The site of the ancient city of Tauric Chersonesos is located on a large promontory between two bays, Karantinnaya (Russian for Quarantine) and Pesochnaya (Sandy) within the limits of the present-day city of Sevastopol. It covers the area of about 45 hectares. The investigations of the ancient city started in 1827 and continued throughout the nineteenth and twentieth century, with short intervals. By the early twenty-first century, the excavations have uncovered about one-third of the ancient city: defensive walls and towers, churches and public spaces like theater, water reservoir, the so-called mint, thermae (baths), etc. The most important result of the excavations in the ancient city is the discovery of the city layout according to Hippodamean plan: grid of residential quarters of the same size composed by parallel and perpendicular streets. Although modern division of the ancient city into areas is conventional, it is used in archaeological documents.
The division of the
ancient city into the areas is a convention; it is made for better orientation
of the visitors (real and virtual) in Chersonesos territory. This zoning is performed
according to existing tradition which is mentioned in scholarly and popular literature.
At the same time, we should mention that there still is a certain confusion as
to the numeration of longitudinal and transverse streets (and even of curtain
walls and residential quarters), so we have to follow more or less common
system of their designation.
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