Sofia (Civ5)/Civilopedia

Capital and largest city of Bulgaria, Sofia lies in the center of the Balkan Peninsula. The Serdi, a Thracian tribe, first settled the area c. 700 BC; around 29 BC the Serdi settlement was conquered by the Romans. The town, lying on an important trade route through the Balkans, flourished during the emperor Trajan's reign (98-117 AD), and reached its height of prosperity and peace during the reign of the Byzantine emperor Constantine. Thereafter, Sofia's history is primarily one of strife, war and conquest.
The city was largely destroyed by the invasion of the Huns in 447 AD. Rebuilt by the Emperor Justinian I, in 809 the city was seized by the Bulgarian khan Krum. The Bulgars were supplanted by the Ottoman Turks in 1382. Following the failed crusade of Wladyslaw III of Poland to liberate Bulgaria, the city's Christian elite was annihilated and it became the capital of the Ottoman province of Rumelia for the next four centuries.
Sofia was taken by Russian troops during the Russo-Turkish War of 1878 and was made the capital of the "Autonomous Principality of Bulgaria," which evolved into the independent Kingdom of Bulgaria in 1908. Following its independence, Bulgaria became embroiled in two Balkan wars. After sitting out the first year of World War I, Bulgaria joined the Entente and attacked Serbia, Greece and Romania, all allies of the Western Powers.
In the political shambles left by the war, the inter-war years were a period of internal strife and bloodshed. Bulgaria joined the Axis Powers in 1941, with the result that Sofia was heavily bombed by Allied air forces in 1943 and occupied by the Red Army in September 1944. The Soviet occupation would last until the collapse of the Iron Curtain in 1989, latest act in the city's long history of turmoil.