Thracian Bulgaria

Thracian Tomb of Kazanlak

A Thracian burial chamber painted around 300 BC.

20–40 min

Thracian Tomb of Sveshtari

Ten stone women holding up the roof of a Getic tomb

45 min–1.5 h

Perperikon

A city cut down into the rock rather than built on it

1.5–3 h

Nicopolis ad Istrum

A Roman city Trajan founded to mark beating the Dacians

45 min–1.5 h

National Archaeological Museum, Bulgaria

A fifteenth-century mosque holding Bulgaria's Thracian gold

1–2 h

Bacho Kiro cave

30 min–1.5 h

Thracian tomb of Aleksandrovo

A Thracian hunt, painted underground, shown in an exact copy

30 min–1 h

Varna Archaeological Museum

The oldest worked gold in the world, in a former girls' high school

1–2 h

Roman Thermae in Varna

Seven thousand square metres of Roman bathhouse between blocks of flats

30–50 min

Marcianopolis

Ancient Roman city in Thracia

30 min–1.5 h

Abritus

A Roman city best known for a battle fought somewhere else

45 min–1.5 h

Heraclea Sintica

A Macedonian city that Rome kept, dug out of a dead volcano near Petrich

45 min–1.5 h

Shumen Fortress

A medieval town on a cliff edge, flattened in 1444 and never rebuilt

45 min–1.5 h

Mesembria

Thracian, Greek and Byzantine walls stacked on one another at the neck of the peninsula

45 min–1.5 h

Philippopolis

The Roman city under Plovdiv: theatre, stadium, forum, all in ten minutes

3–8 h

Roman tomb in Silistra

Ancient Roman tomb

30 min–1.5 h

Apollonia Pontica

The oldest town on this coast, founded around 610 BC and still lying under Sozopol

45 min–1.5 h

Cabyle

Thracian ancient city, archaeological site

30 min–1.5 h

Vila Armira

Suburban Roman villa near Ivaylovgrad

30 min–1.5 h

Pistiros

A Greek trading post planted deep inside Thrace, on the Maritsa

20–45 min

Beglik Tash

A Thracian rock sanctuary of the late Bronze Age, only revealed to the public in 2002

1–2 h

Aquae Calidae

Roman baths, Suleiman the Magnificent's hamam, and 41°C water you can still get into

1.5–3 h

Nesebar Archaeological Museum

The Mesembria back-story, right where the old town begins

30 min–1 h

Tomb of Seuthes III

30 min–1.5 h

Small Basilica

Basilica in Plovdiv

30 min–1.5 h

Archaeological Museum

Apollonia, Mesembria and Anchialos in one room, with the coast's shipwrecks alongside

45 min–1.5 h

Sozopol Archaeological Museum

The best ancient Greek pottery in Bulgaria, in a small museum on Han Krum square

45 min–1.5 h

Sexaginta Prista

Archaeological site

30 min–1.5 h

Thracian tomb Ostrusha

A tomb chamber cut from a single 60-tonne stone

20–40 min

Augusta Traiana

Ancient city in Thrace, now known as Stara Zagora

30 min–1.5 h

Samouil's Fortress

Where the First Bulgarian Empire lost its army, in the summer of 1014

30 min–1.2 h

Thracian tomb near Mezek

Ancient Thracian beehive tomb near Mezek

30 min–1.5 h

Archeological Museum Sandanski

Museum in Sandanski

30 min–1.5 h

Thracian Cult Complex (Starosel)

Underground temple and mausoleum, built under the Chetinyova Mogila

30 min–1.5 h

Orlovi Skali

Thracian sanktuary

30 min–1.5 h

Preslav Fortress

Archaeological museum in Veliki Preslav

30 min–1.5 h

National Historical and Archaeological Reserve "Pliska"

30 min–1.5 h

Thracian tomb, Pomorie

A brick mausoleum with a hollow column at its centre, and nothing like it anywhere

30–45 min

Tatul

30 min–1.5 h

Madara (Archeological Preserve)

A horseman cut into the cliff face early in the eighth century

1–2.5 h

Urdoviza

A fortress on the headland between Kiten's two beaches, dug since 2012

30 min–1 h

Hotalich fortress

Settlement formation in Sevlievo

30 min–1.5 h

Tell Yunatsite

A prehistoric settlement mound near Pazardzhik

30 min–1.5 h

Propada Sanctuary

Forty-eight Thracian mounds in an oak wood three kilometres from Malko Tarnovo

1–2 h

Peshterata na Sveta Marina

A cave shrine deep in Strandzha where the sick left tin models of their own organs

45 min–1.5 h

Rimski termi

Roman baths in the middle of Obzor, open to the street and free

20–40 min