Pannonia

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Pannonia map
Pannonia map

Pannonia is an ancient province of the Roman Empire bounded north and east by the Danube, coterminous westward with Noricum and upper Italy, and southward with Dalmatia and upper Moesia. Pannonia was located mostly over the territory of the present-day western-half of Hungary with small parts in: Austria, Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Today the term Pannonia is usually used for what is called Transdanubia (Dunántúl) in Hungary, or simply the whole of Hungary.

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Julius Pokorny derived the name Pannonia from Illyrian, from the Proto-Indo-European root *pen-, "swamp, water, wet" (cf. English fen, "marsh"; Hindi pani, "water" ).

Position of the Roman province of Pannonia
Position of the Roman province of Pannonia

Its original inhabitants were the Pannonii (Pannonians), a group of tribes akin to Illyrians. From the 4th century BC it was invaded by various Celtic tribes. Little is heard of Pannonia until 35 BC, when its inhabitants, allies of the Dalmatians, were attacked by Augustus, who conquered and occupied Siscia (Sisak). The country was not, however, definitely subdued until 9 BC, when it was incorporated into Illyricum, the frontier of which was thus extended as far as the Danube.

In AD 6, the Pannonians, with the Dalmatians and other Illyrian tribes, revolted, and were overcome by Tiberius and Germanicus, after a hard-fought campaign which lasted for three years. After the rebellion was crushed in 9 AD, the province of Illyricum was dissolved, and its lands were divided between the new provinces of Pannonia in the north and Dalmatia in the south. The date of the division is unknown, most certainly after AD 20 but before AD 50. The proximity of dangerous barbarian tribes (Quadi, Marcomanni) necessitated the presence of a large number of troops (seven legions in later times), and numerous fortresses were built on the bank of the Danube.

Some time between the years 102 and 107, between the first and second Dacian wars, Trajan divided the province into Pannonia Superior (the western), and Pannonia Inferior (the eastern) portion. According to Ptolemy, these divisions were separated by a line drawn from Arrabona (Győr) in the north to Servitium (Gradiška) in the south; later, the boundary was placed further east. The whole country was sometimes called the Pannonias (Pannoniae).

Pannonia Superior was under the consular legate, who had formerly administered the single province, and had three legions under his control: Pannonia Inferior at first under a praetorian legate with a single legion as garrison, after Marcus Aurelius under a consular legate, still with only one legion. The frontier on the Danube was protected by the establishment of the two colonies Aelia Mursia (Osijek) and Aelia Aquincum (Óbuda) by Hadrian.

Under Diocletian a fourfold division of the country was made:

Diocletian also moved parts of today's Slovenia out of Pannonia and included them into Noricum.

In the middle of the 5th century Pannonia was ceded to the Huns by Theodosius II, and after the death of Attila successively passed into the hands of the Ostrogoths (456-471), Lombards (530-568), Avars (560s - c.800), Slavs (living there since c. 480s; independent between c.800 - 900), Magyars (modern Hungarians) (since 900/901); Habsburgs and Ottomans (since 1526; the Ottoman rule ended in 1878). After the First World War, the region was divided between Austria, Hungary and the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (renamed to Yugoslavia in 1929).

Between the 5th and the 10th century the romanized population of Pannonia developed the Romance Pannonian language, mainly around the lake Balaton in western Hungary, where there was the keszthely culture. This language and the related culture were extinct with the arrival of the Magyars.

Aerial photography: Gorsium - Tác - Hungary
Aerial photography: Gorsium - Tác - Hungary
Aquincum
Aquincum

The native settlements consisted of pagi (cantons) containing a number of vici (villages), the majority of the large towns being of Roman origin. The cities and towns in Pannonia were:

The country was fairly productive, especially after the great forests had been cleared by Probus and Galerius. Before that time timber had been one of its most important exports. Its chief agricultural products were oats and barley, from which the inhabitants brewed a kind of beer named sabaea. Vines and olive trees were little cultivated. Pannonia was also famous for its breed of hunting dogs. Although no mention is made of its mineral wealth by the ancients, it is probable that it contained iron and silver mines. Its chief rivers were the Dravus, Savus, and Arrabo, in addition to the Danuvius (less correctly, Danubius), into which the first three rivers flow.

The ancient name Pannonia is retained in the modern term Pannonian plain.

  • Radomir Popović, Rano hrišćanstvo u Panoniji, Vojvođanski godišnjak, sveska I, Novi Sad, 1995.
  • Petar Milošević, Arheologija i istorija Sirmijuma, Novi Sad, 2001.

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Roman Imperial Provinces (AD 117)
Achaea | Ægyptus | Africa | Alpes Cottiae | Alpes Maritimae | Alpes Poeninae | Arabia Petraea | Armenia | Asia | Assyria | Bithynia et Pontus | Britannia | Cappadocia | Cilicia | Corsica et Sardinia | Creta et Cyrenaica | Cyprus | Dacia | Dalmatia | Epirus | Galatia | Gallia Aquitania | Gallia Belgica | Gallia Lugdunensis | Gallia Narbonensis | Germania Inferior | Germania Superior | Hispania Baetica | Hispania Tarraconensis | Italia | Iudaea | Lusitania | Lycia et Pamphylia | Macedonia | Mauretania Caesariensis | Mauretania Tingitana | Moesia Inferior | Moesia Superior | Noricum | Pannonia Inferior | Pannonia Superior | Raetia | Sicilia | Syria | Taurica | Thracia The Roman Empire at its greatest extent, at the death of Trajan (117 AD)
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