City
Pompeiopolis
Taşköprü
Listen to the story
A list of young citizens from the time of Trajan, made up almost entirely of Roman names, reveals the unusual character of Pompeiopolis, at Taşköprü in Turkey. Pompey founded the city in 64 BC and gave it his name, apparently settling soldiers from the West there, and it even dated its documents by the Roman calendar. In the second century AD its coins hailed it as the most illustrious metropolis of Paphlagonia, where the provincial assembly met, until Diocletian's reforms passed that rank to Gangra. The city's prosperity ended with the Sasanian Persian raids around 600.