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The city lies in the upper Drau valley, 4 km. to the west of Spittal/Drau, with its centre on a markedly isolated hilltop, the Holzerberg, which almost everywhere has revealed archaeological finds from the Latène period. A Celtic settlement has not (yet) been discovered, but there are indications of a pre-Roman sanctuary, for example a deposit of 10 intentionally deformed shield bosses dating to the Latène period D1/D2. Traces of the early- and mid-Imperial constructions have been identified on the Holzerberg itself and in the area of the plain to the west of the extra muros church at the west of the mountain. An Augustan vicus lying in the valley therefore might have existed. Nothing is known regarding the presence of military units.
The city-s status as municipium Claudium is epigraphically attested, and domestic buildings dating to the mid-1st century have been identified on the residential terraces. The best information regarding the city, however, comes from the late antique period, when Teurnia - Tiburnia, as the capital city of Noricum mediterraneum, received a city wall and became a bishop-s see.
Excavations at a number of places have revealed that large areas of the Holzerberg were systematically terraced for the laying out of a city plan; with the exception of the Forum, however, there is scarcely any concrete evidence for the inner-city division of the settlement area on the mountain. Yet even here there are axial deviations between the Forum and the neighbouring so-called Baths. At the foot of the mountain at the eastern perimeter of the city, where a residential quarter of the 1st - 3rd century has been excavated, a few stretches of gravelled roads, laid out in a roughly rectangular fashion to each other, are known.
Recently, pipes from an Imperial aqueduct have been found to the west of the cemetery church. This aqueduct can only have served buildings lying low down at the foot of the mountain.
The Forum, which was partially excavated before the First World War, was never adequately published. Along each of its long sides, a colonnade of between 4 and 6 m. in width accompanied the plaza; the narrower western colonnade apparently opened into a corridor connecting to the bathing complex at the south. The northern termination of the Forum is not known, although based on the presence here of a mighty substructure of poured concrete, the existence of a temple has been assumed. This would then conform to the Forum of the neighbouring city of Iulium Carnicum (Zuglio) in Italy, which in other ways is also known to have set an example.
At the southern end of the Forum, a two-aisled basilica, 11 m. wide, was located. It has only been possible to discover the lowest storey, which lay below the level of the Forum itself. The architectural relationship between the basilica and the eastern colonnade of the Forum cannot be understood with certainty on the basis of the existing plans. The inner face of the south wall of the basilica was decorated with lisenes (vertical units similar to pilasters, but without base or capital).
In 1912, a building identified as a bathing establishment conforming to the Row Type was excavated adjoining the Forum at the south. The bathing complex, which was 39.4 m. in length and built on large substructures, contained an apodyterium (Room IV), frigidarium (Room III), tepidarium (Room II) and caldarium (Room I), laid out from west to east. Both the tepidarium and caldarium were heated, and the caldarium and frigidarium possibly contained secondarily attached apses at the south.
In the caldarium, the existence of a heated bathing pool, standing on pillars, has been postulated. The frigidarium reveals evidence for a large drainage channel. To the north of the row of presumed bathing rooms was located a second wing with four rooms, one of which was heated; in front of this wing ran a corridor or open colonnade. These rooms and the apodyterium (room IV) ought to be dated later than the so-called bathing rooms.
There is no conclusive evidence for a precise date for the Forum and the Baths; in general it has been assumed that they were constructed in the 1st or early 2nd century and continued to be used until late antiquity. There is much evidence of spolia in the building materials of the wall decorated with lisenes in the basilica, including a bearded male head of the 2nd century; in addition, certain elements of the plan also suggest a later (late antique?) construction date for the basilica. The so-called baths might have first come into being after an alteration in function of a pre-existing structure, after the construction of the basilica. The original sequence of rooms, based on parallels from Virunum and Carnuntum, also conforms to the typical room sequence, including heated tabularium, used by the civic administration located along the short side of the Forum. Only new excavations could provide clarification for the dating and function of the individual structural elements here.
To date, no urban sanctuary has been excavated at Teurnia, although the existence of a sacred area dedicated to Apollo Grannus is certain, based on a building inscription set up above the entrance door to the area and legible from both inside and outside the sanctuary. On the terraced area to the west and above the Forum terrace was a spring, and in its vicinity was found the building inscription, dated to the 2nd c. A.D., indicating that it was the dedication of a married couple belonging to the local aristocratic family of the Lollii. In the inscription, the temple is described as -navale-, a word which is only attested at the temple of the local god Latobius in the Carinthian Lavant valley; the precise meaning of the word, which can be translated as -ship-house- or -ship-like,- is unclear. The location of the sacred precinct - presumably on the terrace directly uphill adjacent to the Forum - is indicative of its central importance to the city.
An additional public space has been assumed in the plain to the east of the Holzerberg, based on the evidence of aerial photography. On the so-called Upper Residential Terrace (Area IV) lay a small bathing establishment of the Block Type, of which three rooms and a capacious drainage system have been excavated.
On the Holzerberg and in the plain to the west, near the church extra muros, numerous houses with individual wall traces of the early and mid-imperial periods have been identified; also, the late ancient House A is built on top of an earlier structure. Recognisable ground plans, however, have not yet been identified or published.
On the eastern perimeter of the Holzerberg a number of houses located on a settlement terrace were excavated between 1971-1974; only schematic plans of these are available. The separation between the individual houses or pieces of property is complicated. In the so-called Area I, for the first building phase which came to an end at the earliest in the early Flavian period, small rooms dominate the picture; these either lay directly next to each other or were separated by corridors, or were grouped in pairs on both sides of a corridor. Also typical for this phase are larger courtyards, one of which was elaborated with colonnades on three sides. In building phase 2, at the earliest under Antoninus Pius (141-161), one individual residence with three rooms, and one with two rooms, both with large courtyards, were built.
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In Area II a piece of property was situated at a street intersection, and had at first three, and later in building period 2, five commercial rooms set up in the corner of a large, unenclosed courtyard (32 x 16 m.). Traces of structures (a press?) in Room D5, and the presence of two basins lying in front of the courtyard, suggest the existence of a wine-press house. Further to the north was situated a smaller courtyard with three living rooms on its north side behind a small hall, which in building period 2 was converted into two additional living rooms.
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In every building phase, individual heated rooms are preserved, more however in period 2 than in period 1. The end of the settlement terrrace has been dated to the (late) Severan period, most probably around 230 A.D. Taken as a whole, the archaeolgical and structural finds, including the existence of a smithy, indicate the presence of structures in which agricultural and commercial activities took place.
Protective structures serving the function of museums have been erected over both the churches, the Bishop-s Church on the Holzerberg and the so-called Cemetery Church extra muros. In addition a new museum building has been built on the mountain. Numerous additional buildings, such as the late antique House A, have been conserved as open-air areas.
M. Doneus - Ch. Gugl, Von der Luftbildauswertung zum digitalen Stadtplan von Teurnia-St. Peter in Holz (Kärnten), Jahreshefte Österr. Archäolog. Inst. 68, 1999, Beibl. 173-196.
F. Glaser, Ein Heiligtum des Grannus Apollo in Teurnia (mit einem Anhang zu ,navale- von H. Birkhan), Jahreshefte Österr. Archäolog. Inst. 52, 1978-80, 121-127.
F. Glaser, Teurnia. Römerstadt und Bischofsitz. Ein Führer zu den Ausgrabungen und zum Museum in St. Peter in Holz sowie zu den Fundorten im Stadtgebiet von Teurnia (1992).
F. Glaser, Die Skulpturen des Stadtgebietes von Teurnia, CSIR Österreich II 6 (1997).
F. Glaser, Teurnia (mit einer Bibliographie von M. Huber), in: M. -a-el Kos - P. Scherrer (Hrsg.), The Autonomous Towns in Noricum and Pannonia - Die autonomen Städte in Noricum und Pannonien: Noricum, Situla 40 (2002) 135-147.
Ch. Gugl, Archäologische Forschungen in Teurnia. Die Ausgrabungen in den Wohnterrassen 1971-1978. Die latènezeitlichen Funde vom Holzer Berg, Sonderschriften Österr. Archäolog. Inst. 33 (2000).
Ch. Gugl, Das Umland Teurnias vom 2. Jahrhundert v.Chr. bis ins 1. Jahrhundert n.Chr. - Eine Studie zur Siedlungskontinuität von der Latène- zur Römerzeit im oberen Drautal, Arheolo-ki Vestnik 52, 2001, 303-349.
Ch. Gugl - R. Sauer, Mittelkaiserzeitliche Feinkeramik aus den Wohnterrassen von Teurnia-St. Peter in Holz (Kärnten), Fundberichte aus Österreich 37, 1998, 213-244.
Regular excavation reports since 1971 in: Fundberichte aus Österreich; Pro Austria Romana; Carinthia.