Event - Romeinenfestival Tongeren (2025)

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Precisely a decade ago, during a rainy weekend, there was a Viking market in Tongeren and I was exited for this initiative by the Gallo-Roman museum. Alas it took me 10 years and living in Tongeren for half a decade, to cover another such event by this museum. 

Luckily the Roman festival (Romeinenfestival) was worth the wait. A Roman market with historical artisans, workshops, free museum entrance, food, 50 re-enactors, including legionairs from several legions, periods and provinces and the thing everybody remembers: gladiator fights in the streets. 
And the weather was much better.

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Photogallery (Click on the arrows on the side to scroll):  

 Update: 100% of all stills are processed & uploaded 

The Roman market was smaller in size than other market style events in Tongeren, like Ciao Tongeren for example, but still 10k visitors showed up over the weekend.

Having this kind of historical re-enactment in Tongeren is actually the most logical event possible. Tongeren is imbued with Roman history: from the statue of Ambiorix, over the ancient walls, to the ever-expanding Roman legion during the Kroningsfeesten

Tongeren holds the distinction of being Belgium's first city, founded by the Romans as the administrative center of the Civitas Tungrorum around the first century BC After Julius Caesar's conquest of Gaul the Romans built substantial infrastructure, creating a strategic settlement that controlled the local road networks and riverways. Atuatuca Tungrorum, was the administrative hub for the region and was named after the Germanic Tungri-tribe.

If you want to know more about the history of the city and see the remainders with your own eyes, visit the Gallo-Roman museum and the Teseum, they're right next to one another in Tongeren, and on the other side of the Basilica church, you can get great ice-cream or wine, choose your poison.

Two things I would have liked to see added to this event would be the inclusion of the Roman temple into the event and a marching parade of legionairs through the entire city, following the old walls.. even if only once during the entire weekend.
A man can dream..

Namaste. 

A direct link to this article: https://tinyurl.com/Romeinen2025