Abstract Investigations at Red Lodge, Suffolk, recorded a multi-period site spanning the Neolithic through to the medieval period, focusing on remains of an isolated Early Bronze Age barrow. While no associated burials survived, the monument was later incorporated into a Roman-period religious complex, being enclosed within a ditched temenos , probably in the second century. A small building interpreted to be a shrine structure was subsequently constructed alongside the barrow, the ring-ditch of which was recut around this time, suggesting its active use within this religious place. A number of structured animal deposits occupied the religious enclosure, the most notable of which comprise distinctive pig ‘head-and-hoof’ deposits in close association with the shrine. Further probable votive material was found dispersed in deposits in the immediate vicinity of the shrine and barrow. A possible pond, well and oven structure hint at other activities carried out in the enclosure, presumably allied to its religious function which continued into the late fourth century. No subsequent early Medieval land use activity was identified, though a documentary source indicates the presence of a late Medieval gallows in this vicinity, perhaps on the barrow earthwork itself. A single medieval inhumation later inserted into the top of the temenos ditch is therefore speculated to constitute an execution victim.
Abstract This article reviews the evidence for mobility within, and into, the Roman province of Britannia, assesses the current state of the field and sets out how current approaches should be developed and improved. Mobility was foundational to the Roman empire and its provinces, and this paper demonstrates that Britannia provides a rich case study of the breadth, complexity and challenges of the datasets, methodologies and history of investigation of this central topic to understanding the Roman world. The review provides overviews of textual, epigraphic, material and bioarchaeological evidence and interpretive frameworks. Finally, it sets out a vision for holistic and ethical future archaeological research on this topic, especially in light of the bioarchaeological revolution in recent decades and rapidly developing datasets.
Abstract The excavations at Liberty Southwark (LDM21) carried out by Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA) have yielded one of the largest assemblages of Roman wall-painted plaster in London. In the assessment and reassembling of the plasters, the building material specialist discovered two inscriptions unique to Roman Britain and likely to the study of Roman wall paintings in general. Pit (423) yielded what looks to be a signature by the painter while (135) produced a near-complete Greek alphabet scored into the plaster. Both inscriptions were analysed in the greater context of the Roman world in which comparisons of similar inscriptions were made.
After more than 30 years of developer-led archaeology, the concept of 'pacification', the standard model of the invasion period in south-eastern Britain since the mid-twentieth century, can be reconsidered. The following is not about forts as such; it is about quality of evidence. It reviews proposed early forts south-east of the Fosse Way and concludes that few are genuine; some alternative functions are put forward. A broader explanation for the absence of early forts is offered in the context of friendly kingdoms: prior to the Claudian invasion, treaties may have been put in place between Rome and the polities of Verlamion and Silchester, which created a buffer zone to ensure the invasion's success.
This article discusses the noteworthy discovery of an ichthyosaur vertebral centrum from a Roman pit dating to the third quarter of the second century a.d. at the site of the former Essex County Hospital, Lexden Road, Colchester. The pit also yielded a toilet spoon (ligula) and a potentially disparate associated animal bone group which could indicate the structured deposition of the centrum. The reason it was collected and then curated may have involved Greco-Roman folklore or mythology. Alternatively, it might have been a curio. The east Kent coast between Folkestone and Hythe is suggested as the most probable source of the fossil. This find represents the first ichthyosaur remains found in a Roman deposit and the earliest known instance of the deliberate acquisition of an ichthyosaur fossil.
The recent discovery of a Middle to Late Iron Age bloomery iron-smelting site, revealed during archaeological works associated with the M2 Junction 5 improvement scheme in north-west Kent, has highlighted the possibility that the Stockbury Valley was the focus of a substantial ironworking industry during this period. Moreover, the waste slag assemblages recovered from the M2 Junction 5 scheme and several other sites around Stockbury appear to show an industry that employed elements of the prehistoric tradition (largely non-tapping) and the Roman tradition (tapping), producing tapped and non-tapped slag in the same smelt.
Colchester Museums has collected Roman-period medical instruments from the town since the late nineteenth century. Brought together here, along with items from the town housed in other institutions, their typological links or differences are explored, along with their wide range of uses. They are set in a variety of contexts, including a conquest-period British Doctor's kit from Stanway, near Colchester, the alloys used in their manufacture, their distribution across the town and its suburbs, the diseases evident from late Romano-British human remains in the town's cemeteries, and herbal remedies and other treatments. Interpretation of a previously enigmatic collyrium stamp attests to an eye infection not previously recorded in Roman Britain.
A newly identified RPG die from Gloucester is shown to have been a repurposed quinquennales die which was modified after the officials' year of office was completed. In the light of this a further RPG die is proposed as having been repurposed from another quinquennales die. The implications for the duration of civic die production are discussed.
A small glass flask found in 1983-4 in a late second-century context at Tanner Row, York has been identified as a kohl bottle. These were used as eye makeup containers, and are overwhelmingly found in Egypt. The use of kohl can rarely be traced via its containers outside that area. This article explores the implications of this find for York and the soldiers stationed there.
The Berlanga Cup is the second piece found in Hispania of the type known as the Hadrian's Wall series. Despite its artistic interest, it bears important information about the Wall, since it is the only element of the series that mentions the forts located on the eastern side of Hadrian's Wall. This study encompasses research on epigraphy, archaeometry, the virtualisation of the piece, and the survey of its context with a GPR and an artefactual survey. Arguments are provided regarding use as gifts purchased by their owner or given to him to commemorate his military career, perhaps linked to the Corhors I Celtiberorum, which would later accompany him on his return to his place of origin in Roman Celtiberia.
A previous assessment of the measurement unit employed in building the Antonine Wall compared the distance slabs with LiDAR-derived three-dimensional distances on the ground and concluded that it was the pes Drusianus. Using more precisely determined discovery locations, correcting an error in previous published calculations and making allowance for installations already built, establishes that the unit was the pes Monetalis. The wider implications are examined, concluding that postulated secondary forts were, indeed, later additions; that fortlets were an integral part of the original plan, though not all were constructed before the rampart; that there is no direct correlation between the location of the slabs and pre-existing installations; and that the Bridgeness-Avon sector was one of the earliest to be constructed.
When base metal coinage ceased arriving in the north-western Roman Provinces c. a.d. 400, no new currency was introduced. For their everyday exchanges, people may have turned to different practices, or materials, in cases where the still-circulating coins were perhaps not fulfilling demand. This paper examines an early fifth-century burial from the coastal fort at Oudenburg, Belgium. Among the male adornment in burial A-104, the purse assemblage filled with a number of coins and fragmented base metal items stands out. Was the scrap metal used for exchanges? The discussion of the coins and metal items, including their weights, reveals their possible economic functions, as well as the potential in further analysing late Roman and early medieval purse assemblages.
