Studentski Trg

Studentski Trg (Serbian Cyrillic: Студентски Трг), or Students Square, is one of the central town squares and an urban neighborhood of Belgrade, the capital of Serbia. It is located in Belgrade's municipality of Stari Grad. In the Classical Antiquity, area of the modern square was the center of Singidunum, Roman precursor of modern Belgrade.

Studentski Trg is located halfway between the Republic Square (to the east) and the Kalemegdan park-fortress (to the west). It is adjacent to the Academy Park. To the north it extends into the neighborhood of (Upper) Dorćol, while the pedestrian zone of Knez Mihailova is located to the south.

Predecessor of Belgrade was Singidunum, Celtic and, later, Roman fortified town. The original earthen and wooden fort stretched around the Studentski Trg and Knez Mihailova Street. The oldest Roman graves were discovered in this section, dated to the 1st and early 2nd century. The central axis of the city grid was in the modern Uzun Mirkova-Studentski Trg-Vasina-Republic Square direction, thus the area od modern square was the "heart" of ancient Singidunum. Part of the main axis was an additional turning at modern Rajićeva Street. There was a gate at the entrance into the military camp. The gate was located where the City Library, the last building in the Knez Mihailova Street before the Kalemegdan Park, is located today.

Northern section of the Academy Park was excavated in 1968 in the project of building a furnace oil tank for the boiler room of the Belgrade's City Committee of the League of Communists located nearby. Under the lawn, the remnants of the ancient Roman thermae were discovered, including the frigidarium (room with the cold water), laconicum (room with the warm water), caldarium (room with the two pools of hot water) and tepidarium (room where people would sweat and prepare). The site became an archaeological dig in 1969 and 8 rooms in total were discovered, including the remains of the brick furnace which heated the water. Despite the military character of Singidunum, it was a public unisex bath. It is dated to 3rd or 4th century. Almost the entire building was unearthed, covering 150 m² (1,600 sq ft) with walls being preserved up to the height of 140 m (460 ft).

The building had the system of floor and wall heating, made of special, hollow bricks which allowed for the hot air to circulate through the rooms (tegula mammata and tubula). The canals which conducted the water to the thermae, and were discovered in 2013 when the manhole was dug in front of the Ethnographic Museum. The canals were connected to the main aqueduct built by the Romans, which conducted water from the springs in modern Mali Mokri Lug. The thermae was built by the Roman military, as attested by the inscriptions on the bricks which contain markings of the Legio IV Flavia Felix. The entire area of the park is actually within the borders of the "Protected zone of Roman Singidunum". It is situated in the area that used to be the civilian sector of the city, outside the fortress. The remnants were visible until 1978 and due to the lack of funds to continue excavations or to cover it with the roof or a marquee, the remains were conserved and buried again. There are remains of another thermae, at the nearby Faculty of Philosophy Plateau. They are still visible and are used as benches.

In general, the entire surrounding area is rich in Roman remains from the 1st to the 3rd century AD. They also include remains below modern Faculty of Philosophy, hotel Square 9 (locality Studentsi trg 9) and Ethnographic Museum (canals in front of the entrance in the museum). Below the roundabout are extremely well preserved 1-metre-tall (3 ft) walls, surrounded by the intact Roman floors and barriers. This section was discovered in 1989, but wasn't archaeologically surveyed.

Some of the oldest remains are those discovered under the faculty building. They are dated to c.100 and were still made of wattle and lep, a wall plaster made of mud. Apart from the thermae, there are also remains of a large building, with three apses and floor heating system.

During the Ottoman period, the area was occupied by the Turkish cemetery, mezarlık. The cemetery stretched to the modern streets of Knez Mihailova and Zmaj Jovina. Numerous remains from this period were discovered since the 1950s, during the various communal works conducted on the square and the surrounding areas.