Hadrumetum, also known by many variant spellings and names, was a Phoenician colony that pre-dated Carthage. It subsequently became one of the most important cities in Roman Africa before Vandal and Umayyad conquerors left it ruined. In the early modern period, it was the village of Hammeim, now part of Sousse, Tunisia. A number of punic steles were found during excavations at the site of the modern day Église Notre-Dame-de-l'Immaculée-Conception de Sousse. Names The Phoenician and Punic name for the place was (), "Southern", or (), "The Southern". A similar structure appears in the Phoenician name for old Cadiz, which appears as Gadir ("Stronghold") or Agadir ("The Stronghold"). The ancient transcriptions of the name show a great deal of variation. Different Greeks hellenized the name as Adrýmē (), Adrýmēs (), Adrýmēton (), Adrýmētos (), Adramýtēs (), and Adrámētós (). Surviving Roman inscriptions and coinage standardized its latinization as Hadrumetum but it appears in other sources as Adrumetum, Adrumetus, Adrimetum, Hadrymetum, etc. Upon its notional refounding as a Roman colony, its formal name was emended to Ulpia Trajana Augusta to honor its imperial sponsor. It was renamed Honoriopolis after the emperor Honorius in the early 5th century, then Hunericopolis after the Vandal king Huneric and Justinianopolis after the Byzantine emperor Geography Hadrumetum controlled the mouth of a small river on the Gulf of Hammamet (), an inlet of the Mediterranean along the Tunisian coast. History Phoenician colony In the 9th centuryBC, Tyrians established Hadrumetum as a trading post and waypoint along their trade routes to Italy and the Strait of Gibraltar. Its establishment preceded Carthage's but, like other western Phoenician colonies, it became part of the Carthaginian Empire following 's long siege of Tyre in the 580s and 570sBC. Carthaginian city Agathocles of Syracuse captured the town in 310BC during the Third Sicilian War, as part of his failed attempt to move the conflict to Africa. Hadrumetum later provided refuge to Hannibal and other Carthaginian survivors after their 202BC defeat at Zama, which decided the outcome of the Second Punic War. The total length of the Punic fortifications was apparently ; some ruins survive. Roman city During the Third Punic War, the government of Hadrumetum supported the Romans against Carthage and, after Carthage's destruction in 146BC, it received additional territory and the status of a free city in thanks. During this period, it chose its own shufets () and minted its