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Roman Britain - KS2 History - BBC Bitesize

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KS2 History Roman Britain learning resources for adults, children, parents and teachers.

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Conflict - The Roman Empire - KS3 History Revision - BBC Bitesize

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Learn and revise about how the Romans lived and the massive impact their empire has left on life today with BBC Bitesize KS3 History.

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How was Britain changed by the Romans? Learn about their legacy in this BBC Bitesize year 5/6 primary history guide.

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What did Julius Caesar do in Britain?              Julius Caesar invaded Britain twice: in 55 and 54 BC. On the first occasion Caesar took with him only two legions, and achieved little beyond a landing on the coast of Kent. The second invasion consisted of 628 ships, five legions and Did Julius Caesar go to Britain?Julius Caesar first landed in Britain on August 26th, 55 BC, but it was almost another hundred years before the Romans actually conquered Britain in AD 43. Having subdued Gaul, or so it seemed at the time, Julius Caesar launched an expedition to Britain.2,000 cavalry.     

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What did Julius Caesar do in Britain?              Julius Caesar invaded Britain twice: in 55 and 54 BC. On the first occasion Caesar took with him only two legions, and achieved little beyond a landing on the coast of Kent. The second invasion consisted of 628 ships, five legions and Did Julius Caesar go to Britain?Julius Caesar first landed in Britain on August 26th, 55 BC, but it was almost another hundred years before the Romans actually conquered Britain in AD 43. Having subdued Gaul, or so it seemed at the time, Julius Caesar launched an expedition to Britain.2,000 cavalry.     

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Ten Minute English and British History #02 - Late Roman Britain

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Ten Minute English and British History #01 - Early Roman Britain and Boudicca's Rebellion

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How Did The Romans Change Britain? | History in a Nutshell | Animated History

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Britain invasions

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In the course of his Gallic Wars, Julius Caesar invaded Britain twice: in 55 and 54 BC. On the first occasion Caesar took with him only two legions, and achieved little beyond a landing on the coast of Kent. The second invasion consisted of 628 ships, five legions and 2,000 cavalry. The force was so imposing that the Britons did not dare contest Caesar's landing in Kent, waiting instead until he began to move inland. Caesar eventually penetrated into Middlesex and crossed the Thames, forcing the British warlord Cassivellaunus to surrender as a tributary to Rome and setting up Mandubracius of the Trinovantes as client king.

Caesar included accounts of both invasions in his Commentarii de Bello Gallico, with the first significant first-hand descriptions of the people, culture and geography of the island. This is effectively the start of the written history, or at least the protohistory, of Britain.

Britain had long been known to the classical world as a source of tin. The coastline had been explored by the Greek geographer Pytheas in the 4th century BC, and may have been explored even earlier, in the 5th century, by the Carthaginian sailor Himilco. But to many Romans, the island, lying as it did beyond the Ocean at what was to them the edge of the known world, was a land of great mystery. Some Roman writers even insisted that it did not exist, and dismissed reports of Pytheas's voyage as a hoax.

Britain during the reign of Julius Caesar had an Iron Age culture, with an estimated population of between one and four million. Archaeological research shows that its economy was broadly divided into lowland and highland zones. In the lowland southeast, large areas of fertile soil made possible extensive arable farming, and communication developed along trackways, such as the Icknield Way, the Pilgrims' Way and the Jurassic Way, and navigable rivers such as the Thames. In the highlands, north of the line between Gloucester and Lincoln, arable land was available only in isolated pockets, so pastoralism, supported by garden cultivation, was more common than settled farming, and communication was more difficult. Settlements were generally built on high ground and fortified, but in the southeast, had begun to be established on lower ground, often at river crossings, suggesting that trade was becoming more important. Commercial contact between Britain and the continent had increased since the Roman conquest of Transalpine Gaul in 124 BC, and Italian wine was being imported via the Armorican peninsula, much of it arriving at Hengistbury Head in Dorset.

Caesar's written account of Britain says that the Belgae of northeastern Gaul had previously conducted raids on Britain, establishing settlements in some of its coastal areas, and that within living memory Diviciacus, king of the Suessiones, had held power in Britain as well as in Gaul. British coinage from this period shows a complicated pattern of intrusion. The earliest Gallo-Belgic coins that have been found in Britain date to before 100 BC, perhaps as early as 150 BC, were struck in Gaul, and have been found mainly in Kent. Later coins of a similar type were struck in Britain and are found all along the south coast as far west as Dorset. It appears that Belgic power was concentrated on the southeastern coast, although their influence spread further west and inland, perhaps through chieftains establishing political control over the native population.

First invasion (55 BC)

Caesar claimed that, in the course of his conquest of Gaul, the Britons had supported the campaigns of the mainland Gauls against him, with fugitives from among the Gallic Belgae fleeing to Belgic settlements in Britain, and the Veneti of Armorica, who controlled seaborne trade to the island, calling in aid from their British allies to fight for them against Caesar in 56 BC. Strabo says that the Venetic rebellion in 56 BC had been intended to prevent Caesar from travelling to Britain and disrupting their commercial activity, suggesting that the possibility of a British expedition had already been considered by then.

In late summer, 55 BC, even though it was late in the campaigning season, Caesar decided to make an expedition to Britain. He summoned merchants who traded with the island, but they were unable or unwilling to give him any useful information about the inhabitants and their military tactics, or about harbours he could use, presumably not wanting to lose their monopoly on cross-channel trade. He sent a tribune, Gaius Volusenus, to scout the coast in a single warship. He probably examined the Kent coast between Hythe and Sandwich, but was unable to land, since he "did not dare leave his ship and entrust himself to the barbarians", and after five days returned to give Caesar what intelligence he had managed to gather.

By then, ambassadors from some of the British states, warned by merchants of the impending invasion, had arrived promising their submission. Caesar sent them back, along with his ally Commius, king of the Belgae Atrebates, to use their influence to win over as many other states as possible.

He gathered a fleet consisting of eighty transport ships, sufficient to carry two legions ( Legio VII and Legio X), and an unknown number of warships under a quaestor, at an unnamed port in the territory of the Morini, almost certainly Portus Itius ( Boulogne). Another eighteen transports of cavalry were to sail from a different port, probably Ambleteuse. These ships may have been triremes or biremes, or may have been adapted from Venetic designs Caesar had seen previously, or may even have been requisitioned from the Veneti and other coastal tribes. Clearly in a hurry, Caesar himself left a garrison at the port and set out "at the third watch" - well after midnight - on 23 August with the legions, leaving the cavalry to march to their ships, embark, and join him as soon as possible. In light of later events, this was either a tactical mistake or (along with the fact that the legions came over without baggage or heavy siege gear) confirms the invasion was not intended for complete conquest.

Caesar initially tried to land at Dubris ( Dover), whose natural harbour had presumably been identified by Volusenus as a suitable landing place. However, when he came in sight of shore, the massed forces of the Britons gathered on the overlooking hills and cliffs dissuaded him from landing there, since the cliffs were so close to the shore that javelins could be thrown down from them onto anyone landing there. After waiting there at anchor "until the ninth hour" (about 3pm) waiting for his supply ships from the second port to come up and meanwhile convening a council of war, he ordered his subordinates to act on their own initiative and then sailed the fleet about 7 miles (11 kilometres) North East along the coast to an open beach. The first level beach area after Dover is at Walmer where a memorial is placed. Recent archaeology by the University of Leicester indicates that the possible landing beach was in Pegwell Bay on the Isle of Thanet, Kent, where artefacts and massive earthworks dating from this period have been exposed, although this area would not have been the first easy landing site seen after Dover. If Caesar had as large a fleet with him as has been suggested, then it is possible that the beaching of ships would have been spread out over a number of miles stretching from Walmer towards Pegwell Bay.

Having been tracked all the way along the coast by the British cavalry and chariots, the landing was opposed. To make matters worse, the loaded Roman ships were too low in the water to go close inshore and the troops had to disembark in deep water, all the while attacked by the enemy from the shallows. The troops were reluctant, but according to Caesar's account were led by the aquilifer (standard-bearer, whose name is not provided by Caesar) of the 10th legion who jumped in first as an example, shouting:

The British were eventually driven back with catapultae and slings fired from the warships into the exposed flank of their formation and the Romans managed to land and drive them off. The cavalry, delayed by adverse winds, still had not arrived, so the Britons could not be pursued and finished off, and Caesar could not enjoy what he calls, in his usual self-promoting style, his "accustomed success".

The Romans established a camp of which archaeological traces have been found, received ambassadors and had Commius, who had been arrested as soon as he had arrived in Britain, returned to them. Caesar claims he was negotiating from a position of strength and that the British leaders, blaming their attacks on him on the common people, were in only four days awed into giving hostages, some immediately, some as soon as they could be brought from inland, and disbanding their army. However, after his cavalry had come within sight of the beachhead but then been scattered and turned back to Gaul by storms, and with food running short, Caesar, a native of the Mediterranean, was taken by surprise by high British tides and a storm. His beached warships filled with water, and his transports, riding at anchor, were driven against each other. Some ships were wrecked, and many others were rendered unseaworthy by the loss of rigging or other vital equipment, threatening the return journey.

Realising this and hoping to keep Caesar in Britain over the winter and thus starve him into submission, the Britons renewed the attack, ambushing one of the legions as it foraged near the Roman camp. The foraging party was relieved by the remainder of the Roman force and the Britons were again driven off, only to regroup after several days of storms with a larger force to attack the Roman camp. This attack was driven off fully, in a bloody rout, with improvised cavalry that Commius had gathered from pro-Roman Britons and a Roman scorched earth policy.

The British once again sent ambassadors and Caesar, although he doubled the number of hostages, realised he could not hold out any longer and dared not risk a stormy winter crossing. Caesar had set out late in the campaigning season and the winter was approaching, and so he allowed them to be delivered to him in Gaul, to which he returned with as many of the ships as could be repaired with flotsam from the wrecked ships. Even then, only two tribes felt sufficiently threatened by Caesar to actually send the hostages, and two of his transports were separated from the main body and made landfall elsewhere.

If the invasion was intended as a full-scale campaign, invasion or occupation, it had failed, and if it is seen as a reconnaissance-in-force or a show of strength to deter further British aid to the Gauls, it had fallen short. Nonetheless, going to Britain beyond the "known world" carried such kudos for a Roman that the Senate decreed a supplicatio (thanksgiving) of twenty days when they received Caesar's report. It is also suggested that this invasion established alliances with British kings in the area which smoothed the later invasion of AD 43.

Caesar's pretext for the invasion was that "in almost all the wars with the Gauls succours had been furnished to our enemy from that country". This is plausible, although it may also have been a cover for investigating Britain's mineral resources and economic potential: afterwards, Cicero refers to the disappointing discovery that there was no gold or silver in the island; and Suetonius reports that Caesar was said to have gone to Britain in search of pearls.

Second invasion (54 BC)

A second invasion was planned in the winter of 55-54 for the summer of 54 BC. Cicero wrote letters to his friend Gaius Trebatius Testa and his brother Quintus, both of whom were serving in Caesar's army, expressing his excitement at the prospect. He urged Trebatius to capture him a war chariot, and asked Quintus to write him a description of the island. Trebatius, as it turned out, did not go to Britain, but Quintus did, and wrote him several letters from there - as did Caesar himself.

Determined not to make the same mistakes as the previous year, Caesar gathered a larger force than on his previous expedition with five legions as opposed to two, plus two thousand cavalry, carried in ships which he designed, with experience of Venetic shipbuilding technology so as to be more suitable for a beach landing than those used in 55 BC, being broader and lower for easier beaching. This time he named Portus Itius as the departure point.

Titus Labienus was left at Portus Itius to oversee regular food transports from there to the British beachhead. The military ships were joined by a flotilla of trading ships captained by Romans and provincials from across the empire, and local Gauls, hoping to cash in on the trading opportunities. It seems more likely that the figure Caesar quotes for the fleet (800 ships) include these traders and the troop-transports, rather than the troop-transports alone.

Caesar landed at the place he had identified as the best landing-place the previous year. The Britons did not oppose the landing, apparently, as Caesar states, intimidated by the size of the fleet, but this may have been a strategic ploy to give them time to gather their forces.

Upon landing, Caesar left Quintus Atrius in charge of the beach-head and made an immediate night march 12 mi (19 km) inland, where he encountered the British forces at a river crossing, probably somewhere on the River Stour. The Britons attacked but were repulsed, and attempted to regroup at a fortified place in the forests, possibly the hillfort at Bigbury Wood, Kent, but were again defeated and scattered. As it was late in the day and Caesar was unsure of the territory, he called off the pursuit and made camp.

However, the next morning, as he prepared to advance further, Caesar received word from Atrius that, once again, his ships at anchor had been dashed against each other in a storm and suffered considerable damage. About forty, he says, were lost. The Romans were unused to Atlantic and Channel tides and storms, but nevertheless, considering the damage he had sustained the previous year, this was poor planning on Caesar's part. However, Caesar may have exaggerated the number of ships wrecked to magnify his own achievement in rescuing the situation. He returned to the coast, recalling the legions that had gone ahead, and immediately set about repairing his fleet. His men worked day and night for approximately ten days, beaching and repairing the ships, and building a fortified camp around them. Word was sent to Labienus to send more ships.

Caesar was on the coast on 1 September, from where he wrote a letter to Cicero. News must have reached Caesar at this point of the death of his daughter Julia, as Cicero refrained from replying "on account of his mourning".

Caesar then returned to the Stour crossing and found the Britons had massed their forces there. Cassivellaunus, a warlord from north of the Thames, had previously been at war with most of the British tribes. He had recently overthrown the king of the powerful Trinovantes and forced his son, Mandubracius, into exile. But now, facing invasion, the Britons had appointed Cassivellaunus to lead their combined forces. After several indecisive skirmishes, during which a Roman tribune, Quintus Laberius Durus, was killed, the Britons attacked a foraging party of three legions under Gaius Trebonius, but were repulsed and routed by the pursuing Roman cavalry.

Cassivellaunus realised he could not defeat Caesar in a pitched battle. Disbanding the majority of his force and relying on the mobility of his 4,000 chariots and superior knowledge of the terrain, he used guerrilla tactics to slow the Roman advance. By the time Caesar reached the Thames, the one fordable place available to him had been fortified with sharpened stakes, both on the shore and under the water, and the far bank was defended. Second Century sources state that Caesar used a large war elephant, which was equipped with armour and carried archers and slingers in its tower, to put the defenders to flight. When this unknown creature entered the river, the Britons and their horses fled and the Roman army crossed over and entered Cassivellaunus' territory. (However, this may be a confusion with Claudius's use of elephants during his conquest of Britain in AD 43.)

The Trinovantes, whom Caesar describes as the most powerful tribe in the region, and who had recently suffered at Cassivellaunus' hands, sent ambassadors, promising him aid and provisions. Mandubracius, who had accompanied Caesar, was restored as their king, and the Trinovantes provided grain and hostages. Five further tribes, the Cenimagni, Segontiaci, Ancalites, Bibroci and Cassi, surrendered to Caesar, and revealed to him the location of Cassivellaunus' stronghold, possibly the hill fort at Wheathampstead, which he proceeded to put under siege.

Cassivellaunus sent word to his allies in Kent, Cingetorix, Carvilius, Taximagulus and Segovax, described as the "four kings of Cantium", to stage a diversionary attack on the Roman beach-head to draw Caesar off, but this attack failed, and Cassivellaunus sent ambassadors to negotiate a surrender. Caesar was eager to return to Gaul for the winter due to growing unrest there, and an agreement was mediated by Commius. Cassivellaunus gave hostages, agreed an annual tribute, and undertook not to make war against Mandubracius or the Trinovantes. Caesar wrote to Cicero on 26 September, confirming the result of the campaign, with hostages but no booty taken, and that his army was about to return to Gaul. He then left, leaving not a single Roman soldier in Britain to enforce his settlement. Whether the tribute was ever paid is unknown.

Commius later switched sides, fighting in Vercingetorix's rebellion. After a number of unsuccessful engagements with Caesar's forces, he cut his losses and fled to Britain. Sextus Julius Frontinus, in his Strategemata, describes how Commius and his followers, with Caesar in pursuit, boarded their ships. Although the tide was out and the ships still beached, Commius ordered the sails raised. Caesar, still some distance away, assumed the ships were afloat and called off the pursuit. John Creighton (archaeologist) believes that this anecdote was a legend, and that Commius was sent to Britain as a friendly king as part of his truce with Mark Antony. Commius established a dynasty in the Hampshire area, known from coins of Gallo-Belgic type. Verica, the king whose exile prompted Claudius's conquest of AD 43, styled himself a son of Commius.

As well as noting elements of British warfare, particularly the use of chariots, which were unfamiliar to his Roman audience, Caesar also aimed to impress them by making further geographical, meteorological and ethnographic investigations of Britain. He probably gained these by enquiry and hearsay rather than direct experience, as he did not penetrate that far into the interior, and most historians would be wary of applying them beyond the tribes with whom he came into direct contact.

Caesar's first-hand discoveries were limited to east Kent and the Thames Valley, but he was able to provide a description of the island's geography and meteorology. Though his measurements are not wholly accurate, and may owe something to Pytheas, his general conclusions even now seem valid:

The island is triangular in its form, and one of its sides is opposite to Gaul. One angle of this side, which is in Kent, whither almost all ships from Gaul are directed, [looks] to the east; the lower looks to the south. This side extends about 500 miles. Another side lies toward Hispania and the west, on which part is Ireland, less, as is reckoned, than Britain, by one half: but the passage from it into Britain is of equal distance with that from Gaul. In the middle of this voyage, is an island, which is called Mona: many smaller islands besides are supposed to lie there, of which islands some have written that at the time of the winter solstice it is night there for thirty consecutive days. We, in our inquiries about that matter, ascertained nothing, except that, by accurate measurements with water, we perceived the nights to be shorter there than on the continent. The length of this side, as their account states, is 700 miles. The third side is toward the north, to which portion of the island no land is opposite; but an angle of that side looks principally toward Germany. This side is considered to be 800 miles in length. Thus the whole island is about 2,000 miles in circumference.

No information about harbours or other landing-places was available to the Romans before Caesar's expeditions, so Caesar was able to make discoveries of benefit to Roman military and trading interests. Volusenus's reconnaissance voyage before the first expedition apparently identified the natural harbour at Dubris ( Dover), although Caesar was prevented from landing there and forced to land on an open beach, as he did again the following year, perhaps because Dover was too small for his much larger forces. The great natural harbours further up the coast at Rutupiae ( Richborough), which were used by Claudius for his invasion 100 years later, were not used on either occasion. Caesar may have been unaware of them, may have chosen not to use them, or they may not have existed in a form suitable for sheltering and landing such a large force at that time. Present knowledge of the period geomorphology of the Wantsum Channel that created that haven is limited.

By Claudius's time Roman knowledge of the island would have been considerably increased by a century of trade and diplomacy, and four abortive invasion attempts. However, it is likely that the intelligence gathered in 55 and 54 BC would have been retained in the now-lost state records in Rome, and been used by Claudius in the planning of his landings.

The Britons are defined as typical barbarians, with polygamy and other exotic social habits, similar in many ways to the Gauls, yet as brave adversaries whose crushing can bring glory to a Roman:

The most civilised of all these nations are they who inhabit Kent, which is entirely a maritime district, nor do they differ much from the Gallic customs. Most of the inland inhabitants do not sow corn, but live on milk and flesh, and are clad with skins. All the Britons, indeed, dye themselves with woad, which occasions a bluish colour, and thereby have a more terrible appearance in fight. They wear their hair long, and have every part of their body shaved except their head and upper lip. Ten and even twelve have wives common to them, and particularly brothers among brothers, and parents among their children; but if there be any issue by these wives, they are reputed to be the children of those by whom respectively each was first espoused when a virgin.

In addition to infantry and cavalry, the Britons employed chariots in warfare, a novelty to the Romans, who used them for transport and racing. Caesar describes their use as follows:

During the civil war, Caesar made use of a kind of boat he had seen used in Britain, similar to the Irish currach or Welsh coracle. He describes them thus:

"The institution [of Druidism] is thought to have originated in Britain, and to have been thence introduced into Gaul; and even now those who wish to become more accurately acquainted with it, generally repair thither, for the sake of learning it."

Caesar not only investigates this for the sake of it, but also to justify Britain as a rich source of tribute and trade:

[T]he number of cattle is great. They use either brass or iron rings, determined at a certain weight, as their money. Tin is produced in the midland regions; in the maritime, iron; but the quantity of it is small: they employ brass, which is imported. There, as in Gaul, is timber of every description, except beech and fir.

This reference to the 'midland' is inaccurate as tin production and trade occurred in the southwest of England, in Cornwall and Devon, and was what drew Pytheas and other traders. However, Caesar only penetrated to Essex and so, receiving reports of the trade whilst there, it would have been easy to perceive the trade as coming from the interior.

Caesar made no conquests in Britain, but his enthroning of Mandubracius marked the beginnings of a system of client kingdoms there, thus bringing the island into Rome's sphere of political influence. Diplomatic and trading links developed further over the next century, opening up the possibility of permanent conquest, which was finally begun by Claudius in AD 43. In the words of Tacitus:

Lucan's Pharsalia (II,572) makes the jibe that Caesar had:

...run away in terror from the Britons whom he had come to attack!

Valerius Maximus's Memorable Words and Deeds (1st century AD) praises the bravery of Marcus Caesius Scaeva, a centurion under Caesar, who, having been deserted by his comrades, held his position alone against a horde of Britons on a small island, before finally swimming to safety.

Polyaenus's 2nd-century Strategemata relates that, when Cassivellaunus was defending a river crossing against him, Caesar gained passage by the use of an armoured elephant, which terrified the Britons into fleeing. This may be a confusion with Claudius's use of elephants during his conquest of Britain in AD 43.

Orosius's 5th-century History Against the Pagans contains a brief account of Caesar's invasions, which makes an influential mistake: Quintus Laberius Durus, the tribune who died in Britain, is misnamed "Labienus", an error which is followed by all medieval British accounts.

Bede's History of the English Church and People includes an account of Caesar's invasions. This account is taken almost word for word from Orosius, which suggests Bede read a copy of this work from the library at Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Priory which Benedict Biscop had brought from Rome itself.

The 9th-century Historia Britonum attributed to Nennius gives a garbled account, in which Caesar invades three times, landing at the Thames Estuary rather than on a beach in Kent. His chief opponent is Dolobellus, proconsul of the British king Belinus, son of Minocannus. Caesar finally defeats the Britons at a place called Trinovantum.

Henry of Huntingdon's 12th-century Historia Anglorum gives an account based on Bede and the Historia Britonum, and gives Caesar an inspirational speech to his troops.

Geoffrey of Monmouth, in his History of the Kings of Britain, has Caesar invading Britain, and has Cassibelanus (i.e. Cassivellaunus) as Caesar's primary opponent, but otherwise differs from the historical record. As in the Historia Britonum, Caesar invades three times, not twice, landing at the Thames Estuary. His story is also largely based on Bede and the Historia Britonum, but is greatly expanded. Historical elements are modified - the stakes placed in the Thames by the Britons become anti-ship rather than anti-infantry and anti-cavalry devices - and other elements, such as Cassibelanus's brother Nennius engaging in hand-to-hand combat with Caesar and stealing his sword, called Crocea Mors, are not known from any earlier source. Adaptations such as Wace's Roman de Brut, Layamon's and the Welsh Bruts largely follow Geoffrey's story.

The medieval Welsh Triads also refer to Caesar's invasions. Some of these references appear directly related to Geoffrey's account, but others allude to independent traditions: Caswallawn (Cassivellaunus) is said to have gone to Rome in search of his lover, Fflur, to have allowed Caesar to land in Britain in return for a horse called Meinlas, and pursued Caesar in a great fleet after he returned to Gaul. The 18th-century collection of Triads compiled by Iolo Morganwg contains expanded versions of these traditions.

The 13th-century French work Li Fet des Romains contains an account of Caesar's invasions based partly on Caesar and partly on Geoffrey. It adds an explanation of how Caesar's soldiers overcame the stakes in the Thames - they tied wooden splints filled with sulphur around them, and burned them using Greek fire. It also identifies the standard-bearer of the 10th legion as Valerius Maximus's Scaeva.

In the 14th-century French romance Perceforest Caesar, a precocious 21-year-old warrior, invades Britain because one of his knights, Luces, is in love with the wife of the king of England. Afterwards, a Briton called Orsus Bouchesuave takes a lance which Caesar used to kill his uncle, makes twelve iron styluses from the head, and, alongside Brutus, Cassius and other senators, uses them to stab Caesar to death.

E. Nesbit's 1906 children's novel The Story of the Amulet depicts Caesar on the shores of Gaul, contemplating an invasion.

In Robert Graves's 1934 and 1935 novels and Claudius the God, Claudius refers to Caesar's invasions when discussing his own invasion. In the 1976 TV adaptation of the two books they are mentioned in a scene during Augustus's reign where young members of the imperial family are playing a board game (not unlike ) in which areas of the empire must be conquered and arguing about how many legions it theoretically needs to capture and hold Britain, and again in the speech in which Claudius announces his own invasion ("100 years since the divine Julius left it, Britain is once again a province of Rome").

The 1957 Goon Show episode The Histories of Pliny the Elder, a pastiche of epic films, involves Caesar invading Britain, defeating the Britons who think the battle is a football match and so only send 10 men against the Romans, and occupying Britain for 10 years or more.

The 1964 film Carry On Cleo features Caesar and Mark Antony (not present during either invasion) invading Britain and enslaving cavemen there.

In Goscinny and Uderzo's 1965 comic Asterix in Britain, Caesar has successfully conquered Britain because the Britons stop fighting every afternoon for a cup of hot water with milk, tea not yet having been brought to Europe.

Blaschke, Jayme (23 June 2008). "Tide and time: Re-dating Caesar's invasion of Britain". Texas State University.

Bunson, Matthew (2014). Encyclopedia of the Roman Empire. Infobase Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4381-1027-1.

Creighton, John (2000). Coins and Power in Late Iron Age Britain. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-139-43172-9.

Frere, Sheppard Sunderland (1987). Britannia: A History of Roman Britain (3rd ed.). Routledge & Kegan Paul. ISBN 978-0-7102-1215-3.

Nearing, Homer (1949). "The Legend of Julius Caesar's British Conquest". PLMA. Modern Language Association. 64 (4): 889-929. JSTOR 459639.

Peter Salway,11 Roman Britain (Oxford History of England), chapter 2 (pages 20-39)

John Peddie, 1987, Conquest: The Roman Conquest of Britain, chapter 1 (pages 1-22)

T. Rice Holmes, 1907. Ancient Britain and the Invasions of Julius Caesar. Oxford. Clarendon Press.

R. C. Carrington, 1938, "Caesar's Invasions of Britain" by (reviewed in Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 29, Part 2 (1939), pp. 276-277)

Peter Berresford Ellis, Caesar's Invasion of Britain, 1978, ISBN 978-0-85613-018-2

Snyder, Christopher A. (2008). The Britons. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-0-470-75821-2.

W. Welch, C. G. Duffield (Editor), Caesar: Invasion of Britain, 1981, ISBN 978-0-86516-008-8

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Julius Caesar's invasions of Britain - Wikipedia

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In the course of his Gallic Wars, Julius Caesar invaded Britain twice: in 55 and 54 BC. On the first occasion Caesar took with him only two legions, and achieved little beyond a landing on the coast of Kent. The second invasion consisted of 628 ships, five legions and 2,000 cavalry.

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Hadrians wall 2

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Hadrian's Wall ( Latin: Vallum Hadriani, also known as the Roman Wall, Picts' Wall, or Vallum Aelium in Latin) is a former defensive fortification of the Roman province of Britannia, begun in AD 122 in the reign of the Emperor Hadrian. Running from Wallsend on the River Tyne in the east to Bowness-on-Solway in the west of what is now northern England, it was a stone wall with large ditches in front of it and behind it that crossed the whole width of the island. Soldiers were garrisoned along the line of the wall in large forts, smaller milecastles, and intervening turrets. In addition to the wall's defensive military role, its gates may have been customs posts.

A view of Hadrian's Wall showing its length and height. The upright stones on top of it are modern, to deter people from walking on it.

Hadrian's Wall Path generally runs very close to the wall. Almost all of the standing masonry of the wall was removed in early modern times and used for local roads and farmhouses. None of it stands to its original height, but modern work has exposed much of the footings, and some segments display a few courses of modern masonry reconstruction. Many of the excavated forts on or near the wall are open to the public, and various nearby museums present its history. The largest Roman archaeological feature in Britain, it runs a total of 73 miles (117.5 kilometres) in northern England. Regarded as a British cultural icon, Hadrian's Wall is one of Britain's major ancient tourist attractions. It was designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987. The turf-built Antonine Wall in what is now central Scotland, which briefly superseded Hadrian's Wall before being abandoned, was declared a World Heritage Site in 2008.

Hadrian's Wall marked the boundary between Roman Britannia and unconquered Caledonia to the north. The wall lies entirely within England and has never formed the Anglo-Scottish border, though it is sometimes loosely or colloquially described as being such.

Limes and Hadrian's Wall (Latin with English subtitles)

The length of the wall was 80 Roman miles (a unit of length equivalent to about 1,620 yards or 1,480 metres), or 73 modern miles (117 kilometres). This covered the entire width of the island, from Wallsend on the River Tyne in the east to Bowness-on-Solway in the west.

Not long after construction began on the wall, its width was reduced from the originally planned 10 feet (3.0 m) to about 8 feet (2.4 m), or even less depending on the terrain. Some sections were constructed of turf and timber in the first instance, and these might take decades to be modified and replaced by stone.

Bede, a monk and historian who died in 735, wrote that the wall stood 12 feet (3.7 metres) high, with evidence suggesting it could have been a few feet higher at its formation.

Throughout the length of the wall there was a watch-tower every third of a mile, also providing shelter and living accommodation for the Roman troops in these turrets.

Route of Hadrian's Wall, almost from coast to coast

Ordnance Survey map of Hadrian's Wall, published in 1964. A revised and updated edition was published in 2010.

Sections of Hadrian's Wall still remain, particularly in its hilly central sector. Little remains in lowland regions, where it was used as a source of stone for new buildings.

Hadrian's Wall extended west from Segedunum at Wallsend on the River Tyne, via Carlisle and Kirkandrews-on-Eden, to the shore of the Solway Firth, ending a short but unknown distance west of the village of Bowness-on-Solway. The route was slightly north of , an important Roman road built several decades earlier to link two forts that guarded important river crossings: Corstopitum ( Corbridge) on the River Tyne and Luguvalium (Carlisle) on the River Eden. The modern A69 and B6318 roads follow the course of the wall from Newcastle upon Tyne to Carlisle, then along the northern coast of Cumbria (south shore of the Solway Firth).

Part of the central section of the wall follows natural cliffs on an escarpment of the Whin Sill rock formation.

Although the curtain wall ends near Bowness-on-Solway, this does not mark the end of the line of defensive structures. The system of milecastles and turrets is known to have continued along the Cumbria coast as far as Risehow, south of Maryport. For classification purposes, the milecastles west of Bowness-on-Solway are referred to as Milefortlets.

Hadrian's Wall was probably planned before Hadrian's visit to Britain in 122. According to restored sandstone fragments found in Jarrow which date from 118 or 119, it was Hadrian's wish to keep "intact the empire", which had been imposed on him via "divine instruction". On Hadrian's accession to the imperial throne in 117, there was unrest and rebellion in Roman Britain and from the peoples of various conquered lands across the Empire, including Egypt, Judea, Libya and Mauretania. These troubles may have influenced his plan to construct the wall, as well as his construction of frontier boundaries now known as limes in other areas of the Empire, such as the Limes Germanicus in modern-day Germany.

Scholars disagree over how much of a threat the inhabitants of northern Britain really presented to the Romans, and whether there was any economic advantage in defending and garrisoning a fixed line of defences like the wall, rather than conquering and annexing what has become Northumberland and the Scottish Lowlands and then defending the territory with a looser arrangement of forts. Hadrian and his advisers however produced a solution to their problems that remained relevant for centuries.

The primary purpose of the wall was as a physical barrier to slow the crossing of raiders, people intent on crossing its line for animals, treasure, or slaves, and then returning with their loot. The Latin text Historia Augusta states:

(Hadrianus) murumque per octoginta milia passuum primus duxit, qui barbaros Romanosque divideret.

(Hadrian) was the first to build a wall, eighty miles long, to separate the Romans from the barbarians.

Not only the wall itself supports this interpretation; pits known as cippi are frequently found on the berm or flat area in front of the wall. These pits held branches or small tree trunks entangled with sharpened branches. These would make an attack on the wall even more difficult. It might be thought of as the Roman equivalent of barbed wire, a measure to delay an enemy attack and hold the attackers within range of the missiles of the defenders. The curtain wall was not mainly a continuously-embattled defensive line, rather it would deter casual crossing and be an observation point that could alert Romans of an incoming attack and slow down enemy forces so that additional troops could arrive for support.

Besides a defensive structure made to keep people out, the wall also kept people within the Roman province. Movement would be channeled through the gates in the wall, where it could be monitored for information, prevented or permitted as appropriate, and taxed.

The wall would also have had a psychological impact:

For nearly three centuries, until the end of Roman rule in Britain in 410 AD, Hadrian's Wall was the clearest statement of the might, resourcefulness, and determination of an individual emperor and of his empire.

It was not only a defensive structure, but also a symbolic statement of Rome's imperial power, marking the border between the so called civilized world and the unconquered barbarian wilderness. As the British archaeologist Neil Faulkner explains, "the wall, like other great Roman frontier monuments was as much a propaganda statement as a functional facility". There is some evidence that Hadrian's Wall was originally covered in plaster and then whitewashed: its shining surface would have reflected the sunlight and been visible for miles around.

Hadrian ended his predecessor Trajan's policy of expanding the empire and instead focused on defending the current borders, namely at the time Britain. Like Augustus, Hadrian believed in exploiting natural boundaries such as rivers for the borders of the empire, for example the Euphrates, Rhine and Danube. Britain, however, did not have any natural boundaries that could serve this purpose - to divide the province controlled by the Romans from the Celtic tribes in the north.

With construction starting in 122, the entire length of the wall was built with an alternating series of forts, each housing 600 men, and manned milecastles, operated by "between 12 and 20 men".

It took six years to build most of Hadrian's Wall with the work coming from three Roman legions - the Legio II Augusta, Legio VI Victrix, and Legio XX Valeria Victrix, totalling 15,000 soldiers, plus some members of the Roman fleet. The building of the wall was not out of the area of expertise for the soldiers; some would have trained to be surveyors, engineers, masons, and carpenters.

"Broad Wall" and "Narrow Wall"

The footings of the wall, showing the point at which the Broad Wall and the Narrow Wall footings meet

R. G. Collingwood cited evidence for the existence of a broad section of the wall and conversely a narrow section. He argued that plans changed during construction of the wall and its overall width was reduced.

Broad sections of the wall are around nine and a half feet (2.9 metres) wide with the narrow sections two feet (61 centimetres) thinner, around seven and a half feet (2.3 metres) wide. Some of the narrow sections were found to be built upon broad foundations, which had presumably been built before the plans changed. Based on this evidence, Collingwood concluded that the wall was originally due to be built between present-day Newcastle and Bowness, with a uniform width of ten Roman feet, all in stone. On completion, only three-fifths of the wall was built from stone; the remaining western section was a turf wall, later rebuilt in stone. Plans possibly changed due to a lack of resources.

In an effort to preserve resources further, the eastern half's width was therefore reduced from the original ten Roman feet to eight, with the remaining stones from the eastern half used for around 5 miles (8.0 kilometres) of the turf wall in the west. This reduction from the original ten Roman feet to eight created the so-called "Narrow Wall".

Just south of the wall there is a ten-foot (three-metre) deep, ditch-like construction with two parallel mounds running north and south of it, known as the Vallum. The Vallum and the wall run more or less in parallel for almost the entire length of the wall, except between the forts of Newcastle and Wallsend at the east end, where the Vallum may have been considered superfluous as a barrier on account of the close proximity of the River Tyne. The twin track of the wall and Vallum led many 19th-century thinkers to note and ponder their relation to one another.

Some evidence appears to show that the route of the wall was shifted to avoid the Vallum, possibly pointing to the Vallum being an older construction. R. G. Collingwood therefore asserted in 1930 that the Vallum was built before the wall in its final form. Collingwood also questioned whether the Vallum was an original border built before the wall. Based on this, the wall could be viewed as a new, replacement border, built to strengthen the Romans' definition of their territory.

In 1936, further research suggested that the Vallum could not have been built before the wall because the Vallum avoided one of the wall's milecastles. This new discovery was continually supported by more evidence, strengthening the idea that there was a simultaneous construction of the Vallum and the wall.

Other evidence still pointed in other, slightly different directions. Evidence shows that the Vallum preceded sections of the Narrow Wall specifically; to account for this discrepancy, Couse suggests that either construction of the Vallum began with the Broad Wall, or it began when the Narrow Wall succeeded the Broad Wall but proceeded more quickly than that of the Narrow Wall.

From Milecastle 49 to the western terminus of the wall at Bowness-on-Solway, the curtain wall was originally constructed from turf, possibly due to the absence of limestone for the manufacture of mortar. Subsequently, the Turf Wall was demolished and replaced with a stone wall. This took place in two phases; the first (from the River Irthing to a point west of Milecastle 54), during the reign of Hadrian, and the second following the reoccupation of Hadrian's Wall after the abandonment of the Antonine Wall (though it has also been suggested that this second phase took place during the reign of Septimius Severus). The line of the new stone wall follows the line of the turf wall, apart from the stretch between Milecastle 49 and Milecastle 51, where the line of the stone wall is slightly further to the north.

In the stretch around Milecastle 50TW, it was built on a flat base with three to four courses of turf blocks. A basal layer of cobbles was used westwards from Milecastle 72 (at Burgh-by-Sands) and possibly at Milecastle 53. Where the underlying ground was boggy, wooden piles were used.

At its base, the now-demolished turf wall was 6 metres (20 feet) wide, and built in courses of turf blocks measuring 46 cm (18 inches) long by 30 cm (12 inches) deep by 15 cm (6 inches) high, to a height estimated at around 3.66 metres (12.0 feet). The north face is thought to have had a slope of 75%, whereas the south face is thought to have started vertical above the foundation, quickly becoming much shallower.

Above the stone curtain wall's foundations, one or more footing courses were laid. Offsets were introduced above these footing courses (on both the north and south faces), which reduced the wall's width. Where the width of the curtain wall is stated, it is in reference to the width above the offset. Two standards of offset have been identified: Standard A, where the offset occurs above the first footing course, and Standard B, where the offset occurs after the third (or sometimes fourth) footing course.

It is thought that following construction, and when fully manned, almost 10,000 soldiers were stationed on Hadrian's Wall, made up not of the legions who built it but by regiments of auxiliary infantry and cavalry drawn from the provinces.

Following from this, David Breeze laid out the two basic functions for soldiers on or around Hadrian's Wall. Breeze says that soldiers who were stationed in the forts around the wall had the primary duty of defence; at the same time, the troops in the milecastles and turrets had the responsibility of frontier control. Evidence, as Breeze says, for soldiers stationed in forts is far more pronounced than the ones in the milecastles and turrets.

Breeze discusses three theories about the soldiers on Hadrian's Wall. One, these soldiers who manned the milecastles and turrets on the wall came from the forts near it; two, regiments from auxiliaries were specifically chosen for this role; or three, "a special force" was formed to man these stations.

Breeze comes to the conclusion that through all the inscriptions gathered there were soldiers from three, or even four, auxiliary units at milecastles on the wall. These units were " cohors I Batavorum, cohors I Vardullorum, an un-numbered Pannonian cohort, and a duplicarius from Upper Germany". Breeze adds that there appears to have been some legionaries as well at these milecastles.

Breeze also continues saying that evidence is "still open on whether" soldiers who manned the milecastles were from nearby forts or were specifically chosen for this task, and further adds that "the balance [of evidence] perhaps lies towards the latter". A surprise for Breeze is that "soldiers from the three British legions" outnumbered the auxiliaries, which goes against the assertion "that legionaries would not be used on such detached duties".

Further information on the garrisoning of the wall has been provided by the discovery of the Vindolanda tablets just to the south of Hadrian's Wall, such as the record of an inspection on 18 May 92 or 97, when only 456 of the full quota of 756 Belgae troops were present, the rest being sick or otherwise absent.

By about 200 BC, long before the Romans arrived in Britannia, the zone on both sides of the wall, from Lothian to the north and the River Wear to the south, had become dominated by rectilinear enclosures. These were the nuclei of extensive farming settlements at a high level of the social hierarchy, a numerous and widespread nobility; the lower orders lived in groups of round houses that left much less archaeological trace. The wall probably cut across a coherent cultural area, and it was planned and built at a time of serious warfare in Britain, which required major Roman reinforcements from outside Britannia. A tablet from Vindolanda describes a centurio regionarius who exercised direct military rule from Carlisle, some 30 years after Roman conquest of the region. Nevertheless, the settlement pattern in the area did not change immediately after the wall was built, and the groups who fought the Romans may have been from previously-pacified tribes to the south, or from far north of the wall.

The Roman soldiers of the garrison, with their families and other immigrants, may have amounted to some 22-30% of the population of the region. They could not have been supplied entirely from local resources, although any local surpluses would have been taxed or requisitioned. Military conscripts may also have been levied from nearby groups.

To the south, between the wall and the River Tees, Roman-style settlements appear in the early second century, very shortly after the wall was built. This is earlier than Roman villas in Yorkshire further south. Mortaria stamped with the name ANAVS were produced at Faverdale, some 80 kilometres south of the wall, and most of those found have come from the fort of Coria. ANAVS himself was probably an immigrant to the area. In 150, a discharge certificate was issued to one Velvotigernus, son of Maglotigernus, after 26 year's service in the classis Germanica. It was found near (not in) the Roman fort of Longovicium. Presumably Velvotigernus was from the upper echelons of British society (his father's name means 'Great master'); he chose to settle near Lanchester some 27km south of the wall. This suggests the rapid development of elements of Roman culture both by the local upper classes, and by immigrants either attracted by commercial possibilities or officially encouraged to settle.

Northwards a very different picture emerges. A large area of what is now southern Scotland as far as Lothian, and the Northumbrian coastal plain, lost its monumental building tradition of substantial timber roundhouses and earthwork enclosures. Very little late Roman pottery has been found there. The Romans may have cleared a zone of its population, as they are known to have done on the Rhine and for ten Roman miles beyond the Danube frontier. Some sites were still occupied; the fort of Burnswark Hill, previously in ruins, was re-occupied about the time that the wall was built. Possibly this represents a short-lived Roman attempt to establish a cooperative authority on this main route further north to Caledonia. Within a few years, the fort was surrounded by Roman camps and bombarded by Roman missiles. It was finally abandoned by about 140.

Other sites may have been managed by native groups, probably for the management of livestock and possibly to supply Roman requirements. Pollen evidence suggests that the landscape immediately north of the Wall remained generally open, without forest regeneration until the end of Roman rule. At Castle O'er an Iron Age hillfort was given an annexe and a network of ditched and banked boundaries. The sites at Pegswood Moor and St. George's Hospital, Morpeth, also show probable stock enclosures and droveways, far less substantial than the massive Iron Age sites in the area. The site at Huckhoe is the only one in this area to produce evidence of post-Hadrianic domestic residence (Roman coarse pottery, probably containers of high-prestige imported food, as late as the third and possibly fourth centuries), and it may similarly have been mainly concerned with livestock management and delivery.

In general, and as with other Roman frontier lines, Roman coins and pottery did not move across the wall, and the wall seems to have been an effective barrier to trade. A few elite centres continued to import Roman goods, such as the post-160 samian found at Traprain Law. Ongoing exchange may have been managed at a few specific crossing points (and possibly at specific times of year). One such traditional point may be indicated by the concentration of Roman-period metal objects near Great Whittington, about 2 kilometres north along a Roman road from the Portgate on the wall. The coins, mostly silver rather than bronze and suggesting high-value transactions, indicate activity in the late first and early second centuries, a diminution in the Antonine period when the garrison moved north to the Antonine Wall, and recovery in the later second and early third centuries.

Leahill Turret in Cumbria, England, is a typical example of the intermediate turrets built into the wall between the milecastles.

After Hadrian's death in 138, the new emperor, Antoninus Pius, left the wall occupied in a support role, essentially abandoning it. He began building the Antonine Wall about 160 kilometres (100 mi) north, across the isthmus running west-south-west to east-north-east. This turf wall ran 40 Roman miles, or about 60.8 km (37.8 mi), and had more forts than Hadrian's Wall. This area later became known as the Scottish Lowlands, sometimes referred to as the Central Belt or Central Lowlands.

Antoninus was unable to conquer the northern tribes, so when Marcus Aurelius became emperor, he abandoned the Antonine Wall and reoccupied Hadrian's Wall as the main defensive barrier in 164. In 208-211, the Emperor Septimius Severus again tried to conquer Caledonia and temporarily reoccupied the Antonine Wall. The campaign ended inconclusively and the Romans eventually withdrew to Hadrian's Wall. The early historian Bede (AD 672/73-735), following Gildas, wrote (circa AD 730):

[the departing Romans] thinking that it might be some help to the allies [Britons], whom they were forced to abandon, constructed a strong stone wall from sea to sea, in a straight line between the towns that had been there built for fear of the enemy, where Severus also had formerly built a rampart.

Two Roman inscriptions found built into St Paul's Church in Jarrow in 1782, mentioning Hadrian above and the Province of Britannia below. They are possibly from a dedication slab or a victory monument at the very eastern end of the wall.[42]

Bede obviously identified Gildas's stone wall as Hadrian's Wall (built in the 120s) and he would appear to have believed that the ditch-and-mound barrier known as the Vallum (just to the south of, and contemporary with, Hadrian's Wall) was the rampart constructed by Severus. Many centuries would pass before just who built what became apparent.[self-published source? ]

In the same passage, Bede describes Hadrian's Wall as follows: "It is eight feet in breadth, and twelve in height; and, as can be clearly seen to this day, ran straight from east to west." Bede by his own account lived his whole life at Jarrow, just across the River Tyne from the eastern end of the wall at Wallsend, so as he indicates, he would have been very familiar with the wall. What he does not say is whether there was a walkway along the top of the wall. It might be thought likely that there was, but if so it no longer exists.

In the late 4th century, barbarian invasions, economic decline and military coups loosened the Empire's hold on Britain. By 410, the estimated end of Roman rule in Britain, the Roman administration and its legions were gone and Britain was left to look to its own defences and government. Archaeologists have revealed that some parts of the wall remained occupied well into the 5th century. It has been suggested that some forts continued to be garrisoned by local Britons under the control of a Coel Hen figure and former dux. Hadrian's Wall fell into ruin and over the centuries the stone was reused in other local buildings. Enough survived in the 7th century for spolia from Hadrian's Wall (illustrated at right) to find its way into the construction of St Paul's Church in Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Abbey, where Bede was a monk. It was presumably incorporated before the setting of the church's dedication stone, still to be seen in the church, dated 23 April 685.

Building the Roman Wall by William Bell Scott, at Wallington Hall; the face of the centurion is that of the antiquarian John Clayton. The painting might imply that the wall was built by slaves, which it was not.

The wall fascinated John Speed, who published a set of maps of England and Wales by county at the start of the 17th century. He described it as "the Picts Wall" (or "Pictes"; he uses both spellings). A map of Newecastle (sic), drawn in 1610 by William Matthew, described it as "Severus' Wall", mistakenly giving it the name ascribed by Bede to the Vallum. The maps for Cumberland and Northumberland not only show the wall as a major feature, but are ornamented with drawings of Roman finds, together with, in the case of the Cumberland map, a cartouche in which he sets out a description of the wall itself.

Hadrian's Wall near Birdoswald Fort, known to the Romans as Banna, with a man spraying weedkiller to reduce biological weathering to the stones.

Much of the wall has now disappeared. Long sections of it were used for roadbuilding in the 18th century, especially by General Wade to build a military road (most of which lies beneath the present day B6318 " Military Road") to move troops to crush the Jacobite rising of 1745. The preservation of much of what remains can be credited to the antiquarian John Clayton. He trained as a lawyer and became town clerk of Newcastle in the 1830s. He became enthusiastic about preserving the wall after a visit to Chesters. To prevent farmers taking stones from the wall, he began buying some of the land on which the wall stood. In 1834, he started purchasing property around Steel Rigg near Crag Lough. Eventually, he controlled land from Brunton to Cawfields. This stretch included the sites of Chesters, Carrawburgh, Housesteads, and Vindolanda. Clayton carried out excavation at the fort at Cilurnum and at Housesteads, and he excavated some milecastles.

Clayton managed the farms he had acquired and succeeded in improving both the land and the livestock. He used the profits from his farms for restoration work. Workmen were employed to restore sections of the wall, generally up to a height of seven courses. The best example of the Clayton Wall is at Housesteads. After Clayton's death, the estate passed to relatives and was soon lost to gambling. Eventually, the National Trust began acquiring the land on which the wall stands. At Wallington Hall, near Morpeth, there is a painting by William Bell Scott, which shows a centurion supervising the building of the wall. The centurion has been given the face of John Clayton (above right).

In 2021 workers for Northumbrian Water found a previously undiscovered 3-metre section of the wall while repairing a water main in central Newcastle upon Tyne. The company announced that the pipe would be "angled to leave a buffer around the excavated trench".

Hadrian's Wall was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987, and in 2005 it became part of the transnational " Frontiers of the Roman Empire" World Heritage Site, which also includes sites in Germany.

Although Hadrian's Wall was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987, it remains unguarded, enabling visitors to climb and stand on the wall, although this is not encouraged, as it could damage the historic structure. On 13 March 2010, a public event Illuminating Hadrian's Wall took place, which saw the route of the wall lit with 500 beacons. On 31 August and 2 September 2012, there was a second illumination of the wall as a digital art installation called "Connecting Light", which was part of the London 2012 Festival. In 2018, the organisations which manage the Great Wall of China and Hadrian's Wall signed an agreement to collaborate for the growth of tourism and for historical and cultural understanding of the monuments.

Hadrian's Wall Path

In 2003, a National Trail footpath was opened that follows the line of the wall from Wallsend to Bowness-on-Solway. Because of the fragile landscape, walkers are asked to follow the path only in summer.

Hadrian's Wall was known in the Roman period as the vallum (wall), and the discovery of the Staffordshire Moorlands Pan in Staffordshire in 2003 has thrown further light on its name. This copper alloy pan ( trulla) from the 2nd century is inscribed with a series of four names of Roman forts along the western sector of the wall: [Bowness-on-Solway] [Drumburgh] VXELODVNVM [Stanwix] CAMBOGLANNA [Castlesteads]. This is followed by the words RIGORE VALI AELI DRACONIS . Hadrian's family name was Aelius, and the most likely reading of the inscription is Valli Aelii ( genitive), Hadrian's Wall, suggesting that the wall was called by the same name by contemporaries. However, another possibility is that it refers to the personal name Aelius Draco.

Two bronze vessels that are very similar to the Staffordshire Moorlands Pan are the Rudge Cup, found in Wiltshire in 1725, and the Amiens Skillet, found in Amiens in northern France in 1949. They also bear the Latin names of Hadrian's Wall forts round their rims, beneath which are representations of a turreted or battlemented wall, thought to depict Hadrian's Wall.

In March 2010, to commemorate the 1600th anniversary of the end of Roman rule in Britain, a series of 500 beacons were successively lit along the length of Hadrian's Wall.

The Latin and Romano-Celtic names of all of the Hadrian's Wall forts are known, from the Notitia Dignitatum and other evidence such as inscriptions. They are listed here from east to west, in their Latin and modern English names:

The remains of Castle Nick, Milecastle 39, near Steel Rigg, between Housesteads and The Sill Visitor Centre for the Northumberland National Park at Once Brewed

Turrets on the wall include:

Outpost forts beyond the wall include:

Supply forts behind the wall include:

The 1991 American romantic action adventure film Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves uses Sycamore Gap as a location.

The 2011 action drama film The Eagle tells the story of a young Roman officer setting out across Hadrian's Wall into the uncharted highlands of Caledonia to recover the lost Roman eagle standard of the Ninth Legion.[citation needed ] The 2010 film Centurion tells a similar story.

The wall has also been featured as a major focal point of the 2004 King Arthur in which one of the primary gates is opened for the first time since its construction to allow Arthur and his knights passage into the north for their quest. The climactic Battle of Badon between the Britons led by Arthur and his knights, and the Saxons led by Cerdic and his son Cynric are set just inside the wall.

The seventh episode for the eighth season of the documentary television series Modern Marvels was about Hadrian's Wall. It was released on 1 March 2001.

The English poet W. H. Auden wrote a script for a BBC radio documentary called Hadrian's Wall, which was broadcast on the BBC's north-eastern Regional Programme in 1937. Auden later published a poem from the script, "Roman Wall Blues", in his book Another Time. The poem is a brief monologue spoken in the voice of a lonely Roman soldier stationed at the wall.

Hadrian's Wall appears in Assassin's Creed Valhalla. The site can be visited by protagonist Eivor of the Raven Clan during the 870s.

Hadrian's Wall appears in Crusader Kings III as a historical building which provides an economic benefit to the player or AI that controls the province.

A board game with the same name was released in 2021, in which you are tasked with the construction and defence of the wall. In 2022 the game was nominated for the American Tabletop Awards in the Strategy Game category.

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15. Collins R, Biggins J. A. Metal-detecting and geophysical survey at Great Whittington, Northumberland. Archaeologica Aeliana 2013. 5th series 42, pp 235-67. ^ https://archaeologydataservice.ac.uk/archiveDS/archiveDownload?t=arch-3433-1/dissemination/AAseries5/AA542typeset/archael542-235-267-collins.pdf accessed 19 May 2023.

16. Bede, ^ Historia Ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, Book 5 Chapter 24, "I have spent all the remainder of my life in this monastery."

17. ^ The Buildings of England: County Durham by Nikolaus Pevsner and Elizabeth Williamson (1985 edition), p.338. The inscription reads: DEDICATIO BASILICAE SCI PAVLI VIIII KL MAI ANNO XV ECFRIDI REG CEOLFRIDI ABB EIVSDEMQ Q ECCLES DO AVCTORE CONDITORIS ANNO IIII . This translates as "The dedication of the church of St Paul on the ninth before the kalends of May [23 April] in the fifteenth year of King Ecgfrith and the fourth year of Ceolfrith, abbot, and with God's help the founder of this church". (St Paul's Church Jarrow, undated guidebook by Peter Hiscock, p. 4.)

18. ^ "Hadrian's Wall discovered underneath one of Newcastle's busiest streets". Northumbrian Water Group. 10 August 2021. Archived from the original on 29 August 2023.

19. ^ The suffix "chester" reflects the presence of a Roman castra.

20. ^ "GENUKI: The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland (1868) - Northumberland". Genuki.bpears.org.uk. 3 August 2010. Archived from the original on 5 May 2013.

21. Sycamore Gap, a section of the wall between two crests just east of Milecastle 39, is locally known as the "Robin Hood Tree" for its use in the 1991 film ^ Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991).

Birley, A.R. (1963). Hadrians Wall Illustrated Guide. London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office (HMSO).

Burton, Anthony. Hadrian's Wall Path. 2004. Aurum Press Ltd. ISBN 185410893X.

Breeze, David John (2023). Hadrian's Wall. Oxford: Archaeopress. ISBN 9781803274164.

Breeze, David J. (2023). The hinterland of Hadrian's Wall. Oxford: Archaeopress. ISBN 9781803275475.

Chaichian, Mohammad. 2014. "Hadrian's Wall: An Ill-Fated strategy for Tribal Management in Roman Britain", in Empires and Walls: Globalization, Migration, and Colonial Domination (Brill, pp. 23-52). https://www.amazon.com/Empires-Walls-Globalization-Migration-Domination/dp/1608464229.

Davies, Hunter. A Walk along the Wall, 1974. Weidenfeld & Nicolson: London ISBN 0297767100.

de la Bédoyère, Guy. Hadrian's Wall: A History and Guide. Stroud: Tempus, 1998. ISBN 0752414070.

England's Roman Frontier: Discovering Carlisle and Hadrian's Wall Country. Hadrian's Wall Heritage Ltd and Carlisle Tourism Partnership. 2010.

Forde-Johnston, James L. Hadrian's Wall. London: Michael Joseph, 1978. ISBN 0718116526.

Hadrian's Wall Path (map). Harvey, 12-22 Main Street, Doune, Perthshire FK16 6BJ. harveymaps.co.uk

Higgins, Charlotte (2014). "Chapter Seven: Hadrian's Wall". Under Another Sky: Journeys in Roman Britain. London: Vintage. ISBN 978-0099552093.

Hodgson, Nick (2017). Hadrian's Wall. Marlborough, UK: Robert Hale. ISBN 978-0719818158.

Moffat, Alistair, The Wall. 2008. Birlinn Limited Press. ISBN 1841586757.

Shanks, Michael (2012). 'Let me tell you about Hadrian's Wall ...' Heritage, Performance, Design.

Speed, John - A set of Speed's maps were issued bound in a single volume in 1988 in association with the British Library and with an introduction by Nigel Nicolson as The Counties of Britain: A Tudor Atlas by John Speed.

Tomlin, R. S. O., "Inscriptions" in Britannia (2004), vol. xxxv, pp. 344-345 (the Staffordshire Moorlands cup naming the Wall).

Wilson, Roger J. A., A Guide to the Roman Remains in Britain. London: Constable & Company, 1980; ISBN 009463260X.

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Hadrian's Wall ( Latin: Vallum Hadriani, also known as the Roman Wall, Picts' Wall, or Vallum Aelium in Latin) is a former defensive fortification of the Roman province of Britannia, begun in AD 122 in the reign of the Emperor Hadrian.

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Ancient Roman philosophy is philosophy as it was practiced in the Roman Republic and its successor state, the Roman Empire. Roman philosophy includes not only philosophy written in Latin, but also philosophy written in Greek in the late Republic and Roman Empire. Important early Latin-language writers include Lucretius, Cicero, and Seneca the Younger. Greek was a popular language for writing about philosophy, so much so that the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius chose to write his Meditations in Greek.

Interest in philosophy was first excited at Rome in 155 BC, by an Athenian embassy consisting of the Academic skeptic Carneades, the Stoic Diogenes of Babylon, and the Peripatetic Critolaus. Roman philosophy was heavily influenced by Hellenistic philosophy; however, unique developments in philosophical schools of thought occurred during the Roman period as well, with many philosophers adapting teachings from more than one school. Both leading schools of law of the Roman period, the Sabinian and the Proculean Schools, drew their ethical views from readings on the Stoics and Epicureans respectively, allowing for the competition between thought to manifest in a new field in Rome's jurisprudence.

During the autocratic rule of the Flavian dynasty, a group of philosophers vocally and politically protested against imperial actions, particularly under Domitian and Vespasian. This resulted in Vespasian banishing all philosophers from Rome, save for Gaius Musonius Rufus; although he, too, was later banished. This event later became known as the Stoic Opposition, as a majority of the protesting philosophers were Stoics. Later in the Roman period, Stoics came to regard this opposition highly; however, the term "Stoic Opposition" was not coined until the 19th century, where it first appears in the writings of Gaston Boissier.

While philosophy was often admired by jurists and aristocrats, of the emperors the affinity that Hadrian held for philosophy stands out, a feature that was likely amplified by his philhellenism. Hadrian was recorded to have attended lectures by Epictetus and Favorinus on his tours of Greece, and invested heavily in attempting to revive Athens as a cultural center in the ancient world through methods of central planning on his part. Hadrian held philosophy in high regard, something unusual for Roman emperors, who were often indifferent, if not oppositional to it as a practice. These sentiments in favor of philosophy were also shared by the emperors Nero, Julian the Apostate, and Marcus Aurelius -the latter two of whom are now considered as philosophers.

Later, with the spread of Christianity inside the Roman Empire, came the Christian philosophy of Saint Augustine of Hippo. One of the last philosophical writers of antiquity was Boethius, whose writings are the chief source of information as to Greek philosophy during the first centuries of the Middle Ages. During this time Athens declined as an intellectual center of thought while new sites such as Alexandria and Rome hosted a variety of philosophical discussion, such as commentary on the works of Aristotle.

Around 90 BC, Antiochus of Ascalon rejected skepticism, making way for the period known as Middle Platonism, in which Platonism was fused with certain Peripatetic and many Stoic dogmas. In Middle Platonism, the Platonic Forms were not transcendent but immanent to rational minds, and the physical world was a living, ensouled being, the World-Soul. The eclectic nature of Platonism during this time is shown by its incorporation into Pythagoreanism ( Numenius of Apamea) and into Jewish philosophy ( Philo of Alexandria)

The School of the Sextii was an eclectic Ancient Roman school of philosophy founded around 50 BC by Quintus Sextius the Elder and continued by his son, Sextius Niger, however it went extinct shortly after in 19 AD due to the ban on foreign cults. The school blended elements of Pythagorean, Platonic, Cynic, and Stoic together with a belief in an elusive incorporeal power pervades the body in order to emphasize asceticism, honesty, and moral training through nightly examinations of conscience as a means of achieving eudaimonia. The primary sources of information on the school are Seneca the Younger, who was taught by one of its members named Sotion, and the 5th century writer Claudianus Mamertus. Other members of the school included Papirius Fabianus, Crassicius Pasicles, Celsus. While Seneca the Younger often conflates the school with Stoicism, the Sextians were not as inclined to rigorous logical exercises or any abstruse abstract thinking, and unlike the Stoics, advocated avoidance of politics, engaging in the correspondence between words and life, and vegetarianism.

Pythagorean views were revived by Nigidius Figulus during the Hellenistic period, when pseudo-pythagorean writings began circulating. Eventually in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD Neopythagoreanism came to be recognized.

Roman Epicurean philosopher, Lucretius

Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher, Marcus Aurelius

Academic skeptic

Philosophical skepticism

Pyrrhonist

Cynic philosophy survived into the Imperial period, and even became "fashionable", though its adherents were criticized for not being fully committed.

Roman emperor and Neoplatonic philosopher, Julian

Neoplatonism, or Plotinism, is a school of religious and mystical philosophy founded by Plotinus in the 3rd century AD and based on the teachings of Plato and the other Platonists. The summit of existence was the One or the Good, the source of all things. In virtue and meditation the soul had the power to elevate itself to attain union with the One, the true function of human beings. Non-Christian Neoplatonists used to attack Christianity until Christians such as Augustine, Boethius, and Eriugena adopted Neoplatonism.

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Ancient Roman philosophy is philosophy as it was practiced in the Roman Republic and its successor state, the Roman Empire. Roman philosophy includes not only philosophy written in Latin, but also philosophy written in Greek in the late Republic and Roman Empire. Important early Latin-language writers include Lucretius, Cicero, and Seneca the Younger.

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Romans meet Greek philosophy

Roman men didn't begin studying philosophy until about 200 BC. At that time, the Romans were conquering Greece. So a lot of Roman soldiers and generals spent a lot of time in Greece, and got a chance to talk to Greek philosophers.

The Romans found out that Greek philosophers like Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle had been doing a lot of thinking about philosophy just recently. Some Romans got interested. By about 50 BC these Romans were even beginning to write philosophy themselves, though most of it was pretty much just translating Greek philosophy into Latin.

Lucretius and the Epicureans

One of the first Roman men who wrote about philosophy was Lucretius. (Men wouldn't let most women study philosophy.) Lucretius followed Greek Epicurean philosophy. He left us a long poem, called On the Nature of Things, explaining Epicurean philosophy in Latin for people who couldn't read Greek.

Cicero and the Skeptics

Cicero was another man who wrote about philosophy at just about the same time as Lucretius. He was mostly a Skeptic philosopher. Like other Skeptics, Cicero thought that you should question any ideas or facts you heard about. You should always ask "How do they know that?" or "How can they be sure?" or "What about this other thing?" Cicero tried to use philosophy to make men more logical thinkers, so that they would make better decisions about how to run the government. But Cicero also held some Stoic ideas, especially that men should try to be as good as possible.

Seneca and the Stoics

About a hundred years later, in the time of the emperors Claudius and Nero, another philosopher called Seneca wrote another set of essays about Stoic philosophy. Seneca thought that men should not waste time on things that really didn't matter. Instead, they should use their time well, to help improve the world. And they should improve their own minds by studying philosophy.

Gnostics, Neo-Platonism, Cynics

Soon after Seneca's time, many men and women began to look for a closer, more direct relationship to the gods or to God. Some people, like the Christian Gnostics, tried to use magic spells and secret knowledge to get closer to God. The Christian followers of Montanus thought you could get closer to God through prayer. Pagan Neo-Platonists used philosophical ideas that came from Plato's ideas about the perfect form. They tried to perfect themselves and get closer to God that way. At the same time, a revival of Cynic philosophy formed a protest movement against imperial power.

Christian philosophy: Augustine and Ambrose

Later Christians developed their own philosophical ideas. St. Augustine and St. Ambrose, in the late 300s AD, both studied earlier philosophers. They tried to create a Christian philosophy that would include both Christian ideas and Greek and Roman philosophy. Their Christian philosophy would include Aristotle and Neo-Platonism.

The fall of the Roman Empire did not stop men (or a few women) from thinking about these ideas. In both the Islamic Empire and medieval Europe, men like al Tusi and Maimonides and Thomas Aquinas kept on trying to make religion agree with philosophy. They tried to get closer to God through philosophy.

Learn by doing: how could these ideas help you be a better person?
More about medieval philosophy

Bibliography and further reading about Roman philosophy:

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Roman men didn't begin studying philosophy until about 200 BC. At that time, the Romans were conquering Greece. So a lot of Roman soldiers and generals spent a lot of time in Greece, and got a chance to talk to Greek philosophers.

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The Romans, particularly the rich, enjoyed lots of leisure time, and they spent this time in a variety of different ways.

Here are some facts about some of the forms of Roman entertainment.
Roman Baths

Most Romans visited the public bath house on a daily basis. Bath houses were set up like the spas or health clubs of today, and a trip to the bath house was a social occasion.

At the bath house Romans could exercise, get clean, meet friends, walk in the gardens and borrow books from the bath house library.

Follow this link to learn more facts about Roman baths.

Chariot Racing at the Stadium

Chariot races took place in the stadium (sometimes known as the circus). The stadium had a central platform (called the spina), and the crowd watched the chariots race around it.

There were eight chariot circuses in Rome. There's also the remains of one in Colchester, England.

The chariots were incredibly light and travelled really quickly. Chariot racing was a dangerous sport and many injuries occurred to both the charioteers and the horses.

The chariots were usually driven by slaves, and were pulled by between two and four horses.

The Roman Theatre

The Romans loved theatre and they enjoyed watching four different types of performance: comedies, farces, tragedies and pantomimes.

The plays were performed in a theatre with a stage, and area for the orchestra and the auditorium (a semi-circular area where the audience sat).

Only men acted in Roman times and and they often played more then one role per play.

Simple costumes were worn to allow the audience to distinguish between different characters.

Gladiators and the Amphitheatre

The Roman amphitheatre was probably the key form of entertainment for the citizens of the Roman Empire.

Rich and poor would pile into the amphitheatres of the Empire to watch gladiators fight each other, or to watch slaves fight wild beasts, or to watch recreations of famous battles, or to watch wild beasts fight each other. The Romans were very inventive and they came up with lots of different ways in which the crowd could get their fix of combat and bloodshed.

To learn more about Roman gladiators, follow the link.

Roman Feasts and Dinner Parties

Rich Romans enjoyed entertaining at home. They took their time over their evening meal and ate a wide variety of different foods and dishes.

The Romans didn't sit at chairs around a dining table as we do today. Instead, the food was placed on a low tables and the Romans sprawled on couches and most dishes with their hands.

Rich Romans relied on slaves to wash their hands between course and before and after the meal, and to prepare and serve the food.

Find out more facts about the Romans by visiting our resources page.

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Roman Entertainment Facts - Primary Facts

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The Romans, particularly the rich, enjoyed lots of leisure time, and they spent this time in a variety of different ways. Here are some facts about some of the forms of Roman entertainment. Roman Baths Most Romans visited the public bath house on a daily basis.

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Medusa is a character in Greek mythology. Her story has been told and retold by ancient and modern storytellers, writers, and artists.

The Latin poet Ovid writes in Book IV of his Metamorphoses that Poseidon attacked Medusa in the temple of Athena. The goddess became angry, and changed Medusa into a monster with snakes for hair.

Medusa has been depicted in the visual arts for centuries. Many interpretations surround the myth. For the ancients, an image of Medusa's head was a device for averting evil. This image was called a Gorgoneion. The Gorgoneion was very scary and made all the children cry, but worked only against Medusa and not her sisters.

Medusa was one of three sisters. They were known as The Gorgons. Medusa's sisters were Stheno and Euryale. Medusa was mortal, but her sisters were immortal. They were all children of the sea deities, Phorkys and his sister Keto. Before they were monsters, all three sisters were beautiful young women, particularly Medusa; however, she was a priestess in the temple of Athena.

Any man or animal who looked directly upon her was turned to stone.

The hero Perseus beheaded Medusa by viewing her reflection in his burnished shield. After using the dreadful head to defeat his enemies, he presented it to Athena and she put it on her shield.

Medusa in art

Medusa was a subject for ancient vase painters, mosaicists, and sculptors. She appears on the breastplate of Alexander the Great in the Alexander Mosaic at the House of the Faun in Pompeii, Italy (about 200 BC).

A Roman copy of Phidias' Medusa (left) is held in the Glyptothek in Munich, Germany.

Among the Renaissance depictions are the sculpture Perseus with the Head of Medusa by Benvenuto Cellini (1554) and the oil painting Medusa by Caravaggio (1597).

Baroque depictions include Head of Medusa by Peter Paul Rubens (1618); the marble bust Medusa by Bernini (1630s); and Perseus Turning Phineus and his Followers to Stone, an oil painting by Luca Giordano from the (early 1680s).

Romantic and modern depictions include Perseus with the Head of Medusa by Antonio Canova (1801) and Perseus, a sculpture by Salvador Dalí. Twentieth century artists whno tackled the Medusa theme include Paul Klee, John Singer Sargent, Pablo Picasso, Pierre et Gilles, and Auguste Rodin.

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Medusa is a character in Greek mythology. Her story has been told and retold by ancient and modern storytellers, writers, and artists. The Latin poet Ovid writes in Book IV of his Metamorphoses that Poseidon attacked Medusa in the temple of Athena. The goddess became angry, and changed Medusa into a monster with snakes for hair.

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Kerberos ( Latin Cerberus) is a creature in Greek mythology, like a hound ( dog) with three heads. It belongs to Hades, and it guards the gate of the Greek underworld. Cerberus is a Hellhound and is related to another mythical animal, the Chimera (part goat, part lion, part snake). Cerberus makes sure the dead stay within the gates and the living stay away from them. However, the Greeks did note in their myths that Cerberus was a fan of sweet things like honey cakes (The myth of Eros and Psyche) and music (The myth of Orpheus in the Underworld). Another way to become friends with the animal was to talk to his owner, Hades, the Lord of the Underworld (The labours of Hercules).Cerbus is the son of Typhon and echidna.

Descriptions

Descriptions of Cerberus vary, including the number of his heads. Cerberus was usually three-headed, though not always. Cerberus had a multi-headed heritage. His father was the multi snake-headed Typhon, and Cerberus was the brother of three other multi-headed monsters, the multi-snake-headed Lernaean Hydra; Orthrus, the two-headed dog who guarded the Cattle of Geryon; and the Chimera, who had three heads, that of a lion, a goat, and a snake. And, like these close relatives, Cerberus was, with only the rare iconographic exception, multi-headed.

In the earliest description of Cerberus, Hesiod's (c. 8th - 7th century BC), Cerberus has fifty heads, while Pindar (c. 522 - c. 443 BC) gave him one hundred heads. However, later writers almost universally give Cerberus three heads. An exception is the Latin poet Horace's Cerberus which has a single dog head, and one hundred snake heads. Perhaps trying to reconcile these competing traditions, Apollodorus's Cerberus has three dog heads and the heads of "all sorts of snakes" along his back, while the Byzantine poet John Tzetzes (who probably based his account on Apollodorus) gives Cerberus fifty heads, three of which were dog heads, the rest being the "heads of other beasts of all sorts".

In art Cerberus is most commonly depicted with two dog heads (visible), never more than three, but occasionally with only one. On one of the two earliest depictions (c. 590-580 BC), a Corinthian cup from Argos (see below), now lost, Cerberus is shown as a normal single-headed dog. The first appearance of a three-headed Cerberus occurs on a mid sixth century BC Laconian cup (see below).

Horace's many snake-headed Cerberus followed a long tradition of Cerberus being part snake. This is perhaps already implied as early as in Hesiod's Theogony, where Cerberus' mother is the half-snake Echidna, and his father the snake-headed Typhon. In art Cerberus is often shown as being part snake, for example the lost Corinthian cup shows snakes protruding from Cerberus' body, while the mid sixth-century BC Laconian cup gives Cerberus a snake for a tail. In the literary record, the first certain indication of Cerberus' serpentine nature comes from the rationalized account of Hecataeus of Miletus (fl. 500-494 BC), who makes Cerberus a large poisonous snake. Plato refers to Cerberus' composite nature, and Euphorion of Chalcis (3rd century BC) describes Cerberus as having multiple snake tails, and presumably in connection to his serpentine nature, associates Cerberus with the creation of the poisonous aconite plant. Virgil has snakes writhe around Cerberus' neck, Ovid's Cerberus has a venomous mouth, necks "vile with snakes", and "hair inwoven with the threatening snake", while Seneca gives Cerberus a mane consisting of snakes, and a single snake tail.

Cerberus was given various other traits. According to Euripides, Cerberus not only had three heads but three bodies, and according to Virgil he had multiple backs. Cerberus ate raw flesh (according to Hesiod), had eyes which flashed fire (according to Euphorion), a three-tongued mouth (according to Horace), and acute hearing (according to Seneca).

There are various versions of how Heracles accomplished Cerberus' capture. According to Apollodorus, Heracles asked Hades for Cerberus, and Hades told Heracles he would allow him to take Cerberus only if he "mastered him without the use of the weapons which he carried", and so, using his lion-skin as a shield, Heracles squeezed Cerberus around the head until he submitted.

Constellation

In the constellation Cerberus introduced by Johannes Hevelius in 1687, Cerberus is drawn as a three-headed snake, held in Hercules' hand (previously these stars had been depicted as a branch of the tree on which grew the Apples of the Hesperides).

Images for kids

Athena, Hermes and Heracles, leading a two-headed Cerberus out of the underworld, as Persephone looks on. Hydria (c. 550-500 BC) attributed to the Leagros Group (Louvre CA 2992).

One of the two earliest depictions of the capture of Cerberus (composed of the last five figures on the right) shows, from right to left: Cerberus, with a single dog head and snakes rising from his body, fleeing right, Hermes, with his characteristic hat (''petasos'') and caduceus, Heracles, with quiver on his back, stone in left hand, and bow in right, a goddess, standing in front of Hades' throne, facing Heracles, and Hades, with scepter, fleeing left. Drawing of a lost Corinthian cup (c. 590-580 BC) from Argos.

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Kerberos ( Latin Cerberus) is a creature in Greek mythology, like a hound ( dog) with three heads. It belongs to Hades, and it guards the gate of the Greek underworld. Cerberus is a Hellhound and is related to another mythical animal, the Chimera (part goat, part lion, part snake).

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Roman Medicine

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The Roman Empire began around 800 B.C.E. and existed for around 1,200 years. Medical knowledge and practice were advanced for the time, and the ancient Romans made progress in many areas.

The Romans encouraged the provision of public health facilities throughout the Empire. Their medicine developed from the needs of the battlefield and learnings from the Greeks.

Among the practices that the Romans adopted from the Greeks was the theory of the four humors, which remained popular in Europe until the 17th century.

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The temple of Aesculapius stood on the Tiber Island. The original is now long gone, but this Renaissance-era replica may bear some resemblance to it.

The Romans had their first introduction to Greek medicine when Archagathus of Sparta, a medical practitioner, arrived in Rome in 219 B.C.E.

Other scientists and doctors came from Greece, first as prisoners of war and later because they could earn more money in Rome. They continued researching Greek theories on disease and physical and mental disorders.

The Romans allowed them to carry on their research and adopted many of their ideas. However, unlike the Greeks, the Romans did not like the idea of dissecting corpses, so they did not discover much about human anatomy.

The spiritual beliefs surrounding medicine in Greece were also common in Rome.

By the 3rd century B.C.E., the Romans had adopted a religious healing system called the cult of Aesculapius, which took its name from a Greek god of healing. Initially, they built shrines, but these expanded in time to include spas and thermal baths with doctors in attendance.

When plagues occurred in Italy in 431 B.C.E, the Romans built a temple to the Greek god Apollo, who they believed had healing powers.

The Romans also took a sacred snake from the Greeks. It escaped but reappeared on the Tiber Island, where the Romans built a sanctuary for it. People would come to this place in search of healing.

On conquering Alexandria, the Romans found various libraries and universities that the Greeks had set up. They contained many learning centers and places for research as well as a wealth of documented knowledge of medicine.

It was by observing the health of their soldiers that Roman leaders began to realize the importance of public health.

On the battlefield

Romans on the battlefield used surgical tools to remove arrowheads and carry out other procedures.

Most Roman surgeons got their practical experience on the battlefield. They carried a tool kit containing arrow extractors, catheters, scalpels, and forceps. They used to sterilize their equipment in boiling water before using it.

The Romans performed surgical procedures using opium and scopolamine to relieve pain and acid vinegar to clean up wounds.

They did not have effective anesthetics for complicated surgical procedures, but it is unlikely that they operated deep inside the body.

Maternity care

The Romans also had midwives, whom they treated with great respect. Records of medical instruments include a birthing stool, which was a four-legged stool with arm and back supports and a crescent-shaped opening for the delivery of the baby.

Cesarean sections did sometimes take place. The women would not survive, but the baby might.

Hospitals

In purpose-built hospitals, people could rest and have a better chance of recovery. In the hospital setting, doctors were able to observe people's condition instead of depending on supernatural forces to perform miracles.

As Roman doctors did not have permission to dissect corpses, they were somewhat limited in their understanding of human anatomy.

However, soldiers and gladiators often had wounds, which could be severe, and doctors had to treat them. In this way, they learned more about the human body.

Claudius Galen, who moved from Greece to Rome in 162 C.E., became an expert on anatomy by dissecting animals and applying his knowledge to humans.

He was a popular lecturer and a well-known doctor, eventually becoming Emperor Marcus Aurelius' physician. He also wrote several medical books.

Galen also dissected some human corpses. He dissected a hanged criminal and some bodies that a flood had unearthed in a cemetery.

As a result, Galen displayed an excellent knowledge of bone structure. After cutting the spinal cord of a pig and observing it, he also realized that the brain sends signals to control the muscles.

The Romans made progress in their knowledge of what causes diseases and how to prevent them. Medical theories were sometimes very close to what we know today.

For example, Marcus Terentius Varro (116-27 B.C.E) believed that disease occurred due to minute creatures too small for the naked eye to see. We now know about bacteria and viruses, which we can only see using a microscope.

However, others believed that the stars caused illness.

Lucius Junius Moderatus Columella, who lived from 4 C.E. to around 70 C.E., was an agricultural writer. He thought that diseases came from swamp vapors.

Until two centuries ago, many of these beliefs were still popular.

Roman diagnosis and treatment consisted of a combination of Greek medicine and some local practices.

As the Greeks did before them, Roman physicians would carry out a thorough physical examination of the individual.

Progress in diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis in ancient Rome was slow and patchy. Doctors tended to develop their own theories, which led them to diverge in several different directions.

Herbal remedies

The Romans used a wide range of herbal medicines and other remedies, including:

Fennel: This plant was a standard treatment for nervous disorders because Romans believed that it calmed the nerves.

Unwashed wool: The Romans applied this to sores.

Elecampane: Also known as horseheal, people used this herb for digestive problems.

Egg yolk: Doctors prescribed egg yolk for dysentery.

Sage: This perennial had religious value. Its use was common among those who believed that the gods could heal them.

Garlic: Doctors advised that garlic was good for the heart.

Boiled liver: People with sore eyes used this.

Fenugreek: Doctors often prescribed this plant for lung diseases, especially pneumonia.

Cabbage: Cato recommended this for many purposes, including a hangover remedy and a cure for wounds and sores.

Silphium: People used this as a form of contraceptive and for fever, cough, indigestion, a sore throat, aches and pains, and warts. Historians are not sure exactly what silphium was, but they believe it to be an extinct plant of the genus Ferula, possibly a variety of giant fennel.

Willow: People used this as an antiseptic.

Pedanius Dioscorides lived around 40-90 C.E. He was a Greek botanist, pharmacologist, and physician who practiced in Rome when Nero was the ruler.

He became a famous Roman army doctor.

He wrote a 5-volume pharmacopeia called "De Materia Medica," which listed over 600 herbal cures. Doctors used "De Materia Medica" extensively for the next 1,500 years.

Many Roman doctors came from Greece. They firmly believed in achieving the right balance of the four humors and restoring the "natural heat" of people with medical conditions.

Galen said that opposites would often cure people. For a cold, he would give the person hot pepper. If they had a fever, he advised doctors to use cucumber.

Public health aims to keep the whole community in good health and prevent the spread of disease.

Today, among other things, it involves vaccination programs, promoting a healthful lifestyle and diet, building hospitals, and providing clean water for drinking and washing.

The Romans, unlike the Greeks and Egyptians, were firm believers in public health. They knew that hygiene was vital to prevent the spread of diseases.

Practical projects, such as creating a water supply, were very important to them. They built aqueducts to pipe water to cites. The sewage system in Rome was so advanced that nothing matching it was built again until the late 17th century.

One explanation of how the Romans were able to organize such major public projects is that they had a vast but centralized empire. The Emperor wielded his power across the Roman territory, and there was enough cheap labor and sufficient wealth to carry out these schemes.

Some of the wealthy even had underfloor heating in their homes.

The Romans also promoted facilities for personal hygiene by building public baths and washrooms. Their focus was on maintaining a motivated and healthy army, but their citizens also benefited.

Public health facilities

The Romans built baths, hospitals, and water supply channels throughout their Empire to encourage public health.

Examples of some Roman facilities include:

Public baths: There were nine public baths in Rome alone. Each one had pools at varying temperatures. Some also had gyms and massage rooms. Government inspectors were vigorous in their enforcement of proper hygiene standards.

Hospitals: Ancient Romans were responsible for setting up the first hospitals, which they initially designed to treat soldiers and veterans.

Water supply: The Romans were superb engineers, and they built several aqueducts throughout their Empire to supply people with water.

Planning: The Romans were careful to place army barracks well away from swamps. If marshes got in the way, they would drain them. They were aware of the link between swamps and mosquitoes and understood that these insects could transmit diseases to humans.

The Romans learned about medicine from the Greeks and Egyptians, and they made their own contribution to the discipline by focusing on public health and disease prevention.

However, they did not make significant progress in understanding how the human body works, and they were not yet aware of the association of germs with disease.

After the fall of the Roman Empire, medical knowledge in Europe did not make significant progress again until the Renaissance period.

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Ancient Roman medicine: Influences, practice, and learning

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The Roman Empire began around 800 B.C.E. and existed for around 1,200 years. Medical knowledge and practice were advanced for the time, and the ancient Romans made progress in many areas. The Romans encouraged the provision of public health facilities throughout the Empire. Their medicine developed from the needs of the battlefield and learnings from the Greeks.

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Hadrians Wall

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Hadrian's Wall was the north-west frontier of the Roman empire for nearly 300 years. It was built by the Roman army on the orders of the emperor Hadrian following his visit to Britain in AD 122. At 73 miles (80 Roman miles) long, it crossed northern Britain from Wallsend on the River Tyne in the east to Bowness-on-Solway in the west. The most famous of all the frontiers of the Roman empire, Hadrian's Wall was made a World Heritage Site in 1987.

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Hadrian's Wall was the north-west frontier of the Roman empire for nearly 300 years. It was built by the Roman army on the orders of the emperor Hadrian following his visit to Britain in AD 122. At 73 miles (80 Roman miles) long, it crossed northern Britain from Wallsend on the River Tyne in the east to Bowness-on-Solway in the west.

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Welcome to the Cambridge School Classics Project (North America)!

From our base in Cambridge, UK, we offer support for Latin learners and teachers around the world. This site is for our users in North America and brings together materials for both current editions of the Cambridge Latin Course, free digital versions of the Cambridge Latin Anthology, mythology and storytelling resources as part of our Classics Tales project. You can also find information about our distance learning services and a shop with information on where to buy our products.
For additional teacher support visit the North American Cambridge Classics Project site.

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From our base in Cambridge, UK, we offer support for Latin learners and teachers around the world. This site is for our users in North America and brings together materials for both current editions of the Cambridge Latin Course, free digital versions of the Cambridge Latin Anthology, mythology and storytelling resources as part of our Classics Tales project.

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A dictator was a magistrate of the Roman Republic, entrusted with the full authority of the state to deal with a military emergency or to undertake a specific duty. All other magistrates were subordinate to his , and the right of the plebeian tribunes to veto his actions or of the people to appeal from them was extremely limited.

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Julius Caesar

Gaius Julius Caesar, known as Julius Caesar, was a military and political leader in the Roman Republic. He was instrumental in ending the Roman Republic.

He became the dictator-for-life after defeating his enemies. Julius Caesar was liked by the people or plebeians but not liked by the wealthy known as patricians in ancient Rome.

Early years

Gaius Julius Caesar was born around 100 B.C.E. in the city of Rome. His father was also named Gaius Julius Caesar. He was the Praetor of the Asia Province. His mother, Aurelia Cotta, was from an aristocratic family.

The family could trace their roots to the founding of Rome and is considered to be part of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty.

He grew up in a modestly wealthy household, but his family was not rich. When Julius Caesar was a child, he learned how to read and write in Latin. He studied Roman law, history, and learned to be an orator.

At the age of 16 years old, his father passed away. This made Julius Caesar responsible for providing for his mother and sister, Julia. He thought about joining the priesthood to support his family.

But he needed to be married to a patrician woman. He was in love with a plebeian woman at the time. Caesar decided to break off the marriage. Instead, he married a patrician woman named Cornelia. After his marriage, Caesar became the High Priest of Jupiter.

Fleeing from Sulla

After becoming the High Priest of Jupiter, Caesar's family was targeted by Sulla, who had become dictator of Rome. Sulla began to purge families that did not fall in line with his politics.

Sulla held to the ideology of supporting patrician values that favored the rich in Rome. Julius Caesar was raised to support more rights for plebeians and the lower class. Soon Sulla was looking for Julius Caesar. Julius Caesar then fled Rome.

Although he was later able to return, Julius Caesar lost his title as High Priest of Jupiter, and his wealthy wife's estate was taken from them.

With no way to support his family, Julius Caesar joined the military. He proved to be a good soldier. Julius Caesar was awarded many medals for saving lives in battle. He soon found himself being promoted through the ranks. He was then chosen to secure numerous ships from Bithynia.

Julius Caesar returned to Rome after the death of Sulla. Once in Rome, he entered politics. He was a good orator and rose through the political ranks quickly. Julius Caesar became a tribune and then elected quaestor in 69 B.C.E.

He also made powerful friends while pursuing new positions in the government. His friends included Pompey the Great and a wealthy patrician named Marcus Licinius Crassus.

Julius Caesar was appointed the governor of Spain or Hispania. He commanded four Roman legions in Hispania and was successful in defeating rebellions. After his conquest of Hispania, he returned to Rome.

Becoming Consul of Rome

In 60 B.C.E. Julius Caesar ran for consul and won. Consul was the highest position in the Roman Republic government. In the Roman Republic, there were two consuls elected each year to serve one-year terms.

His relationships with Pompey the Great and Crassus flourished during his consul. Julius Caesar helped his daughter Julia marry Pompey to further their family ties. The three men formed the First Triumvirate of Rome. Together the three men ruled Rome.

The First Triumvirate

Through an agreement with Pompey and Crassus, Julius Caesar became the governor of Gaul. He was instrumental in fighting against the Germanic tribes that wanted to invade Gaul.

After defeating the Germanic tribe's Roman territory now reached the North Sea. Now Julius Caesar set his sights on Britannia in 55 B.C.E. and was able to conquer the island.

Politics in Rome

During his absence in Rome, the political situation became bad. A civil war was breaking out. Crassus had been killed in 54 B.C.E. in a battle against the Parthians. The same year Julia, his daughter, died in childbirth.Advertisement

Pompey used these circumstances to take over total control of Rome as the sole military leader. These actions fractured the First Triumvirate. In 50 B.C.E., Pompey ordered Julius Caesar to disband his Roman legions.

Julius Caesar decided not to return to Rome. Instead, he took his Roman legions and crossed the Rubicon River. Julius Caesar then marched on Rome in 49 B.C.E., but Pompey had already fled to Spain.

Caesar followed defeated Pompey's army in Spain. For the next 18 months, Pompey fought against Julius Caesar's Roman legions. Eventually Pompey traveled to Egypt for safety. But Pompey was killed by the Egyptian Ptolemy VIII, who presented Pompey's head to Julius Caesar upon his arrival.

This did not sit well with Julius Caesar, and he formed an alliance with Queen Cleopatra. His Roman legions then battled the Egyptian army for more than six months. Julius Caesar and Cleopatra defeated the Egyptian army in the Spring of 47 B.C.E. He left Cleopatra as queen and took his army through Asia Minor, defeating any enemies that were aligned with Pompey.

Dictator for life

In 46 B.C.E. Julius Caesar returned triumphantly to Rome. He was immediately made Dictator-for-life by the Roman Senate. While he was dictator-for-life, Julius Caesar installed Senators that were loyal to him.

This made passaging laws easier. He was able to change the land reform laws to favor the poor. He constructed numerous buildings, temples, and installed the Julian calendar, which we use today.

Ides of March

On the 15 th of March, 44 B.C.E. Julius Caesar was assassinated on the steps of the Roman Senate. The two men responsible were named Cassius and Brutus.

They were hired by patrician senators that feared Julius Caesar had favored the common people too much. The day of his killing is known as the Ides of March.

Future Succession

While in Egypt, Julius Caesar had an affair with Cleopatra producing a child named Caesarion. She had hoped that Caesarion would one day be named dictator-for-life.

But Julius Caesar adopted his grandnephew named Octavian. Two decades later, Octavian became the first Roman Emperor of the Roman Empire.

Important facts about Julius Caesar

Gaius Julius Caesar was born in 100 B.C.E. to an aristocrat family. They were not considered wealthy, but they were well off financially. He learned how to read and write as a child. He studied Roman law and history. He liked to write too.

His father died when he was 16 years old. Julius Caesar then became the High Priest of Jupiter to support the family.

When the treason trials by Sulla began, Julius Caesar fled Rome. He then joined the Roman army. He rose quickly through the ranks.

His first political position was a tribune. Then he became a quaestor for Hispania in 69 B.C.E.

Julius Caesar made powerful friends with Marcus Crassus and Pompey the Great. They formed the First Triumvirate when Caesar was elected consul in 60 B.C.E.

After being a consul, he became governor of Gaul. Civil war broke out in Rome after Crassus died in battle, and Pompey took control of Rome. In 49 B.C.E. Julius Caesar marched on Rome.

He defeated Pompey's army in Egypt. He placed Cleopatra in charge of Egypt. They had a child together named Caesarion. He also adopted Octavian, his grandnephew. Octavian would become the first Roman Emperor of the Roman Empire two decades later.

Julius Caesar became dictator-for-life in 46 B.C.E. He installed the Julian calendar during his reign. He also reformed land policy to favor the common people.

He was assassinated on the 15thof March in 44 B.C.E. The day is known as the Ides of March.

Questions

What family dynasty was Julius Caesar associated with?
Julio-Claudian Dynasty

Besides Julius Caesar, which two other people formed the First Triumvirate?
Pompey the Great and Marcus Crassus

Where did Julius Caesar finally defeat Pompey the Great?
Egypt

What is the name of the calendar Julius Caesar installed in Rome?
Julian calendar

What is the name of the day that Julius Caesar was assassinated on?
Ides of March

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Gaius Julius Caesar, known as Julius Caesar, was a military and political leader in the Roman Republic. He was instrumental in ending the Roman Republic. He became the dictator-for-life after defeating his enemies. Julius Caesar was liked by the people or plebeians but not liked by the wealthy known as patricians in ancient Rome.

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The story of Boudicca and why there is a statue of her outside Parliament in London. Find out more with Bitesize KS1 History.

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Cambridge Latin Book 2 (cambridgescp.com)

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Welcome to the Cambridge School Classics Project (North America)!

From our base in Cambridge, UK, we offer support for Latin learners and teachers around the world. This site is for our users in North America and brings together materials for both current editions of the Cambridge Latin Course, free digital versions of the Cambridge Latin Anthology, mythology and storytelling resources as part of our Classics Tales project. You can also find information about our distance learning services and a shop with information on where to buy our products.
For additional teacher support visit the North American Cambridge Classics Project site.

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From our base in Cambridge, UK, we offer support for Latin learners and teachers around the world. This site is for our users in North America and brings together materials for both current editions of the Cambridge Latin Course, free digital versions of the Cambridge Latin Anthology, mythology and storytelling resources as part of our Classics Tales project.

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Horrible Histories  Roman = CIRCUS MAXIMUS - Scorpus Chariot Racer

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BEN-HUR (2016) - Chariot Race 360° Video - Paramount Pictures

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Arena Fighter Rotten Romans | HH Video Games | Horrible Histories

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Information about the daily life of women in the ancient Roman empire

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Welcome to the Cambridge School Classics Project (North America)!

From our base in Cambridge, UK, we offer support for Latin learners and teachers around the world. This site is for our users in North America and brings together materials for both current editions of the Cambridge Latin Course, free digital versions of the Cambridge Latin Anthology, mythology and storytelling resources as part of our Classics Tales project. You can also find information about our distance learning services and a shop with information on where to buy our products.
For additional teacher support visit the North American Cambridge Classics Project site.

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From our base in Cambridge, UK, we offer support for Latin learners and teachers around the world. This site is for our users in North America and brings together materials for both current editions of the Cambridge Latin Course, free digital versions of the Cambridge Latin Anthology, mythology and storytelling resources as part of our Classics Tales project.

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Check on each object - some non-Roman items may have popped in!

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Search Results | V&A Explore the Collections

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A Brief Introduction to Ancient Roman Jewelry

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Apart from gold and other precious metals, Romans used glass to make their jewelry. Their jewelry gives us an insight into the culture of ancient Rome.

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Watch from 6min45 onwards!  Personal Adornment in Roman Britain: Romano-British Fibulae — Alex Sorgo

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Churchill College, University of Cambridge

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Personal Adornment in Roman Britain: Romano-British Fibulae — Alex Sorgo

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Boudicca & the Roman Invasion | The Story of Britain | BBC Teach

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Cambridge Latin Book 1 (cambridgescp.com)

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Welcome to the Cambridge School Classics Project (North America)!

From our base in Cambridge, UK, we offer support for Latin learners and teachers around the world. This site is for our users in North America and brings together materials for both current editions of the Cambridge Latin Course, free digital versions of the Cambridge Latin Anthology, mythology and storytelling resources as part of our Classics Tales project. You can also find information about our distance learning services and a shop with information on where to buy our products.
For additional teacher support visit the North American Cambridge Classics Project site.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
From our base in Cambridge, UK, we offer support for Latin learners and teachers around the world. This site is for our users in North America and brings together materials for both current editions of the Cambridge Latin Course, free digital versions of the Cambridge Latin Anthology, mythology and storytelling resources as part of our Classics Tales project.

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Cambridge Latin Book 1 (cambridgescp.com)

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From our base in Cambridge, UK, we offer support for Latin learners and teachers around the world. This site is for our users in North America and brings together materials for both current editions of the Cambridge Latin Course, free digital versions of the Cambridge Latin Anthology, mythology and…

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3B5pGiWptb4&ab_channel=HistoryVideos100

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3X7D8yz6QFg

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The Roman Empire and its effect on Britain | Primary History - Roman Voices

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nN_x9o8MV1o

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Life in Roman Britain | The Story of Britain | BBC Teach

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLDlUGXJMFY

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Garum, Rome's Favorite Condiment (Ancient Cooking)

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Romulus, Remus and wolf

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Why do you think the story of Romulus and Remus was developed by the early Romans? Which parts of the story do you think might refer to real events and which do you think are exaggerated?

The site of a settlement on a hill would perhaps have been an obvious choice for a Bronze Age community wishing to overlook a navigable river that had an outlook towards the sea and commanding views of land-based trading routes. The image of strength and independence of the story of the young boys reared in the wild might have flattered the early settlers and perhaps they wanted to send a message out to their neighbours that there was something different about their heritage. Resilient and rugged, determined and instinctive, the early settlers of Rome could well have been creating their own propaganda to carve out a successful future.

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The origins of Rome - The Roman Empire - KS3 History Revision - BBC Bitesize

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Why do you think the story of Romulus and Remus was developed by the early Romans? Which parts of the story do you think might refer to real events and which do you think are exaggerated?

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Stories mentioning animals

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Aesop's Fables

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40 of Aesop's best-known fables are brought to life in adaptations for children aged 5 to 9. Each story is five minutes long and read by an all-star cast including Brenda Blethyn, the late Richard Briers, Lindsay Duncan, Richard E Grant, Jane Horrocks, Jonathan Pryce and Alison Steadman.

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40 of Aesop's best-known fables are brought to life in adaptations for children aged 5 to 9. Each story is five minutes long and read by an all-star cast including Brenda Blethyn, the late Richard Briers, Lindsay Duncan, Richard E Grant, Jane Horrocks, Jonathan Pryce and Alison Steadman.

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In 27BC, Augustus established the Roman Empire, which was from then on ruled by an absolute Emperor though there were many rebellions and plots.

We're going to look at five aspects of the Roman Empire - government, conflict, migration, economy and trade, and everyday life:

It is difficult to know much about politics in the Roman Empire because little survives from the time. Most of what we know about the Roman emperors comes from Suetonius' Lives of the Caesars (AD119). Not only was this many years after the events, but Suetonius hated the emperors for destroying the Senate , and he filled his books with the most disgusting rumours. Trying to construct a history from Suetonius is like trying to write a history of modern times using only celebrity gossip. How far can we trust his account of Rome?

Britain was conquered by Emperor Claudius in AD43, despite fierce resistance by the chieftain Caratacus and a rebellion by Boudicca (AD60). However, the Romans were not able to conquer Scotland - their Ninth Legion may have been destroyed there and in the 120s they pulled back behind Hadrian's Wall.

The Roman Empire grew until it stretched from Portugal to Persia (today's Iran), and from Scotland to the Sahara desert. It was at its biggest under the Emperor Trajan in AD101, when it may have had 100 million inhabitants.

Under the 'Pax Romana', which means 'Peace of Rome', merchants traded across the whole known world . Its economy included lead mining, high-tech watermills and reapers, millions of enslaved people and 'latifundia' (huge agricultural estates). As a result, Rome was incredibly wealthy, with aqueducts, concrete buildings, huge sewers, and lavish baths, and a lifestyle which included decadent meals for the rich, and 'bread and circuses' to keep the poor happy.

After a crisis in the third century AD, Rome slowly declined, and the Western Empire finally collapsed in AD476.

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Summary of the Roman Empire - The Roman Empire - KS3 History Revision - BBC Bitesize

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In 27BC, Augustus established the Roman Empire, which was from then on ruled by an absolute Emperor though there were many rebellions and plots. We're going to look at five aspects of the Roman Empire - government, conflict, migration, economy and trade, and everyday life: It is difficult to know much about politics in the Roman Empire because little survives from the time.

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Food and the Roman Kitchen

In the museum there is a reconstruction of a Romano-British kitchen as it may have looked in about 200 A.D. in the museum. Food was cooked over a charcoal fire on a raised stone hearth. The cooking pots stood on iron tripods or grid-irons.

An amphora was a double-handed vessel used for transporting and storing wine and oil. In the kitchen it would have rested in a pit on the earthen floor. Wine and oil would have been poured from amphorae into jugs for more convenient handling at the table. On the table are utensils and pots used in the preparation and serving of food, for example, a platter, bowls and mortaria. A mortarium was a dish with a pouring lip and a roughened inside surface for grinding and crushing food. Most of our evidence for pottery comes from small pieces found during archaeological digs but occasionally whole pots are found including a very large amphora and two beautifully preserved Nene valley ware vessels displaying hunting scenes.

A quern stone was used for grinding corn into flour. Most households would have made their own bread in small clay ovens; others could buy loaves from the local bakery. Honey was used as a sweetener and herbs were used a lot for seasoning.

Favourite Roman foods were fattened snails, dormice, pigeons, shellfish and game. For a typical Roman family, breakfast was a light meal of bread and fruit. The mid-day meal (prandium) was a cold snack or a light dish of fish, eggs and vegetables. Dinner was the main and most elaborate meal consisting of several courses including a sweet course. Vegetables were eaten a lot and were often served as a stew. Oysters were very popular and special spoons were made with pointed handles for eating them. There are several oyster spoons on display in the museum galleries.

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In the museum there is a reconstruction of a Romano-British kitchen as it may have looked in about 200 A.D. in the museum. Food was cooked over a charcoal fire on a raised stone hearth. The cooking pots stood on iron tripods or grid-irons.

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Britain was part of the Roman Empire for over three and a half centuries. From the invasion under the emperor Claudius in AD 43 until rule from Rome ended in the early 5th century, the province of Britannia was part of a political union that covered most of Europe.

Use the links below to discover the impact and legacy of the Roman era on the landscape, buildings, life and culture of Britain. You can also follow links to the many Roman sites that English Heritages cares for - from villas and towns to the forts along Hadrian's Wall, the empire's north-western frontier.

Introduction to Roman Britain

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Britain was part of the Roman Empire for about four centuries. From the invasion under the emperor Claudius in AD 43 until rule from Rome ended in the early 5th century, Britain was an integral part of a political union that covered most of Europe.

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Creatures which are part-animal

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10 Creatures From Greek Mythology – World History et cetera

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The mythology of the ancient Greeks is positively packed with stories involving weird and wonderful creatures. Represented on pottery, in sculpture, and in literary tradition, they typically create havoc with the best laid plans of the Greek heroes but they could also prove helpful in certain situat…

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Jewellery

"There is nothing that a woman will not permit herself to do, nothing that she deems shameful, when she encircles her neck with green emeralds and fastens huge pearls to her elongated ears..."Juvenal Satires VI 457

Many rich Roman women owned expensive jewellery. They wore precious stones such as opals, emeralds, diamonds, topaz and pearls set as earrings, bracelets, rings, brooches, necklaces and diadems. Anklets were also sported - though not by respectable matrons! Amongst the wealthy in a busy provincial town like Cirencester there must have been those who could afford to wear such treasures. The numbers of less-expensive pieces found on this and other Roman sites suggest that most people were accustomed to wear jewellery of some kind.

Information about jewellery is gathered from inscriptions and statues as well as excavated material. We also have several references to jewellery in contemporary literature - usually by male satirists complaining about women's extravagance in this respect. Most precious jewels were imported to Italy from the East at terrific cost and Pliny, amongst others, warned that this was becoming a national economic peril. The Romans prized pearls very highly and they hoped that Britain would become a good supplier.

Women loved earrings and there are references stating how their ears became distorted as a result. Pliny says that women spent more on their ears than on any other part of their bodies and continued:

"Women glory in hanging pearls on their fingers and using two or more for a single car-ring ... as if they enjoyed the sound and mere rattling together of the pearls; nowadays oven more people covet them - it is a common saying that a pearl is as good as a lackey for a lady when she walks abroad"

Bracelets (Armillae)

Bracelets of bronze, bone and jet are frequently found. These vary in size and design - some plain, some decorated, some of twisted metal. The clasps vary too. Some are bent together at the edges but not fastened, some are riveted, some have a hook and loop and some have quite sophisticated hinges.

Bracelets were also made of shale, a soft material which was quarried and used for jewellery and drinking vessels during the Iron Age. The Romans continued to exploit this material and used it for carving furniture and making jewellery. Children and babies also wore bangles. Bracelets were often buried with the dead and are therefore found as grave goods.

Rings

Rings occur frequently on Roman sites and there are many designs and types. Rings were worn by men, women and children. They were made of silver, gold, bronze, iron and jet and sometimes had precious stones and intaglios set in them. Some are plain bands but others have more intricate designs.

Necklaces

Torques were worn in Britain before the Roman conquest and from epigraphic evidence we know that these continued to be worn by Romans of importance. Chain and bead necklaces were more commonly sported and bead necklaces in particular seem to have been very popular. Occasionally a string of beads included a small charm or amulet to guard the wearer against evil. Heads of glass, coral, shell, jet, ivory and amber are found in all shapes and sizes. The most typical Roman bead was the melon bead. These were made of glass, covered with a turquoise glaze and ridged.

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Small finds comprising personal ornament, often of copper alloy or precious metals, have been found at sites in Cirencester and across the Cotswolds.

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From our base in Cambridge, UK, we offer support for Latin learners and teachers around the world. This site is for our users in North America and brings together materials for both current editions of the Cambridge Latin Course, free digital versions of the Cambridge Latin Anthology, mythology and…

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CLC Book 2

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You can watch this video