Belgrade Fortress

Belgrade Fortress is a fortification and park complex at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers in the Stari Grad district of Belgrade, Serbia, standing on a ridge 125.5 meters above the water. Its site was first fortified as the Roman settlement of Singidunum around 279 BC, and the current works reflect successive rebuildings under the Byzantine emperor Justinian I around 535, the Serbian despot Stefan Lazarevic in 1403, and the Austrian engineer Nicolas Doxat de Demoret between 1723 and 1736. The 66 hectare complex includes the towers of Kula Nebojsa and the Despot Stefan Tower, extensive ramparts and gates, and an eighteenth century Austrian built well descending 54 meters by a 212 step spiral staircase, popularly known as the Roman Well despite its later date. Protected since 1965 as a Cultural Monument of Exceptional Importance, it draws more than two million visitors a year and remains an active archaeological site, with ongoing excavations uncovering Roman, medieval and Ottoman period remains.