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قراءة كتاب Roman Britain in 1914
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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.
(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 Haddingtonshire, some twenty miles east of Edinburgh, on the Whittingehame estate of Mr. Arthur Balfour. Legends cluster 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 assigned 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 hoard 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 Titus, 6 Domitian, 1 unidentified.
Copper: 3 Vespasian, 1 Titus, 2 Domitian, 3 Nerva, 1 Trajan, 2 unidentified.
The latest coin was the copper of Trajan—a dupondius or Second Brass of A.D. 98. All the coins had been corroded into a single mass, 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