The year 14 or 15. Emona boasts of
a great new construction. It is solemnly fitted with a marble imperial
inscription in elegant letters: The late Emperor Augustus and his adopted son
and successor, Emperor Tiberius, have financially enabled an important construction
in the city ...
This inscription stone is partially
preserved – it is kept by the National Museum of Slovenia – and it became the
impetus for celebrating Emona 2000.
The period that the territory of present-day
Slovenia was part of the large, well-organised and highly cultivated Roman
Empire lasted for about five centuries; its spiritual legacy is the foundation
of Western civilisation.
Among the more than a thousand objects
on display, the imperial stone inscription, dated to the year 14 or 15, which
was the impetus for the Emona 2000 project and is kept by the National Museum
of Slovenia, holds a special place in the exhibition. Shown beside it is the
original arrangement of the gilded bronze statue of an Emona citizen: at the
time of Emperor Trajan, the statue was part of an outstanding tombstone, which
was obviously inspired by Trajan’s Column in Rome.
The stories told by the exhibited
objects compose a picture of the Roman age on the territory of present-day
Slovenia like the stone pieces of a mosaic, where – as before and after –
different worlds collided, and remarkable stories were created.
A catalogue by the author of the
exhibition, Janka Istenič, PhD, was also published to accompany the exhibition.