National Museum Čačak

National Museum Čačak

Info

The Roman Period

In its aim to penetrate to the east and conquer the new territories, the Roman Empire, at the beginning of the 1st century AD occupied the territories deeply inside the Balkans. The effect of their occupation was the romanisation of the local inhabitants, spreading of Roman culture and administration. On this period can testify many monuments found in the town of Čačak and its vicinity, where one can emphasize the Roman baths (one in the center of the town, another in its periphery-suburb of Beljina), which modestly imitate classical Roman ideals/models. The way of construction and the system of floor heating (hipocaustus), just show the well-known Roman need for luxury, that could have not been avoided even on these, quite distant territories.

There was constructed road network and the settlements were founded. Favorable climate and fertile soil enabled that during the 3rd and 4th century, in the Čačak vicinity, were founded many farmsteads with additional objects (villae rusticae). It is considered that on the territory of the modern town existed a village of the vicus type. To the sacred monuments belong a burial memory excavated on the site of Čuljevina in Prijevor, made at the beginning of the 5th century.

The interpretation of epigraphic monuments ensured new information on Antiquity period in this area. Inscription on one of the honorary monuments – an ara - found in the churchyard in Čačak, confirms that this territory in the 3rd century was a part of the province of Dalmatia on a borderline with the province of Moesia Superior. Between the monuments from Čačak there were identified two consular beneficiaries as well, pointing on existance of a Roman beneficiary station (for tax collection) on this territory.

The biggest part of Antiquity display shows the findings from the period of Late Roman period – cca. the end of 3rd untill the beginning of the 5th century. Previous phase – from the end of the 1st untill the end of 3rd century is presented by occasional findings (bronze fibulae, Mercury statue, coin hoard from Goračići) and stone monuments with inscriptions. The Late Roman period represent the best known phase and it is dislayed thoughout the showcases furnished with ceramic ware, items made of metal and bone, found in the Roman baths in Čačak and in Beljina, or in the farmstead from Prijevor. The way of burying in the same period is illustrated by reconstructed grave covering found on the Late Roman necropolis in the churchyard of the Saint Virgin Mary Assumption in Beljina and findings of glass ware and tools from the grave at Čuljevina in Prijevor.