Deva Victrix

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Roman Britain about 150 AD
Roman Britain about 150 AD

Deva Victrix, or simply Deva, was a fort and town in the Roman province of Britannia. Today it is known as Chester, located in the English county of Cheshire. This is a page about the city in Roman times, there are separate pages on Roman remains, the Amphitheatre and the Minerva shrine.

Contents

[edit] Pre-Roman Chester

Poulton (map) lies on the western bank of the Dee and is home to the Poulton Project, a landscape archaeology research project jointly established between Liverpool University and Chester Archaeology. The starting point was the investigation of a medieval chapel site, but the discovery of Stone-Age flints at Poulton along with large quantities of Roman material, occasional Saxon ware and numerous burials has extended the historical scope of the project back at least as far as the 7th millenium BC. In the Lower and Middle Palaeolithic ("Old Stone Age") hunting was based on big game animals, such as mammoth, bison, rhinoceros and lion. By the late Upper Palaeolithic, when evidence for occupation of Cheshire becomes clearer, these species were extinct and the dominant food animals included reindeer and wild horses.

The first traces of mankind at Poulton are small, "microlithic", tools and weapons for hunting and fishing that were used by nomadic hunter-gatherers in the Mesolithic ("Middle Stone Age") from the end of the Lower Dryas to c.6500 years ago. In the early part of the period, it is believed that the Mersey still flowed through the "Deva Spillway" (which runs north of Chester Zoo and is followed by the Canal) to enter the Dee estuary between Blacon and Chester. The sea level around 9000 years ago was still around 20m (66ft) lower than it is today and extensive areas of what is now the sea off the North Wirral would have been low lying wetlands - although whether there was a late-existing land-bridge between Britain and Ireland is still hotly disputed. The warmer climate changed the Arctic environment to one of pine, birch, and alder forest; this less open landscape was less conducive to the large herds of reindeer and wild horse that had previously sustained humans. Those animals were replaced in people's diets by pig and less social animals such as elk, red deer, roe deer, wild boar and aurochs (wild cattle). Part of the badly damaged skull of an auroch was found on the Roodee in Chester, buried in river silt, although it is not clear if the animal had been killed by hunters or simply died close to the riverbank.

Perhaps the most significant palaeoenvironmental evidence from the region concerns the discovery of cereal pollen at Bidston Moss on Wirral and Sefton park in Liverpool in peat deposits dated 4900-4500 BC (in the Mesolithic or "Middle Stone Age"). This shows that the local population was experimenting with crop raising over five centuries before the adoption of a true farming economy. This fits evidence from Northern Ireland for similarly early experimentation and suggests that the Irish Sea was becoming established as part of an important international trade route.

In the Neolithic ("New Stone Age") forest clearance and agriculture arrived and a Timber Circle ('wood henge') was constructed at Poulton. From the Bronze Age (around 4000 years ago), Poulton has a cemetery group of barrows and evidence of cremations as well as some coarse pottery. Towards the end of the Bronze Age the ring-ditch of the ritual enclosure was ceremonially closed. Cheshire has few of the impressive monuments such as long barrows, cursus and causewayed enclosures that characterise the earlier Neolithic of other areas, but another possible site has been identified from aerial photographs in Farndon, where there is a subrectangular ditched enclosure within a larger rectangular enclosure and associated with pits. This may have also been an early Neolithic mortuary enclosure, a site where corpses were exposed to reduce the body to bones. They had internal timber structures in which the burials were deposited and are the precursors of earthen long barrows and chambered tombs and date from the centuries before 4000 BC. There is also a barrow at Eccleston. There are flint scatters of Neolithic date from Hockenhull, Mouldsworth and Willington. Two separate collections from either side of a small brook have been found between Tarvin and Oscroft. Several of the lithics from Carden appear to be Neolithic in form. Axes have been found in Ashton, Barrow, Carden, Guilden Sutton and Tiverton. Sherds from a bowl in the Grimston-Lyles Hill tradition were found incorporated into the defences of the Roman fortress at Chester. Flints of earlier Neolithic date have been found on excavations throughout the city, suggesting that the site was well used by early farmers. There is a possible barrow at Broxton, located beneath the sandstone ridge at the point where the hilltop enclosure of Maiden Castle is sited (in Bickerton).

The people at this time may well have spoken a language which was the ancestor of modern Welsh. As this site argues, the peoples of the east of England may already have been "Anglo-Saxons". In Britain, the Bronze Age is considered to have ended around 700 BC with the introduction of iron.

[edit] Hill Forts

The map below shows the approximate route of the Roman Road south of Chester. This may well have followed the path of a much earlier trade route. The route continues south to Hawkstone and the Bury Walls hill fort in Shropshire (where Roman buildings were discovered in the 1930's) and then on to The Wrekin.

Hill forts in Britain are known from the Bronze Age, but the great period of hill fort construction was during the Iron Age, between 200 BC and the Roman conquest. Although there are over 1,300 hill forts in England, they are concentrated in the south of the country, with only seven in Cheshire. Eddisbury is the largest and most complex of the Cheshire hill forts. The forts form two geographical groups of three, with Maiden Castle (Bickerton) on its own in the south of the county; Eddisbury hill fort is in the southern group with Kelsborrow Castle and Oakmere hill fort. Pits dating from the 4th millennium BC indicate the site of Beeston Castle may have been inhabited or used as a communal gathering place during the Neolithic period. Archaeologists have discovered Neolithic flint arrow heads on the crag, as well as the remains of a Bronze Age community, and of an Iron Age hill fort. The rampart associated with the Bronze Age activity on the crag has been dated to around 1270–830 BC; seven circular buildings were identified as being either late Bronze Age or early Iron Age in origin. It may have been a specialist metalworking site - excavations there in the 1980s located a bronze-working hearth together with crucible and mould fragments. The associated metalwork was of the Ewart Park phase (c 800-700 BC), but metalworking may have begun at the site much earlier. The source of copper was perhaps the vein that runs along the eastern side of the mid Cheshire ridge. Mines at Bickerton were commercially exploited during the nineteenth century (hence the pub called "The Coppermine"), and it is possible that mines were located nearby in the prehistoric period (some details on the mines can be found here).

The Cornovii were a "celtic" people of Iron Age and Roman Britain, who lived principally in the modern English counties of Cheshire, Shropshire, north Staffordshire, north Herefordshire and eastern parts of the Welsh county of Powys. Their capital in pre-Roman times was probably a hill fort on The Wrekin. Ptolemy's 2nd century Geography names two of their towns: Deva Victrix (Chester), and Viroconium Cornoviorum (Wroxeter), which became their capital under Roman rule. Their control of the south-Cheshire salt-making industry and parts of its distribution network probably gave them a fair degree of wealth, multiplied by trading and cattle breeding. However, their economy was mainly a pastoral one. Since the early Iron Age they had a network of paved and semi-paved roads good enough to transport their famous chariots.

There is some direct evidence for settlement at Chester in pre-Roman times. However during the 2005 season of the Amphitheatre dig, a pair of large post-holes were discovered beneath the pre-Roman ground surface. The size of these holes suggests that they held timber posts 50cm in diameter. Radio-carbon dating indicated that post holes are from the middle of the Iron Age (~400 BC). Subsequent investigations showed not only evidence of animal herding, but also a possible enclosure for cattle and signs of farming.

Salt is believed to have been an important commodity since at least the Iron Age. Archaeological evidence of Iron Age salt-making in Britain has been largely based on the discovery of remnants of "coarse pottery" vessels and supporting pillars recognised as being connected with salt-making and known as "briquetage". Sea water or brine from inland springs, such as those common in Cheshire, was evaporated in these vessels over fires to give a residual lump of salt. Clay dug between Middlewich and Nantwich has been shown to have been used to make the pottery fragments found at wide ranging Iron Age sites in a wide area of Wales and western England.

The roads of the Cornovii possibly became the routes of the principal Roman roads of the region. On the map to the left it can be seem that "Watling Street" stretched from Chester to the Kentish coast. This route was probably a trade-route well before the Romans arrived. It continued to be a trade route into later times as a drovers road known in parts as the "Welsh Road", or the "Chester Road". Where cattle were herded in the middle ages may well have been where cattle had been herded for many years.

The combination of cattle farming and the availability of salt possibly meant that Cheshire cheese was being produced here since the Iron Age or earlier.

[edit] The Roman Invasion

In 69, the "year of four emperors", civil war raged in Rome and weak governors were unable to control the legions in Britain. Venutius of the Brigantes seized his chance, ending up in control of the north of the country. After Vespasian secured the empire, his first two appointments as governor, Quintus Petillius Cerialis and Sextus Julius Frontinus, took on the task of subduing the Brigantes and Silures respectively - the Romans then conquered more of the island, building a fort at Chester on the way. The governor Gnaeus Julius Agricola, with XX Valeria Victrix, defeated the Caledonians in 84 at the Battle of Mons Graupius (somewhere in northern Scotland). Chester was occupied for the next 300 years and may have been the effective capital of Roman Britain. Around 384, the usurper Magnus Maximus (he is mentioned on the "Pillar of Eliseg") fought a successful campaign against the Picts and Scots, but his continental exploits required troops from Britain, and it appears that forts at Chester and elsewhere were abandoned at this period. Not all of the troops in Britain may have returned, but by around 396, there were increasing barbarian incursions in Britain.

[edit] Early beginnings - the invasion of southern Britain

Most sources state that "Deva" was founded around 74-79 CE during the reign of Vespasian. It is thought that the title "victrix" in the name of the legion and fortress refers to the defeat of Boudicca and the British rebellion against Roman rule by the twentieth legion (60-61AD). The Roman name of Deva for Chester was pronounced "Deewa" and derives from "goddess". Thus, the Roman fortress was named after the goddess of the River Dee. Today's name Chester derives from the Latin word "castra", which is present in many other cities that were once Roman towns and forts.

A "Roman" Soldier at Chester
A "Roman" Soldier at Chester

The Roman invasion of Britain marks the formal end of the British Iron Age, although some believe that the Iron Age still continues (unless recently superseded by the age of the "Bakelite People", or the "Paleosilicic"). By AD 43, the time of the main Roman invasion of Britain, Great Britain had already been the target of planned or actual Roman invasions, starting with Julius Caesar's failed expeditions in 55 and 54 BC. Augustus prepared invasions in 34 BC, 27 BC and 25 BC, but these were called off due to the troops being needed to quell trouble elsewhere in the Roman Empire. Strabo's Geography, written during this period, says that the Client Kingdoms of Britain paid more in customs and duties than could be raised by taxation if the islands were conquered.

By the 40s AD, however, the political situation within Britain was rapidly changing. The Catuvellauni had displaced the Trinovantes as the most powerful kingdom in south-eastern Britain, taking over the former Trinovantian capital of Camulodunum (Colchester), and were pressing their neighbours the Atrebates, then ruled by the descendants of Julius Caesar's former ally Commius. "Barking mad" Caligula planned a campaign against the British in 40, but its execution was bizarre, he had the troops gather sea shells, referring to them as "plunder from the ocean, due to the Capitol and the Palace" - then he went home.

Finally, in 43, Claudius mounted an invasion under Aulus Plautius, leading four legions, totalling about 20,000 men, plus about the same number of auxiliaries. The legions included Legio II Augusta and Legio XX Valeria Victrix, both of which were later to be associated with Chester. The II Augusta was commanded by the future emperor Vespasian. The invasion was delayed by a mutiny of the troops, who were eventually persuaded by an imperial freedman to overcome their fear of crossing the Ocean and campaigning beyond the limits of the known world.

British resistance was led by Togodumnus and Caratacus, sons of the late king of the Catuvellauni, Cunobelinus. A substantial British force met the Romans at a river crossing thought to be near Rochester on the River Medway. The battle raged for two days. Hosidius Geta (who probably led the IX Hispana) was almost captured, but recovered and turned the battle so decisively that he was awarded the ornamenta triumphalia. The British were pushed back to the Thames. The Romans pursued them across the river causing them to lose men in the marshes of Essex. Whether the Romans made use of an existing bridge for this purpose or built a temporary one is uncertain. At least one division of auxiliary Batavian troops swam across the river as a separate force. Togodumnus died shortly after the battle on the Thames. Plautius halted and sent word for Claudius to join him for the final push.

Cassius Dio presents this as Plautius needing the emperor's assistance to defeat the resurgent British, who were determined to avenge the recently deceased Togodumnus. However, Claudius was not a man for bloody victory when negotiation would do. Claudius's arch says he received the surrender of eleven kings without any loss, and Suetonius says that Claudius received the surrender of the Britons without battle or bloodshed. It is likely that the Catuvellauni were already as good as beaten, allowing the emperor to appear as conqueror on the final march on Camulodunum. Cassius Dio relates that Claudius brought war elephants and heavy armaments which would have overawed any remaining native resistance. Eleven tribes of South East Britain surrendered to Claudius and the Romans prepared to move further west and north. The Romans established their new capital at Camulodunum and Claudius returned to Rome to celebrate his victory. Caratacus escaped and would continue the resistance further west.

For his part in the conquest, Claudius honoured by being given the surname "Britannicus", which also passed to his sons. Several triumphal arches were errected after his achievement, including one on the Palatine hill. The arch is portrayed on a number of gold and silver coins of Claudius. It features an equestrian statue atop the arch, undoubtedly representing Claudius, between two trophies, a trophy being a pile of captured shields, spears, armour and other spoils of war. On the architrave of the arch is inscribed "DE BRITAN", "DE BRITANN", "DE BRITANNI", or "DE BRITANNIS", depending on the space available.

Late in 47 the new governor of Britain, Ostorius Scapula, began a campaign against the tribes of modern day Wales, and the Cheshire Gap. The Silures of south east Wales caused considerable problems to Ostorius and fiercely defended the Welsh border country. Caratacus himself was defeated in one encounter and fled to the Roman client tribe of the Brigantes who occupied the Pennines. Their queen, Cartimandua was unable or unwilling to protect him however given her own truce with the Romans and handed him over to the invaders in chains. In 52 C.E. Ostorius died and was replaced by Aulus Didius Gallus who brought the Welsh borders under control but did not move further north or west, probably because Claudius was keen to avoid what he considered a difficult and drawn-out war for little material gain in the mountainous terrain of upland Britain.

As for Caratacus, he was taken to Rome to be killed after a triumphal parade. However, he so impressed the Romans with his speech (as recorded by Tacitus) that he was freed and lived out his life in Rome:

  • If the degree of my nobility and fortune had been matched by moderation in success, I would have come to this City as a friend rather than a captive, nor would you have disdained to receive with a treaty of peace one sprung from brilliant ancestors and commanding a great many nations. But my present lot, disfiguring as it is for me, is magnificent for you. I had horses, men, arms, and wealth: what wonder if I was unwilling to lose them? If you wish to command everyone, does it really follow that everyone should accept your slavery? If I were now being handed over as one who had surrendered immediately, neither my fortune nor your glory would have achieved brilliance. It is also true that in my case any reprisal will be followed by oblivion. On the other hand, if you preserve me safe and sound, I shall be an eternal example of your clemency.

[edit] Rome moves north

When Nero (another lunatic) became emperor in AD 54, he seems to have decided to continue the invasion and appointed Quintus Veranius as governor, a man experienced in dealing with the troublesome hill tribes of Asia Minor. He was dead within a year, and according to Tacitus:

  • "... Veranius, after having ravaged the Silures in some trifling raids, was prevented by death from extending the war. While he lived, he had a great name for manly independence, though, in his will's final words, he betrayed a flatterer's weakness; for, after heaping adulation on Nero, he added that he should have conquered the province for him, had he lived for the next two years."

Veranius and his successor Gaius Suetonius Paulinus mounted a successful campaign across Wales, famously destroying the druidical centre at Mona or Anglesey in AD 60. Final occupation of Wales was postponed however when the rebellion of Boudica forced the Romans to return to the south east. Suetonius defeated Boudica, reinforced his army with legionaries and auxiliaries from Germania and conducted punitive operations against any remaining pockets of resistance, but this proved counterproductive. The new procurator, Gaius Julius Alpinus Classicianus, expressed concern to the Emperor Nero that Suetonius's activities would only lead to continued hostilities. An inquiry was set up under Nero's freedman, Polyclitus, and an excuse, that Suetonius had lost some ships, was found to relieve him of his command (and governorship of Britain). He was replaced by the more conciliatory Publius Petronius Turpilianus.

Following the suppression of Boudicca, a number of new Roman governors continued the conquest by edging north. Quintus Petillius Cerialis took his legions from Lincoln as far as York and defeated Venutius near Stanwick around 69. This resulted in the already Romanised Brigantes and Parisii tribes being further assimilated into the empire proper.

Oman (History of England, Methuen, 1910) gives the year c57 as the date that either Aulus Didius Gallus or Suetonius moved the headquarters of one or both of his legions from Wroxeter to Deva, and built a flotilla of flat-bottomed boats on the Dee so that in 60 A.D. he could invade North Wales. As Gallus died in 57 it was probably the latter who started and completed the invasion.

In 69 the Romans overthrew the Brigantes. This tribe was a Roman ally ruled by Cartimandua and her consort, Venutius. Cartimandua had been responsible for handing over resistance leader Caratacus to the Romans in 51 AD. Shortly afterwards, she divorced Venutius who revolted but was driven off by Roman arms. But in 69 AD, with the Romans in the midst of civil war, Venutius staged a second revolt and successfully overthrew Cartimandua, who fled to the Romans. According to one scrap of fragmentary evidence she may have lived out her days in Chester. The collapse of the treaty relationship with the Brigantes was an important turning point in Roman history in Britain. The Romans could have reinstated their ally Cartamandua but instead they chose to annex Brigantia and conquer Wales. Having commanded Legio II Augusta back in 43 C.E., under the emperor Claudius, the eventual ruler after the civil war, Vespasian, could well understand how a large-scale conquest in Britain could bolster his reputation back in Rome and help secure his position as emperor.

It is possible that there was already a settlement on the site before the Romans arrived, or at least a "campsite" near the Gloverstone. Some early historical speculation is found in Samuel Lewis's 1848 Topographical Dictionary of England which includes the following information for Chester:

  • The origin of this ancient city has been ascribed to the Cornavii, a British tribe who, at the time of the Roman invasion, inhabited that part of the island which now includes the counties of Chester, Salop, Stafford, Warwick, and Worcester; and its British name Caer Leon Vawr, "city of Leon the Great," has been referred to Leon, son of Brût Darian Là, eighth king of Britain.

There may be some confusion here with Caerleon in south Wales. Caerleon is also a site of considerable archaeological importance, with a Roman legionary fortress (it was the headquarters for Legio II Augusta from about 75 to 300 AD) and an Iron Age hill fort. The name Caerleon is derived from the Welsh for "fortress of the legion" (compare with the Anglo-Saxon name for Chester - Legercyestre). "Brût Darian Là" (Welsh: Bryttys darian las) appears to be a reference to Brutus Greenshield one of the legendary kings mentioned by the notoriously inaccurate Geoffrey of Monmouth's 1136 pseudohistorical (i.e. mostly "made up") Historia Regum Britanniae ("the History of the Kings of Britain"). The "Leon" in question may be Liel after whom Carlisle (another Roman fort) may or may not be named.

Raphael Hollinshead tells a similar story, including mention of a specific governor of Britain, P. Ostorius Scapula (who was governor of Britain from AD47-52):

  • Carleil builded. Chester repaired. Leill the sonne of Brute Greeneshield, began to reigne in the yeare of the world 3021, the same time that Asa was reigning in Iuda, and Ambri in Israell. He built the citie now called Carleil, which then after his owne name was called Caerleil, that is, Leill his citie, or the citie of Leill. He repaired also (as Henrie Bradshaw saith) the citie of Caerleon now called Chester, which (as in the same Bradshaw appeareth) was built before Brutus entrie into this land by a giant named Leon Gauer. But what authoritie he had to auouch this, it may be doubted, for Ranulfe Higden in his woorke intituled "Polychronicon," saith in plaine wordes, that it is vnknowen who was the first founder of Chester, but that it tooke the name of the soiourning there of some Romaine legions, by whome also it is not vnlike that it might be first built by P. Ostorius Scapula, who as we find, after he had subdued Caratacus king of the Ordouices that inhabited the countries now called Lancashire, Cheshire, and Salopshire, built in those parts, and among the Silures, certeine places of defense, for the better harbrough of his men of warre, and kéeping downe of such Britaines as were still readie to moue rebellion.

Ptolemy's 2nd century Geographia has a passing mention (text) of the two cities of the Cornovii as:

  • ..From these toward the east are the Cornavi, among whom are the towns: Deva, Legio XX Victrix 17°30 56°45 and Viroconium 16°45 55°45

"Deva Victrix" is Chester, and "Viroconium" is Wroxeter. The later had become the capital of the Cornovii under Roman rule. More on the Cornovii can be found here.

[edit] Vespasian

With the intend of extending the boundaries of the Roman Empire Vespasian send Sextus Julius Frontinus into Roman Britain in 74 AD to succeed Cerialis as governor. He subdued the Silures and other "hostile" tribes of Wales, establishing a new base at Caerleon for Legio II Augusta and a network of smaller forts fifteen to twenty kilometres apart for his auxiliary units. During his tenure, he probably established the fort at Pumsaint in west Wales, largely to exploit the gold deposits at Dolaucothi. He retired in 78 AD, and later he was appointed water commissioner in Rome. The new governor was the famous Gnaeus Julius Agricola. He finished off the Ordovices in North Wales and then took his troops north along the Pennines, building roads as he went.

Raphael Hollinshead gets the story a a little confused and has the Romans responsible for the undercrofts on the Rows:

  • There be some led by coniecture grounded vpon good aduised considerations, that suppose this Ostorius Scapula began to build the citie of Chester after the ouerthrow of Caratacus: for in those parties he fortified sundrie holds, and placed a number of old souldiers either there in that selfe place, or in some other néere therevnto by waie of a colonie. And for somuch (saie they) as we read of none other of anie name thereabouts, it is to be thought that he planted the same in Chester, where his successors did afterwards vse to harbour their legions for the winter season, and in time of rest from iournies which they haue to make against their common enimies. In déed it is a common opinion among the people there vnto this daie, that the Romans built those vaults or tauerns (which in that citie are vnder the ground) with some part of the castell. And verelie as Ranulfe Higden saith, a man that shall view and well consider those buildings, maie thinke the same to be the woorke of Romans rather than of anie other people. That the Romane legions did make their abode there, no man séene in antiquities can doubt thereof, for the ancient name Caer leon ardour deuy, that is, The citie of legions vpon the water of Dée, proueth it sufficientlie enough.

The precise date at which the Romans began construction at Chester has been the subject of much debate. According to one version, sometime around 74 CE, the then governor of Roman Britain, Sextus Julius Frontinus constructed an "auxiliary fort" at Deva Victrix (Chester). The placement of this fort (at the lowest ford of the Dee) appears to have been a strategic move by Frontinus with the intent of both blocking the route of any routed British trying to escape to the north, and to guard against help arriving from the Brigantes and other northern tribes. Frontinus was a noted engineer as well as being a governor, and author of De aquis urbis Romae, a history and description of the water supply of Rome. It is not known whether he was involved in providing Chester's water supply from the springs at Boughton to the Roman fort, but is is known that at this time lead (such as is used for plumbing) was traded with the Deceangli of north Wales. The lead was probably mined at Pentre

  • In June 1885 (at the Roodee) a lead 'pig' was found inscribed IMP•VESP•AVGV•T•IMP•III: the word DECEANGI appears on the side (this has been dated: AD74).
  • In 1838 (1¼ miles east of Chester's Eastgate) another 'pig' was found with the inscription; IMP•VESP•V•T•IMP•III•COS, and again, on the side; DECEANGI (again dated: AD74).

Frontius was succeeded as governor (in AD78) by Gnaeus Julius Agricola a Roman general responsible for much of the Roman conquest of Britain. His biography, the well known De vita et moribus Iulii Agricolae (The Life and Character of Julius Agricola), was the first published work of his son-in-law, the historian Tacitus (and says nothing at all about Chester). By AD79, the fort had developed into the extensive base of Legio II Adiutrix Pia Fidelis. There is another naval link here as the Second Legion were initially raised by Vespasian from the marines (Classis Ravennatis) of the Adriatic fleet. There is no real agreement on the size of the roman fleet which might have been associated with Chester - however it may have been the embarkation point for an attempted invasion of Ireland (see below). There is also no real agreement about what is often called the "massive Roman harbour" and pictured to be the size of the modern Roodee. The nautical character of the city, and the need for combined land and sea operations was probably one reason why the "marine-based" Legio II Adiutrix Pia Fidelis was placed here rather than moving the Legio XX from its base 40 miles away at Wroxeter, where it had take over from Legio XIV Gemina c.65. Another reason for putting Legio II in Chester was that it was the most loyal legion to Vespasian and his Flavian dynasty. In 87, Legio II was recalled to the continent to participate in the Dacian wars of emperor Domitian last of the Flavian dynasty.

Further lead piping can be seen in the Grosvenor Museum which bears the name of Gnaeus Julius Agricola in the following form:

  • IMP•VESP•VIIII•T•IMP•VII•COS•CN•IVLIO•AGRICOLA•LEG•AVG•PR•PR
  • (Imperator Vespasian nine times and Imperator Titus seven times consul. For Gnaeus Julius Agricola, pro-praetorian legate of the emperor)

The earlier lead pigs have been used to argue that they were supplies provided for the construction of the city, and there is a fragmentary inscription from the baths which show that the baths were in operation in 79. It is known that the baths were not the first thing built in a Roman city so it appears that a date around AD 74 is probably correct.

[edit] The fortress

The Romans positioned the larger than normal fortress high on a sandstone bluff above the marshes. The fortress covered 60.90 acres, 20% larger than those in York and Caerleon, which were founded at the same time. Free from the floods of winter and the ever-changing shorelines of the estuary, the bend in the River Dee provides protection on two sides – south and west. It is also the lowest bridgeable and fordable point on the River Dee before it becomes too wide and treacherous. Drinking water was piped in from a spring in the suburb of Boughton.

The fortress was designed in the standard "playing card" shape, with some modifications to the normal plan of buildings. It had four gates, corner towers and interval towers between the gates. The Roman gates had double arches and the Roman Eastgate had a statue of Mars, the Roman god of war, in the middle of the two arches. A fosse or ditch was dug around the north and east sides to provide extra protection. It has been calculated that the fortress was designed to accommodate 6,000 soldiers. The internal buildings consisted of barracks, baths, a hospital, a granary and some "headquarters" buildings. The main fortress baths were located halfway down the modern Bridge Street on the right-hand side. The full plan of Roman Deva is still not known because only limited excavations have taken place following demolition work of later buildings. It has been speculated that a Roman temple may have existed under Chester Cathedral – this is yet to be proved.

The original fortress was constructed of timber and replaced later with a stone fortress. Traces have been found under the amphitheatre and market hall of pre-fortress buildings on a different alignment. It has been speculated that a forward camp was established before the first timber fortress was constructed. The castle hill is also a possible site for such a camp. The timber fortress would have looked like the one reconstructed at Lunt Roman Fort.

Local sandstone was quarried from the south of the river around the area now called Edgar’s Field to provide building material for the fortress and its buildings. The Roman quarry face is still visible today on the outcrop of rock in the field. Through excavations, it has been established that many of the stone buildings were not completed and they were left abandoned for as much as 100 years before they were completed to a slightly modified plan.

The second Legion built their fortress in the territory of the Cornovii. It soon became the main base for Legio XX Valeria Victrix, the 20th Legion, which used it as a port administration base and military fort. It was then one of the principal towns of Roman Britain, with many relics remaining today, including parts of the original Chester Roman walls, parts of a hypocaust system from a Roman bathhouse, and a strongroom from the 'principia', as well as the street pattern at the Cross, where the four main streets intersect and half of its original amphitheatre (controversially, the other half was built over, but is currently being excavated).

Parts of the Roman quay wall of the port can still be seen under the medieval walls at the racecourse. It has been suggested that this quay wall formed a platform for a jetty which stretched out across the river to allow ships to dock at low tide.

Later on in the fortress's history, settlements began to develop outside the fortress walls between the west wall and the port area near the river. Mansion buildings were created for wealthy Romans outside the Walls, an example of which was discovered on Castle Street. Roman shops and workshops lined the incoming roads and to the south as far away as modern day Eccleston. A bath complex was established outside the fortress walls on the modern Watergate Street under the site now occupied by Sedan House.

By Roman law, the dead were buried outside the fortress in cemeteries along the incoming roads to the north and east. Some were cremated and buried in urns, others buried in stone-lined tombs. Elaborate monuments lined the roads. Sometime in the Roman period, these monuments were broken up and used to repair the fortress walls. During the 19th century, these tombstones were recovered from the north wall and now form the best collection of Roman tombstones in the UK. They can now be seen in the Grosvenor Museum.

The Roman fortress was occupied up to the 4th Century. Roman coins have been found in the area dating up to this time. The fortress was described as waste land in the 6th century. It is thought that some Roman buildings remained standing as late as the Norman period. This is the reason why Northgate Street is dog-legged in shape. A massive column base of the Roman 'principia' can be seen through the floor in the shop Blacks. Much of the Roman masonry was robbed out and reused in later periods.

A recent Timewatch investigation by the BBC speculated that, from the size and scale of the fort, had the Roman Empire not begun to collapse, Deva would have become the Roman capital of Britain and a launch post for invasions on Ireland. In fact, recent discoveries of a fort in Ireland suggest that at least one foray was made.

Although both Gildas and Bede located the Roman martyrs, Julius and Aaron, in the "City of the Legions", this is generally identified as Isca Augusta (Caerleon) rather than Deva, because of the chapels there dedicated to the two saints from at least medieval times.

[edit] The baths

Like most Roman settlements, Deva Victrix had a large legionary bath complex for the soldiers to wash and to use for leisure time. The remains on the east side of Bridge Street were largely destroyed during the construction of the Grosvenor Mall. It has been estimated that the baths used between 500,000 and 750,000 litres of water a day, which was supplied from the springs in Boughton. Water was piped in large lead pipes underground from a branch off the main aqueduct near the Eastgate, downhill to the baths on Bridge Street. The water was then held in large tanks with concrete foundations, and then fed through the complex. Waste water would have been fed downhill using gravity to the river. The water was fed through 24 hours a day.

The bath complex consisted of an exercise hall, courtyard, and three Turkish baths with basins and plunge pools. The complex was warmed by a hypocaust, or under-floor heating system, fed by three furnaces. The ceilings of the baths were domed with lines of terracotta tubes to support the structure. Part of the Roman hypocaust remains in situ under the Mall and can be viewed from the cellar of the restaurant on 39 Bridge Street. The remains consist of a number of local sandstone pillars on a concrete base supporting a buried Roman floor. Also remaining in situ is part of a fine Roman mosaic floor, located under St. Michael's Arcade by the Bridge Street entrance. It is known that the bath complex stood for a long time after being abandoned by the Romans. When part of the site was excavated during the demolition of the Feathers Hotel, the floor was found intact with a 0.4 meter covering with dark soil from the Saxon period, followed by remains of the collapsed roof. Five columns from the exercise hall with parts of another hypocaust can be viewed in the Roman Gardens off Pepper Street.

[edit] The quarry

The second fortress was constructed of local sandstone, which was quarried from across the river to the south of the fortress. Traces of the quarry can still be seen today in Handbridge. A large amount of sandstone was taken and used in the construction of the fortress wall and the many buildings inside. On the old quarry face, near an old ford, was carved an image of the Roman goddess Minerva. It may have been carved by the workmen of the quarry for protection.

[edit] The Eliptical Building

The ruins of this unique building were first uncovered in 1939, the remainder was exposed during "rescue excavations" in the late 1960's. The shape of the building is roughly that of a "vesica piscis". That is the shape formed by the overlap of two circles. The building can be dated by the inscription on a lead water-pipe leading to the central courtyard fountain which records its manufacture 'during the ninth consulship of the emperor Vespasian and the seventh consulship of the emperor Titus, in the governorship of Gnaeus Julius Agricola’ - (the pipe is one of those mentioned above, now in the Grosvenor Museum), that is during the first half of AD 79.

The building work seems to have been stopped after a very short period of time. While the degree to which the construction of the building had progressed varied throughout the complex, in many cases work had hardly progressed beyond the laying of foundations and the completion of masonry up to ground level. In other places not even the foundation material had been laid. In no area had the process of forming the internal floors or external surfacing been started. The original drain from the fountain was re-routed during the early work, but this modification was incomplete when the building work stopped. The Elliptical Building was not the only construction project to be interrupted at this time; work on a massive complex to its east was clearly delayed as was the completion of buildings to the north. It has been suggested that the deployment of much of the Chester garrison, Legio II Adiutrix, to Scotland for Agricola’s campaigns is the most likely explanation for this interruption. This would put the cessation of work before or around AD 83, meaning that around five years of work had been done on the site.

The site of the Elliptical Building lay derelict for most of the next 150 years, and many of the monolithic blocks of stone employed in the foundations of the colonnades and piers were removed for re-use elsewhere. Part of the site was briefly occupied by a group of timber workshop buildings. After the demolition of these workshops at the beginning of the 2nd century, the site of the Elliptical Building remained derelict and was used as a general dumping-ground for various forms of rubbish. By the time the decision was taken to construct a new building on the area c AD 225 the rubbish was a metre deep.

Remarkably, the design of the new building followed that of it's unfinished predecessor in some ways and was an improvement of it in others. It has been suggested that this must have meant that the designers of the new building had access to the plans of the original from a century and a half earlier.

Some imaginative hypotheses have been put forward for the purpose of the building. These have have included a theatre, a market-hall and a retirement palace for Cartimandua (ruled c. 43 – 69) following her ejection from Brigantia by the anti-Roman party. Others have speculated that the each of the twelve chambers around the central courtyard may have each had as its focus a statue of one of the principal deities of the Roman State - Jupiter, Juno, Mars, Minerva, Vesta, Diana, Apollo, Ceres, Neptune, Janus, Mercury, and either Dea Roma or Vulcan.

[edit] Chester and Roman Ireland

The Roman historian Tacitus mentions that Agricola, while governor of Roman Britain (AD 78 - 84), entertained an exiled Irish prince, thinking to use him as a pretext for a possible conquest of Ireland. At about the same time, Juvenal specifically tells us, Roman "arms had been taken beyond the shores of Ireland". Neither Agricola nor his successors ever conquered Ireland, but in recent years archaeology has challenged the belief that the Romans never set foot on the island. Roman and Romano-British artefacts have been found primarily in Leinster, notably a fortified site on the promontory of Drumanagh, fifteen miles north of Dublin - perhaps the name of the fortified promontory itself holds clues as to its Roman origin: Drumanagh has as a possible root (D)ruman, a possible reference to Romans (however Gaelic "Droim Meánach" means "Ridge of Meanach", giving another explanation). In addition, a group of burials on Lambay Island, just off the coast near Drumanagh, contained Roman brooches and decorative metalware of a style also found in Roman Britain from the late first century (this could be invasion or trade).

There may be some connection between the un-named prince and a semi-mythical Irish king. Túathal Techtmar ("the legitimate"), was the son of Fíachu Finnolach, and himself a High King of Ireland according to medieval Irish legend and historical tradition. He is said to be the ancestor of the Uí Néill (O'Neil) and Connachta (Connor) dynasties through his grandson "Conn of the Hundred Battles". Túathal is said to have been exiled from Ireland as a child, but to have returned, defeated the then king and waged extensive war. Both Roman sites at Drumanagh and Lambay are close to where the semi-mythical Túathal is supposed to have landed. Some other archaeological discoveries inside Ireland, including Roman jewellery and coins at Tara, the midland ritual complex, and at Clogher, further support the possibility of a Roman invasion of Ireland. It has been suggested that the distribution of Roman remains in Ireland fits well with the places associated with Túathal's campaign. The traditional date of his return is AD76-80.

Speculating somewhat, it is notable the the unique "Elliptical Building" in Chester bears some resemblance to the ritual structures at Tara, and comes from roughly the same period as the supposed invasion by Agricola and the presence of the "prince", who may (possibly) have been Túathal, in Britain. The lead pipe from the elliptic building is dated to AD 79 and Tacitus (Chapter 24) says that in AD 82 Agricola "crossed the sea and defeated people hitherto unknown to the Romans". While he does not specify which sea they crossed (many scholars think that Tacitus refers to the Clyde or the Forth), it should be noted that after this statement, Tacitus writes only about Ireland for the remainder of the chapter, which suggests that the people he was referring to were, in fact, the Irish. There is no evidence that Túathal was actually in Chester, but it does seem to have a contender for Agricola's "capital" and there is the remarkable co-incidence of dates:

  • AD79: Elliptical building lead pipe (stamped on it);
  • ~AD76-80: Túathal returns to Ireland (traditional);
  • AD82: Agricola "crosses the sea" (Tacitus);

In addition Tacitus mentions that Agricola frequently said that Ireland could be conquered with "a single legion and a few auxiliary troops", which suggests the Romans expected some special advantage if they invaded Ireland. This could have been knowledge of local troop dispositions, geography and local rivalries, but could it also have been the presence on the Roman side of a credible claimant to the Kingship of Ireland? So could the Elliptical Building have been connected to this - a palace for a potential king, with a design similar to the ritual site at Tara and a fountain that must have seemed magical at the time? A bauble to show Túathal the advantage of being a client of Rome?

Even if there was no invasion there was almost certainly trade, as the geographer Ptolemy (c. AD 90 – c. 168) writing in the second century made a map of "Hibernia" with reasonably accurate data on rivers, mountains and people, thereby demonstrating some considerable knowledge of the island had been gained by that time.

[edit] Links

[edit] References

Anon .1961. Supposed Barrow in Dunham New Park. Journal of the Chester and North Wales Architectural, Archaeological and Historical Society 48, 45 Archaeological Surveys, 1976. The Archaeology of Warrington's Past. Warrington Development Corporation

Barnatt, J., 1996. Barrows in the Peak District: a review and interpretation of extant sites and past excavations, in Barnatt, J. and Collis, J.(eds), Barrows in the Peak District, pp.3-94

Bond, D., 1988. Excavations at the North Ring, Mucking, Essex. East Anglian Archaeological Report 43

Buckley, D & Hedges, J., 1987. The Bronze Age and Saxon Settlements at Springfield Lyons, Essex: An interim report. Essex County Council Occasional Paper 5

Burl, A., 2000. The Stone Circles of Britain, Ireland and Brittany. Yale University Press

Ellis, P., 1989. Norton Fitzwarren Hillfort: a report on the excavations by Nancy and Philip Langmaid between 1968 and 1971, Proceedings of the Somerset Archaeology and Natural History Society 133, 1-74

Gale, D., 1986. Recording an Elevation of a Copper Mining Face at Engine Vein, Alderley Edge. Undergraduate Dissertation, Department of Archaeological Sciences, University of Bradford

Gale, D., 1989. Evidence of Ancient Copper Mining at Engine Vein, Alderley Edge, Cheshire, Bulletin of the Peak District Mines Historical Society 10(5), 266-273

Gale, D., 1990. Prehistoric Stone Mining Tools from Alderley Edge, in Crew, P. & Crew, S., Early Mining in the British Isles pp. 47-8

Needham, S., 1980. An Assemblage of Late Bronze Age Metalworking Debris from Dainton, Devon, in Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 46, 177-215

Needham, S., 1991. The Grimes Graves Metalwork in the Context of other Middle Bronze Age Assemblages, in Longworth, I., Herne, A., Varndell, G. & Needham, S., Excavations at Grimes Graves Norfolk 1972-1976. British Museum Fascicule 3, 171-180

Varley, W., 1964. Cheshire before the Romans. Cheshire Community Council

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