Parentium, Croatia
II century B.C.

Poreč is a town on the western coast of Istria, inhabited as far as in prehistory. During the 2nd century B.C. the Roman castrum, was erected on the peninsula, and that is nowadays the nucleus of the old town. During the rule of the Emperor Augustus, in 1st century, the Castrum was officially proclaimed as Roman colony – Colonia Iulia Parentium. During Roman times Poreč gets its first walls. On the western side of the peninsula there is the Neptune's or Jupiter's temple. In the 3rd century already, there was an  organised Christian community in the town and an early Christian complex. The Christian community disappeared almost completely in Diocletian's period and the Poreč martyrs St. Mauro and St. Eleutherus were victimised. According to the legend, St. Eleutherus was tied to a stone and thrown into the sea. After the year 539, the town was ruled by Byzantium. During Byzantine rule bishop Euphrasius  had his seat in the town. The bishop ordered the renovation of the basilica geminata of that period. The new basilica was built on the model of the basilica in Ravenna, with gold mosaics in whose centre stays the figure of Our Lady with the Child. In the apse left of Our Lady  there is bishop Euphrasius (carrying the model of the basilica), St. Maur and St. Eleutherus. The complex of the Euphrasian  basilica was entered in the UNESCO World Heritage list. 

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