 The Roman Via Egnatia led past it towards Thessaloniki.Though there are traces of human activity in Neolithic times, the settlement proper dates to the Iron Age (Illyrian proto-urban) through to the Illyrian urban period (5th to 2nd centuries BC), and reached its height under settlement by the Illyrian tribe of Enchele in the later Iron Age and was also occupied in the Roman period as traces of a municipal building show.From the 4th to 1st centuries BC the city was the royal residence of Illyrian kings and therefore, also probably an important political and economic centre.