Shumen Fortress

Shumen Fortress, also known as the Old Town, stands on the Shumen Plateau, two kilometres west of the city of Shumen. The geographical region is an important crossroads, linking the Danube bank with Adrianople and Constantinople, and the northern Black Sea coast with the western Bulgarian lands.: Thracians inhabited the site 3,000 years ago, with a Thracian settlement around 1200 BC. After the Roman conquest in AD 15, the fortress became a Roman possession. In 395 it became part of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire. The Bulgarians occupied the territory in the eighth century, and after the ninth and tenth centuries the fortress temporarily passed into Byzantine hands. It was restored again in the eleventh century after the Pecheneg invasions. The period of the Second Bulgarian Empire began in the twelfth century, when Shumen was one of the most developed towns. Ottoman troops captured the fortress in 1388, and it was burnt down and destroyed during the crusade of 1444.

This brought to an end the thousand-year history of Shumen Fortress, which had played an important military and economic role in different periods.