Museum Quintana - Romans and Archeology in Künzing

Museum Quintana - Romans and Archeology in Künzing

After our visit to the Roman Museum Boiotro in Passau, we had changed our plans, also due to the cold autumn weather, and because of that we now wanted to visit the Museum Quintana in Künzing too.

As one of the Roman fortifications along the Danube limes, next to Passau and Regensburg, the Roman colony Quintana was established in Künzig around 90 AD. The fortress walls, protected by a strikingly strong outer wall protecting approximately two hectares of land, offered space for a crew of 500 men, including a section of 120 riders.

In 2003 the local Deggendorf research group for Archaeology succeeded in making a sensational discovery: a former amphitheater, which was built from timber and which was never expected at a small settlement like Künzing. A model of this amphitheater shows a reconstruction of the oval arena with the dimensions 34.6 m (= 117 Roman feet) times 29.6 m (= 100 feet) in north-south direction. The total diameter with wooden stands, which could accommodate about 600 people, was 46 x 40 m (155 x 135 feet).

The museum itself is housed in the city center in the building of the local town hall, where also various special exhibitions take place. At the time of our visit, for example, an exhibition on cocoa was placed there. Even in the entrance area, a model of a part of the castle allows a deep insight into the administrative buildings, the hospital, the military accommodation and the horse stands at Roman times.

Various metal hoarding points with location information do not only show a large selection of original weapons and equipment in the museum's exhibition space, but also tell the story of the violent end of the castle in the middle of the 3rd century AD: The weapons were used as treasures of raids buried by looters.

But not only the military even the daily life is reflected by the exhibits from Künzing castle and the surrounding camp village: pieces for playing, jewelry and writing utensils, simple items such as fine terra sigillata, the tableware of the Romans were included.

A special treasure of the museum is the military diplomacy, which after a 25-year period of service, granted the Roman citizenship to a non-Roman soldier of the Roman auxiliary forces, and thus also to the right to marry.

Please read as well:

Regensburg Festival of German-Turkish Literature

Sepp Bögle - the stone-stacker from Radolfzell at Lake Constance

History

Life | Outdoors

Culture