City
Cirta colonia
Constantine
Listen to the story
Cirta Colonia rose on a steep rock above a river in Numidia and had long been the royal seat of Numidian kings such as Syphax and Masinissa. Julius Caesar gave the town to the mercenary leader Publius Sittius, who settled there with his followers, and under Augustus it became a colony of Roman citizens. On its hill stood a sanctuary of the god Baal Hamon, which has yielded more than eight hundred votive stones. After the city was destroyed in a civil conflict around 310, the emperor Constantine rebuilt it and gave it his name, which the city in Algeria still bears as Constantine.