Kula ( bg, Кула, , ) is a town in northwestern

Bulgaria Bulgaria (; bg, България, Bǎlgariya), officially the Republic of Bulgaria,, ) is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Macedo ...

. It is the administrative centre of Kula Municipality part of

Vidin Province Vidin Province () is the northwesternmost province of Bulgaria. It borders Serbia to the west and Romania to the northeast. Its administrative centre is the city of Vidin on the Danube river. The area is divided into 11 municipalities. As of D ...

. Located just east of the

Serbia Serbia (, ; Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia ( Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin and the Balkans. It shares land borders with Hu ...

n-Bulgarian border, it is the third largest town in the province after

Vidin Vidin ( bg, Видин, ; Old Romanian: Diiu) is a port city on the southern bank of the Danube in north-western Bulgaria. It is close to the borders with Romania and Serbia, and is also the administrative centre of Vidin Province, as well as ...

and

Belogradchik Belogradchik ( bg, Белоградчик ) is a town in Vidin Province, Northwestern Bulgaria, the administrative centre of the homonymous Belogradchik Municipality. The town, whose name literally means "small white town," is situated in the fo ...

. Kula lies 30 kilometres west of Vidin and 13 kilometres east of the border checkpoint at

Vrashka Chuka Vrashka Chuka ( bg, Връшка чука ) or Vrška čuka (Serbian Cyrillic: , ) is a peak in the Balkan Mountains, situated on the border between Bulgaria and Serbia. The peak is high. Vrashka Chuka is the most northwestern peak in the Balka ...

. As of 2021, the town has a population of 2400 inhabitants.Bulgarian National Statistical Institute - Bulgarian towns in 2021

History

Kula is the modern site of the Late

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: * Rome, the capital city of Italy * Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lett ...

fortress of ''

Castra Martis Castra Martis ( bg, Кастра Мартис) was a Roman fortified garrison (castra) in Dacia which became a town and bishopric and remains a Latin Catholic titular see. History Castra Martis, named after the Roman god of war Mars, on the mode ...

'', the ruins of which can still be seen today, which also was a bishopric in the

Roman province The Roman provinces (Latin: ''provincia'', pl. ''provinciae'') were the administrative regions of Ancient Rome outside Roman Italy that were controlled by the Romans under the Roman Republic and later the Roman Empire. Each province was rule ...

Dacia Ripensis Dacia Ripensis () was the name of a Roman province in the northern Balkan peninsula, immediately south of the Middle Danube. Its capital was Ratiaria (modern Archar, Bulgaria). It was a district less urban than neighbouring Dacia Mediterranea a ...

and remains a Latin Catholic

titular see A titular see in various churches is an episcopal see of a former diocese that no longer functions, sometimes called a "dead diocese". The ordinary or hierarch of such a see may be styled a "titular metropolitan" (highest rank), "titular archbi ...

under the Latin name. The town has a museum exhibiting various tools and everyday items found in the fortress, as well as a miniature model of the Roman town. While within Danube Vilayer of the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University ...

, the town was called Adliye and

Yezdanşêr Yezdanşêr was a Kurdish leader, military officer and a relative of Bedir Khan Beg. He became shortly the Müteselim of Cizre and later led a revolt against the Ottoman Empire in the mid 1850s. After the revolt failed, he was exiled to Vidin, ret ...

became its

Governor A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...

in the late 1860s. The most important local industry is the rubber and plastic processing factory.

Eponymy

Castra Martis Hill Castra Martis Hill (Halm Kastra Martis \'h&lm 'kas-tra 'mar-tis\) is a 453 m hill near Leslie Hill in Livingston Island. The peak was named after the Roman settlement of Castra Martis, ancestor of the present town of Kula in Northwestern Bul ...

Livingston Island Livingston Island (Russian name ''Smolensk'', ) is an Antarctic island in the Southern Ocean, part of the South Shetlands Archipelago, a group of Antarctic islands north of the Antarctic Peninsula. It was the first land discovered south of 60 ...

in the

South Shetland Islands The South Shetland Islands are a group of Antarctic islands with a total area of . They lie about north of the Antarctic Peninsula, and between southwest of the nearest point of the South Orkney Islands. By the Antarctic Treaty of 1 ...

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest cont ...

is named after the fortress of Castra Martis.

References

Sources and external links

Website about Kula
{{Authority control Towns in Bulgaria Populated places in Vidin Province Kula Municipality, Bulgaria