Isaccea

Isaccea stands on the lower Danube, where a crossing and a trading place drew rulers and merchants to the river. In the late thirteenth century it was a base of the Tatar leader Nogai, and its mint struck silver and copper coins bearing the names of Golden Horde rulers. The Wallachian prince Mircea later held the town before the Ottomans took it in 1417.

In the sixteenth century the bazaar attracted merchants from as far away as Chios and Ragusa, trading livestock, wine, cloth and timber. The crossing also brought armies: Michael the Brave of Wallachia attacked the town in 1598, and Cossacks burned it in 1603. Sultan Osman II ordered a new fort built in 1620. During the Russian–Ottoman war of 1828–1829, Russian troops crossed the Danube here and the Ottoman garrison surrendered without resistance.