Kaleto fortress

The first appearance of settlers on the rocky hill near Mezdra was in the second half of the 5th millennium BC. Remains of the preparation of the terrain for construction were found in a gray layer with a lot of charcoal. The ancient settlers cut down and burned the vegetation to level the ground before build their dwellings. Above this layer lie several floor screeds (4-5 in number) and the charred remains of the first cultural layer of the Kaleto fortress. These are actually the remains of the earliest settlement, which was apparently hit by a major fire. Its inhabitants probably escaped, because traces of clearing the terrain and preparation for new construction are visible at the same place. In 2021, an anthropomorphic ceramic figure, about 6,000 years old, was discovered. It is associated with the most important and widespread cult in antiquity to the Mother Goddess. This small figurine depicts a standing female figure, which is atypical for the local figures of the mother goddess, who are seated. According to archaeologists, the figurine was imported from tribes located to the north – indication of developed trade relations.

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  In the summer of 2008, a prehistoric sanctuary was discovered in the smallest borehole located in the center of the rocky hill, directly on the limestone rock. Archaeologists cleared two skulls of aurochs (the wild predecessors of the domestic cow), placed side by side in a north-south direction among the remains of ash, charcoal, broken ceramics and animal bones. A flat river stone, plastically shaped like a bull's head, was vertically driven in tightly behind their occipital parts. The ritually placed skulls of aurochs and the stone sculpture were covered with broken stones and plastered on top with burnt clay. The "sanctuary of the aurochs" arose at the end of the Stone-Copper Age, more than 6,000 years ago, i.e. it has been functioning since the beginning of the settlement of the rocky hill. The blood of the sacrificed bull fertilizes the land and ensures fertility according to the widespread cult of the Mother Goddess. The second cultural layer lies directly on the first and has a total thickness of about 0.9 m. Three mortars, baked to a brick-red color, left over from a half-destroyed oven, were found. Numerous flint arrowheads, throwing spears and stone balls for slings were found in the cultural layers. Apparently, at the end of the Chalcolithic period, the settlement near Mezdra flourished as a craft center with well-developed workshops for processing and decorating ceramics, making agricultural tools from horn, bone and stone and producing copper objects. After the burning and levelling of the terrain, in parallel with building houses, the first settlers undertook the construction of a wooden earthen fortification on the northern, relatively easily accessible side of the hill. Later stone fortifications, dating from Antiquity and the Middle Ages, were built in the same place on the remains of the prehistoric fence. This is a relatively rare phenomenon of continuity in fortress construction during different periods – from the 5th millennium BC to the Late Bulgarian Middle Ages (13th-14th centuries). But here it can be easily explained by the features of the relief. In 2007, the remains of a structure dating back to the Early Iron Age (8th-6th centuries BC) were found in the central part of the Citadel. The discovered fragments of a large anthropomorphic sculpture, urn-shaped vessels, a large amount of ash, charred plants, animal bones and a silver fibula give archaeologists reason to speak of an early Thracian sanctuary that has existed on the rocky hill more than 2600 years ago. It is striking that this Thracian cult center from the 8th-6th centuries BC arose on the Citadel several centuries earlier than the settlement considered the dynastic center of the Tribals tribe in the Gradishteto area near Vratsa. The history of "Kaleto" continued in Antiquity, when a Roman fortification existed on this site from the middle of the 2nd century, a pagan cult center from the 3rd century and a fortified settlement from the 4th – 6th century, developing during the late Roman and early Byzantine periods. The ancient Thracians from the Tribals tribe inhabited the "Kaleto" area until the 1st century, when the settlement, together with all of The Moesia province, was conquered by the Roman Empire. From this period, numerous bronze coins (antoninians) from the time of the Roman emperors Dometian, Claudius II Gothicus and Probus, bronze fibulae, belt ornaments, a torc and a silver leaf from a laurel wreath were found. A very rare discovery was made under the base of the fortress wall, a bronze cast of an eagle. This is one of the earliest images of this mighty bird expressing power and strength, symbolizing the supreme Roman deity Jupiter (in Greek mythology Zeus) and an emblem of the Roman Empire. Another valuable find is a bronze key from the remains of the most representative building of the "Kaleto". The strategically located Roman fortress is the best preserved fortress from this period in our country. The late antique fortified settlement on the Kaleto hill continued its existence until the end of the 6th or beginning of the 7th century, when it was destroyed during one of the Avar-Slavic invasions. This marked the beginning of the Medieval period for the fortress and the settlement. During The Migration Period (The Barbarian Invasions) the fortress and the city were destroyed and rebuilt repeatedly. The last wave of "barbarian peoples" who came to these places were the Slavs. The last ancient coins found here date from the time of the early Byzantine emperor Justin II (565-578) and indicate the approximate date of Slavic settlement. After the Slavs, the Asparuh Bulgarians came to these lands and an Old Bulgarian settlement developed in the 9th-11th centuries on the ruins of the late antique fortified settlement. From this period, kitchen ceramics predominate - small and medium-sized clay pots with sand impurities and incised decoration of straight and wavy lines. This pottery is well known from other medieval monuments and dates back to the 8th-9th centuries. The Old Bulgarian fortress and the settlement, known as Darmanitsa (according to another translation of an Ottoman document from the 15th century, Torbaritsa) were conquered in the 11th century, when Emperor Basil II undertook a campaign against Vidin and conquered the northwest Bulgarian lands. In the 14th century, the Turks destroyed the fortress. This was the end of this fortification, which was never rebuilt again. The Liberation of Ottomans found it as a bare hill covered with grass.