70 to 79 — it was established as a settlement for retired veterans of the VIII Augusta Legion, the military unit that had participated in the suppression of the Jewish revolt and various other campaigns.

The founding of a veteran colony at this location made strategic sense.

The site was positioned along important communication and trade routes in the eastern Balkans, in territory that was then part of the Roman province of Thrace.

The geographic location — in what is now southeastern Bulgaria, near the modern city of Burgas and the Black Sea coast — placed it at a crossroads of movement between the Danube frontier to the north and the important cities of the eastern Aegean world to the south.

The city followed the typical Roman urban plan: a forum at its center, temples, baths, administrative buildings, a theater, and the network of streets that organized Roman civic life.