Hungary's oldest city — Roman Savaria, the birthplace of Saint Martin of Tours, and Art Nouveau at the Austrian border
Szombathely is Hungary's oldest continuously inhabited city, founded as the Roman city of Savaria in 43 CE — making it older than most of Western Europe's great cities. It was the capital of the Roman province of Pannonia Prima and the birthplace of Saint Martin of Tours (316 CE), the patron saint of France, whose cult spread across medieval Europe. The city has exceptional Roman ruins beneath its streets, beautiful Art Nouveau architecture from the Habsburg fin-de-siècle, and sits 8km from the Austrian border.
Savaria was one of the most important Roman cities in Pannonia — on the Amber Road connecting the Baltic to the Adriatic, and a key military station on the Danube frontier. The city was the provincial capital and a major administrative center; the Emperor Constantius II died here in 361 CE. Saint Martin was born in Savaria around 316 CE to a Roman military tribune; he later became Bishop of Tours in Gaul and founded the monastic tradition that would shape medieval Western Christianity.