Emona: a City of the Empire

The Roman colony of Emona was the first actual city settlement in the area of today’s Ljubljana. Like a precise machine connected with other cities and the capital, Rome, Emona helped to propel the empire. With its universal form, architecture, way of life, laws and values the city educated its inhabitants into loyal Roman citizens. Emona's rituals, rules and everyday practices strengthened their common political, ideological and cultural identity.

The Emona: a City of the Empire exhibition will thus display the city's urban structure, its development, the relations within the colony among Roman newcomers and the native inhabitants and how the consciousness of being Roman had been reinforced. The exhibition will also explore the Emona’s heritage, which started coming back to life in the last two centuries. We will display comprehensive archaeological excavations and a wealth of objects, companies and projects that found their names in Ljubljana's Roman past (the Emona café, Emona store, the gramophone Emona, Rex type-writers, Ilirija swimming pool, Mercator, Kolosej, Millenium, Emporium, etc.)

The Emona: a City of the Empire exhibition's author is Dr. Bernarda Županek, PhD, curator for Roman Archaeology at MGML.