition the Saint was martyred, votive mosaics and frescoes (5th - 9th c.) are preserved. Part of them was destroyed in the fire of 1917. In the basilica of Achiropoiitos (mid 5th c. ) mosaics adorn the insides of the arches. In the catholicon of the Monastery of Latomou (Holy David), built on top of a Roman building, a mosaic representation of the epiphany in the alcove of the sanctuary (late 5th or 6th century). Early Christian basilicas existed in the place of the churches of Agia Sophia (7th century) and Agios Minas (19th century). Ruins of early Christian buildings (royal, secular buildings, etc.), including a large octagonal church (the "Octagon"), with a baptistery and additions with mosaic decoration. North of the Campus, an early Christian building with mosaic floors. In Panorama, ruins of an early Christian basilica with frescoes imitating orthomarbling. In Pylaia, remains of an early Christian basilica, where a vaulted tomb with frescoes. In the stream between Pylaia and Toumba, part of a bridge from the early Christian period is preserved, remains of a wall and vaulted tomb from the same period. The Museum of Byzantine Culture exhibits sculptures and other important findings from the early Christian period, including tombs with wall paintings.
Editor: Fotini Anastasopoulou