Roman Britain in 1914 Part 1

Roman Britain in 1914.

by F. Haverfield.

PREFACE

The contents of the present volume are of much the same character as those of its predecessor, 'Roman Britain in 1913'. The first section gives a retrospect of the chief finds made in 1914, so far as they are known to me. The second section is a more detailed and technical survey of the inscriptions found in Britain during that year. The third and longest section is a summary, with some attempt at estimate and criticism, of books and articles dealing with Roman Britain which appeared in 1914 or at least bear that date on cover or t.i.tle-page.

At the end I have added, for convenience, a list of the English archaeological and other publications which at least sometimes contain noteworthy articles relating to Roman Britain.

The total, both of finds and of publications, is smaller than in 1913.

In part the outbreak of war in August called off various supervisors and not a few workmen from excavations then in progress; in one case it prevented a proposed excavation from being begun. It also seems to have r.e.t.a.r.ded the issue of some archaeological periodicals. But the scarcity of finds is much more due to natural causes. The most extensive excavations of the year, those of Wroxeter and Corbridge, yielded little; they were both concerned with remains which had to be explored in the course of a complete uncovering of those sites but which were not in themselves very interesting. The lesser sites, too, were somewhat unproductive, though at least one, Traprain Law, is full of promise for the future, and good work has been done in the systematic examination of the fort at Ambleside and of certain rubbish-pits in London. In one case, that of Holt (pp. 15-21), where excavations have for the present come to an end, I have thought it well to include a brief retrospect of the whole of a very interesting series of finds and, aided by the kindness of the excavator, Mr. Arthur Acton of Wrexham, to add some ill.u.s.trations of notable objects which have not yet appeared elsewhere in print.

A. RETROSPECT OF FINDS MADE IN 1914

i-xiv. FINDS RELATING TO THE ROMAN MILITARY OCCUPATION.

(i) The exploration of the Roman-seeming earthworks in northern Scotland which Dr. Macdonald and I began in 1913 at Ythan Wells, in Aberdeens.h.i.+re (Report for 1913, p. 7), was continued in 1914 by Dr. Macdonald at Raed.y.k.es, otherwise called Garrison Hill, three miles inland from Stonehaven. Here Roy saw and planned a large camp of very irregular outline, which he took to be Roman.[1] Since his time the ramparts have been somewhat ploughed down, but Dr. Macdonald could trace them round, identify the six gateways, and generally confirm Roy's plan, apart from its hill-shading. The ramparts proved to be of two kinds: part was built solidly of earth, with a deep ditch of Roman shape strengthened in places with clay, in front of it, while part was roughly piled with stones and defended only by a shallow rounded ditch. This difference seemed due to the differing nature of the ground; ditch and rampart were slighter where attack was less easy. The gateways were wide and provided with traverses (_t.i.tuli_ or _tutuli_), as at Ythan Wells. No small finds were secured. The general character of the gateways and ramparts seemed to show Roman workmans.h.i.+p, but the exact date within the Roman period remained doubtful. It has been suggested that the traverses indicate Flavian rather than Antonine fortifying. But these devices are met with in Britain at Bar Hill, which presumably dates from about A.D. 140, and on Hadrian's Wall in third-century work.

[Footnote 1: _Antiquities_, plate 50. Roy does not notice it in his text, any more than he notices plate 51 (Ythan Wells camp). They are the two last plates in his volume; as this was issued posthumously in 1793 (he died in 1790), perhaps the omission is intelligible.]

(ii) _Wall of Pius and its forts._ At Balmuildy, north of Glasgow (see Report for 1913, p. 10), Mr. Miller has further cleared the baths outside the south-east corner of the fort and the adjacent ditches.

The plan which I gave last year has now to be corrected so as to show a triple ditch between the south gate and the south-east corner and a double ditch from the south-east corner to the east gate. This latter section of ditch was, however, filled up at some time with clay, and the bath planted on top of it. At presumably the same time a ditch was run out from the south-east corner so as to enclose the bath and form an annexe; in this annexe was found a broken altar-top with a few letters on it (below, p. 29). Search was also made for rubbish-pits on the north side of the fort, but without any result.

On other parts of the Wall Dr. Macdonald has gained further successes.

Evidence seems to be coming out as to the hitherto missing forts of Kirkintilloch and Inveravon. More details have been secured of the fort at Mumrills--fully 4-1/2 acres in area and walled with earth, not with the turf or stone employed in the ramparts of the other forts of the Wall. The line of the Wall from Falkirk to Inveravon, a distance of four miles, has also been traced; it proved to be built of earth and clay, not of the turf used in the Wall westwards. Dr. Macdonald suggests that the eastern section of the Wall lay through heavily wooded country, where turf was naturally awanting.

(iii) _Traprain Law._ Very interesting, too, are the preliminary results secured by Mr. A. O. Curie on Traprain Law. This is an isolated hill in Haddingtons.h.i.+re, some twenty miles east of Edinburgh, on the Whittingehame estate of Mr. Arthur Balfour. Legends cl.u.s.ter round it--of varying antiquity. It itself shows two distinct lines of fortification, one probably much older than the other, enclosing some 60 acres. The area excavated in 1914 was a tiny piece, about 30 yards square; the results were most promising. Five levels of stratification could be distinguished. The lowest and earliest yielded small objects of native work and Roman potsherds of the late first century: higher up, Roman coins and pottery of the second century appeared, and in the top level, Roman potsherds a.s.signed to the fourth century. One Roman potsherd, from a second-century level, bore three Roman letters IRI, the meaning of which is likely to remain obscure. As the inscribed surface came from the inside of an urn, the writing must have been done after the pot was broken, and presumably on the hill itself. Among the native finds were stone and clay moulds for casting metal objects. The site, on a whole, seems to be native rather than Roman; it may be our first clue to the character of native _oppida_ in northern Britain under Roman rule; its excavation is eminently worth pursuing.

(iv) _Northumberland, Hadrian's Wall._ On Hadrian's Wall no excavations have been carried out. But at Chesterholm two inscribed altars were found in the summer. One was dedicated to Juppiter Optimus Maximus; the rest of the lettering was illegible. The other, dedicated to Vulcan on behalf of the Divinity of the Imperial House by the people of the locality, possesses much interest. The dedicators describe themselves as _vicani Vindolandenses_, and thus give proof that the civilians living outside the fort at Chesterholm formed a _vicus_ or something that could plausibly be described as such; further, they teach the proper name of the place, which we have been wont to call Vindolana. See further below, p. 31.

North of the Wall, at Featherwood near High Rochester (the fort Bremenium) an altar has been found, dedicated to Victory (see p. 30).

(v) _Corbridge._ The exploration of Corbridge was carried through its ninth season by Mr. R. H. Forster. As in 1913, the results were somewhat scanty. The area examined, which lay on the north-east of the site, adjacent to the areas examined in 1910 and 1913, seems, like them, to have been thinly occupied in Roman times; at any rate the structures actually unearthed consisted only of a roughly built foundation (25 feet diam.) of uncertain use, which there is no reason to call a temple, some other even more indeterminate foundations, and two bits of road. More interest may attach to three ditches (one for sewage) and the clay base of a rampart, which belong in some way to the northern defences of the place in various times. The full meaning of these will, however, not be discernible till complete plans are available and probably not till further excavations have been made; Mr. Forster inclines to explain parts of them as ditches of a fort held in the age of Trajan, about A.D.

90-110. Several small finds merit note. An inscribed tile seems to have served as a writing lesson or rather, perhaps, as a reading lesson: see below, p. 32. The Samian pottery included a very few pieces of '29', a good deal of early '37', which most archaeologists would ascribe to the late first or the opening second century, and some other pieces which perhaps belong to a rather later part of the same century. The coins cover much the same period; few are later than Hadrian. Among them was a h.o.a.rd of 32 denarii and 12 copper of which Mr. Craster has made the following list:--

_Silver_: 2 Republican, 1 Julius Caesar, 1 Mark Antony, 1 Nero, 1 Galba, 3 Vitellius, 13 Vespasian, 3 t.i.tus, 6 Domitian, 1 unidentified.

_Copper_: 3 Vespasian, 1 t.i.tus, 2 Domitian, 3 Nerva, 1 Trajan, 2 unidentified.

The latest coin was the copper of Trajan--a _dupondius_ or Second Bra.s.s of A.D. 98. All the coins had been corroded into a single ma.s.s, apparently by the burning of a wooden box in which they have been kept; this burning must have occurred about A.D. 98-100. Among the bronze objects found during the year was a dragonesque enamelled brooch.

(vi) In Upper _Weardale_ (co. Durham) a peat-bog has given up two bronze _paterae_ or skillets, bearing the stamp of the Italian bronze-worker Cipius Polybius, and an uninscribed bronze ladle. See below, p. 33.

(vii) Near Appleby, at Hangingshaw farm, Mr. P. Ross has come upon a Roman inscription which proves to be a milestone of the Emperor Philip (A.D. 244-6) first found in 1694 and since lost sight of (p. 35).

(viii) _Ambleside Fort._ The excavation of the Roman fort in Borrans Field near Ambleside, noted in my Report for 1913 (p. 13), was continued by Mr. R. G. Collingwood, Fellow of Pembroke College, Oxford, and others with much success. The examination of the ramparts, gates, and turrets was completed; that of the main interior buildings was brought near completion, and a beginning was made on the barracks, sufficient to show that they were, at least in part, made of wood.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 2. BORRANS FORT, AMBLESIDE

(I. Granaries; II. Head-quarters; III. Commandant's House; A. Cellar; B. Hearth or Kiln; C. Deposit of corn; D. Ditch perhaps belonging to earliest fort; E. Outer Court of Head-quarters; F. Inner Court)]

The fort, as is now clear (fig. 2), was an oblong enclosure of about 300 420 feet, nearly 3 acres. Round it ran a wall of roughly coursed stone 4 feet thick, with a clay ramp behind and a ditch in front. Turrets stood at its corners. Four gates gave access to it; three of them were single and narrow, while the fourth, the east gate, was double and was flanked by two guard-chambers. As usual, the chief buildings stood in a row across the interior. Building I--see plan, fig. 2--was a pair of granaries, each 66 feet long, with a s.p.a.ce between. They were of normal plan, with external b.u.t.tresses, bas.e.m.e.nt walls, and ventilating windows (not shown on plan). The s.p.a.ce between them, 15 feet wide, contained marks of an oven or ovens (plan, B) and also some corn (plan, C) and may have been at one time used for drying grain stored in the granaries; how far it was roofed is doubtful. Building II, the Principia or Praetorium, a structure of 68 76 feet, much resembled the Principia at Hardknot, ten miles west of Ambleside, but possessed distinct features. As the plan shows, it had an entrance from the east, the two usual courts (EF), and the offices which usually face on to the inner court F. These offices, however, were only three in number instead of five, unless wooden part.i.tions were used. Under the central office, the _sacellum_ of the fort, where the standards and the altars for the official wors.h.i.+p of the garrison are thought to have been kept, our fort had, at A, a sunk room or cellar, 6 feet square, entered by a stone stair. Such cellars occur at Chesters, Aesica, and elsewhere and probably served as strong-rooms for the regimental funds. At Chesters, the cellar had stone vaulting; at Ambleside there is no sign of this, and timber may have been used. In the northernmost room of the Principia some corn and woodwork as of a bin were noted (plan, C). The inner court F seemed to Mr. Collingwood to have been roofed; in its north end was a detached room, such as occurs at Chesters, of unknown use, which accords rather ill with a roof. In the colonnade round the outer court E were vestiges of a hearth or oven (plan, B). Building III (70 80 feet) is that usually called the commandant's house; it seems to show the normal plan of rooms arranged round a cloister enclosing a tiny open s.p.a.ce. In buildings II and III, at D, traces were detected as of ditches and walling belonging to a fort older and probably smaller than that revealed by the excavation generally.

Small finds include coins of Faustina Iunior, Iulia Domna, and Valens, Samian of about A.D. 80 and later, including one or two bits of German Samian, a silver spoon, some gla.s.s, iron, and bronze objects, a leaden basin (?), and seven more leaden sling-bullets. It now seems clear that the fort was established about the time of Agricola (A.D. 80-5), though perhaps in smaller dimensions than those now visible, and was held till at least A.D. 365. Mr. Collingwood inclines to the view that it was abandoned after A.D. 85 and reoccupied under or about the time of Hadrian. The stratification of the turrets seems to show that it was destroyed once or twice in the second or third centuries, but the evidence is not wholly clear in details. The granaries seem to have been rebuilt once and the rooms of the commandant's house mostly have two floors.

(ix) _Lancaster._ In October and November 1914, structural remains thought to be Roman, including 'an old Roman fireplace, circular in shape, with stone flues branching out', were noted in the garden of St.

Mary's vicarage. The real meaning of the find seems doubtful.

(x) _Ribchester._ In the spring of 1913 a small school-building was pulled down at Ribchester, and the Manchester Cla.s.sical a.s.sociation was able to resume its examination of the Principia (praetorium) of the Roman fort, above a part of which this building had stood. The work was carried out by Prof. W. B. Anderson, of Manchester University, and Mr.

D. Atkinson, Research Fellow of Reading College, and, though limited in extent, was very successful.

The first discovery of the Principia is due to Miss Greenall, who about 1905 was building a house close to the school and took care that certain remains found by her builders should be duly noted: excavations in 1906-7, however, left the size and extent of these remains somewhat uncertain and resulted in what we now know to be an incorrect plan. The work done last spring makes it plain (fig. 3) that the Principia fronted--in normal fas.h.i.+on--the main street of the fort (gravel laid on cobbles) running from the north to the south gate. But, abnormally, the frontage was formed by a verandah or colonnade: the only parallel which I can quote is from Caersws, where excavations in 1909 revealed a similar verandah in front of the Principia[2]. Next to the verandah stood the usual Outer Court with a colonnade round it and two wells in it (one is the usual provision): the colonnade seemed to have been twice rebuilt. Beyond that are fainter traces of the Inner Court which, however, lies mostly underneath a churchyard: the only fairly clear feature is a room (A on plan) which seems to have stood on the right side of the Inner Court, as at Chesters and Ambleside (fig. 2, above).

Behind this, probably, stood the usual five office rooms. If we carry the Principia about 20 feet further back, which would be a full allowance for these rooms with their walling, the end of the whole structure will line with the ends of the granaries found some years ago.

This, or something very like it, is what we should naturally expect. We then obtain a structure measuring 81 112 feet, the latter dimension including a verandah 8 feet wide. This again seems a reasonable result.

Ribchester was a large fort, about 6 acres, garrisoned by cavalry; in a similar fort at Chesters, on Hadrian's Wall, the Principia measured 85 125 feet: in the 'North Camp' at Camelon, another fort of much the same size (nearly 6 acres), they measured 92 120 feet.

[Footnote 2: I saw this verandah while open. The whole excavations at Caersws yielded important results and it is more than regrettable that no report of them has ever been issued.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 3. RIBCHESTER FORT, HEAD-QUARTERS]

(xi) _Slack._ The excavation of the Roman fort at Slack, near Huddersfield, noted in my report for 1913 (p. 14), was continued in 1914 by Mr. P. W. Dodd and Mr. A. M. Woodward, lecturers in Leeds University, which is doing good work in the exploration of southern Yorks.h.i.+re. The defences of the fort, part of its central buildings (fig. 4, I-III), and part of its other buildings (B-K) have now been attacked. The defences consist of (1) a ditch 15 feet wide, possibly double on the north (more exactly north-west) side and certainly absent on the southern two-thirds of the east (north-east) side; (2) a berme, 8 feet wide; and (3) a rampart 20-5 feet thick, built of turf and strengthened by a rough stone base which is, however, only 8-10 feet wide. Of the four gates, three (west, north, and east) have been examined; all are small and have wooden gate-posts instead of masonry. On each side of the east gate, which is the widest (15 ft.), the rampart is thought to thicken as if for greater defence. The absence of a ditch on the southern two-thirds of the east side may be connected with some paving outside the east gate and also with a bath-house, partly explored in 1824 and 1865, outside the south-east (east) corner; we may think that here was an annexe. The central buildings, so far as uncovered, are of stone; the Principia (III) perhaps had some wooden part.i.tions. They are all ill-preserved and call for no further comment. West of them, in the rear of the fort, the excavators traced two long narrow wooden buildings (B, C), north of the road from the west (south-west) gate to the back of the Principia; on the other side of the road they found the ends of two similar buildings (D, E). This looks as if this portion of the fort was filled with four barracks. On the other side of the row of buildings I-III remains were traced of stone structures; one of these (F) had the L-shape characteristic of barracks, and indications point to two others (G, H) of the same shape. This implies six barrack buildings in this portion of the fort and ten barrack buildings in all, that is, a cohort 1,000 strong. But the whole fort is only just 3 acres, and one would expect a smaller garrison; when excavations have advanced, we may perhaps find that the garrison was really a _cohors quingenaria_ with six barracks, as at Gellygaer. Close against the east rampart, and indeed cutting somewhat into it, was a long thin building (K), 12-16 feet wide, which yielded much charcoal and potsherds and seemed an addition to the original plan of the fort.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 4. PART OF SLACK FORT

(I. Granaries; II. Doubtful; III. Head-quarters; A. Shrine in III; B, C, D, E. Wooden buildings in western part of fort; F, G, H, K. Stone buildings in eastern part)]

The few small finds included Samian of the late first and early second centuries (but no '29'), and a denarius of Trajan. In respect of date, they agree with the finds of last year and of 1865, and suggest that the fort was established under Domitian or Trajan, and abandoned under Hadrian or Pius; as an inscription of the Sixth Legion was found here in 1744, apparently in the baths, the evacuation cannot have been earlier than about A.D. 130. The occupation of Slack must therefore have resembled that of Castleshaw, which stands at the western end of the pa.s.s through the Pennine Hills, which Slack guards on the east. If this be so, an explanation must be discovered for two altars generally a.s.signed to Slack. One of these, found three miles north of Slack at Greetland in 1597 among traces of buildings, is dated to A.D. 205 (CIL.

vii. 200). The other, found two miles eastwards, at Longwood, in 1880 (Eph. Epigr. vii. 920), bears no date; but it was erected by an Aurelius Quintus to the Numina Augustorum, and neither item quite suits so early a date as the reign of Trajan. The dedication of the first is to the G.o.ddess Victoria--_Vic_(_toria_) _Brig_(_antia_)--that of the second _deo Berganti_ (as well as the _Numina Aug._); so that in each case a local shrine to a native deity may be concerned. It is also possible that a fort was built near Greetland, after the abandonment of Slack, to guard another pa.s.s over the Pennine, that by way of Blackstone Edge.

It is to be hoped that these interesting excavations may be continued and completed.

(xii) _Holt._ At Holt, eight miles south of Chester on the Denbighs.h.i.+re bank of the Dee, Mr. Arthur Acton has further explored the very interesting tile and pottery works of the Twentieth Legion, of which I spoke in my Report for 1913 (p. 15). The site is not even yet exhausted.

But enough has been discovered to give a definite picture of it, and as it may perhaps not be possible to continue the excavations at present, and as the detailed report which Mr. Acton projects may take time to issue, I shall try here, with his permission, to summarize very briefly his most noteworthy results. I have to thank him for supplying me with much information and material for ill.u.s.trations.

Holt combines the advantages of excellent clay for pottery and tile making,[3] good building stone (the Bunter red sandstone), and an easy waterway to Chester. Here the legion garrisoning Chester established, in the latter part of the first century, tile and pottery works for its own use and presumably also for the use of other neighbouring garrisons.

Traces of these works were noted early in the seventeenth century, though they were not then properly understood.[4] In 1905 the late Mr.

A. N. Palmer, of Wrexham, identified the site in two fields called Wall Lock and Hilly Field, just outside the village of Holt, and here, since 1906, Mr. Acton has, at his own cost, carefully and systematically carried out excavations.

[Footnote 3: A Bronze Age burial (fig. 6, D) suggests that the clay may have been worked long before the Romans.]

[Footnote 4: References are given by Watkin, _Ches.h.i.+re_, p. 305, and Palmer, _Archaeologia Cambrensis_, 1906, pp. 225 foll.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 5. ROMAN SITE NEAR HOLT