Сомбатхей

Szombathely is the oldest city in Hungary and the birthplace of a saint the whole calendar knows. Founded as Savaria by the Emperor Claudius in 45 AD on the Amber Road, the city keeps its Roman floor plan literally on display — the Iseum, the reconstructed temple of Isis, stages the Savaria Historical Carnival's toga-clad legions each August, and mosaic pavements surface across the centre — and around 316 Savaria witnessed the birth of Martin, the soldier who divided his cloak with a beggar and became St Martin of Tours, Europe's most beloved bishop; his birthplace church and well mark the spot where the continent's Via Sancti Martini begins.

The city's second pilgrim is fictional and Irish: James Joyce made Leopold Bloom's father a Virág from Szombathely, and the city returned the compliment with a Joyce statue leaning on a wall and Bloomsday celebrations — literature's favourite Hungarian ancestry. Musical life is anchored where the concert record documents it: the Bartók Terem, the concert hall named for Bartók that is home to the Savaria Symphony Orchestra, whose seasons and the international Bartók Seminar keep the composer's name in working use. A Roman street grid, a saint's cloak, Bloom's imaginary birthright and Bartók on the marquee: Szombathely has two millennia of guests to entertain, and does.