Roman Aquileia

Roman Aquileia was a Roman military colony and city founded in 181 BC near the head of the Adriatic Sea, on the site of the modern Italian comune of Aquileia in northeastern Italy. It grew into a major Roman city, with an estimated population close to 100,000 in the second century AD, and served as a military headquarters for Roman expansion toward the Danube and as a hub of Mediterranean trade. The city was also an early center of Christianity, and its bishop, the Patriarch of Aquileia, held the second most important ecclesiastical position in the Western church. Aquileia was destroyed by Attila the Hun in 452 AD. Its archaeological remains, distinct from the modern town on the same site, form part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site covering the Archaeological Area of Aquileia and the Patriarchal Basilica.