Roman Wales: Caerwent

Caerleon may have a reputation for the best Roman ruins in Wales but, to be honest, I preferred Caerwent, or, as the Romans called it, Venta. It may not have a museum full of interesting finds but I liked the fact that it had less modern buildings built on top of it so you could walk around it more freely, and perhaps it was also the beautiful setting and the fact that the sun had finally come out.

As my friend Jill left me her guide book to read, I’ve copied from that an illustration of the layout and I will number my photos and comments according to the numbers on the map. Only the areas shaded brown can be seen as ruins today – the other structures have been worked out from excavations and ground-penetrating radar but are not visible above ground. I didn’t take photos of everything – I was too busy just enjoying – and, as you’ll see, I was also a little obsessed with the walls.

I Courtyard House

Though my photo shows only one room of this house – one of two that had under-floor heating – this was a large and very impressive house which had been constructed in the early fourth century. It was built around two courtyards and, as well as having hypocaust heating in at least two large rooms, it also had mosaics on the floors, tessellated pavements and brightly painted walls (plaster remains were found during excavations).

VII Pound Lane

These are the remains of shops and a blacksmith’s workshop, which all faced on to the main street (in the background of my photo), though even these buildings were altered many times from their first incarnation in the late first century AD to their abandonment in the mid fourth century. Nearest the camera and at the rear of the shops was a large fourth-century house set around a courtyard (the green lawn, centre left). The family who lived here must have been wealthy as excavations have revealed thirteen rooms, a fine mosaic pavement, and a hypocaust heating system.

IX The temple

The temple complex, near the centre of town, was built around 330AD and has been the subject of two major excavations, the first in 1908 and the most recent between 1984 and 1991, though no evidence has yet been found to identify which god was worshipped here.

Unfortunately, I have no photos of one of the most impressive ruins of all, the Forum-Basilica, the civic hall and market place around which life in Caerwent revolved. Though parts of it have subsequently been built on, the original basilica was immense, measuring 260 feet (80m) by 182 feet (56m). Only the stubs of walls remain so the grandeur of the buildings themselves cannot easily by imagined by the casual visitor but the best thing about this area was that you can actually walk where the Romans walked, on the paved stones of the piazza.

The walls

Fortunately, large parts of Caerwent’s Roman walls still remain so you can walk alongside them and be impressed by their size, and along the tops of them and imagine how it might have been to be a Roman centurion guarding those walls so many centuries ago.

This is the west wall, looking south from where the west gatehouse would have been. You can get an idea of the height of the wall from the relative size of the man who was out walking his dog. The wall stands around 10 feet (3m) tall on average, though in some places it is still over 17 feet (5m), and it was about 10 feet (3m) thick at the base.

To quote from the guide book:

The builders began by laying rows, front and back, of facing stones of roughly hammer-dressed limestone blocks. Then the core was filled with pieces of limestone bedded roughly on edge, followed by a slurry of lime mortar; the whole structure was raised course by course. This method of construction resulted in the herringbone pattern of the core so clearly visible here [photo above].

The south wall also stands up to 17 feet (5m) tall in places but it has an additional feature: six hollow towers were added to strengthen the defences on this side. Though most of these towers had their stones robbed many years ago for local building construction, one is still relatively intact and, from close examination of its construction, archaeologists have determined that it had two internal levels as well as the top level – all wooden platforms.

This view looks west along the length of the south wall. The earth mound on the right is all that remains of a motte that was built by Norman invaders in the south-east corner of the town in the late eleventh century.

We walked along the east wall as far as the central gate and then back through the centre of Caerwent to the carpark. It had been a fabulous walk around, though we had both been itching throughout to find a handy trowel and have a bit of a dig at some of the intriguing lumps and bumps that can be seen in every piece of vacant land. There is so much of Caerwent still waiting to be discovered!

England: Pevensey, East Sussex

My last stop in the UK (except for a couple of days in London before I left) was visiting my friend Jill in East Sussex, another part of the country I hadn’t been to before, so we spent our days out exploring the beautiful countryside in that neck of the woods.

Pevensey is a small settlement about one mile inland from Pevensey Bay – it was once on the edge of a tidal lagoon and marshes but the shoreline has moved rather a lot over the centuries. The bay was the first landing point for William the Conqueror when he invaded England in 1066 but the Romans had invaded this place long before Willie pulled his boat ashore.

The Roman fort – and the Norman castle built inside its walls – was the main reason we visited Pevensey. Dating from around 290AD and in constant use until the Romans withdrew from Britain around 410AD, the Roman fort of Anderita was one of a chain of ten built along the southern British coastline to protect against Saxon pirate raids.

Built to the shape of the peninsula jutting into the lagoon, the walls are not as rectangular as most Roman forts, but they are still in remarkably good condition. The main entrance, through a western gateway flanked by tall towers, is particularly imposing.

The Roman walls

Aerial view, taken from one of the signboards

Inside these protective walls, the Normans built their own defences – a large castle which has a long and colourful history of warfare and defence. Four times it was besieged and survived. In 1088 and 1147, starvation rather than damage to the castle forced the defenders to surrender, in 1264-5 supporters of Henry III held out against the forces of Simon de Montfort, and in 1399 those loyal to Henry Bolingbroke held out against the supporters of Richard II.

From the top of the castle walls looking back to the Roman fort walls

The Norman Castle

Although largely obsolete by the 16th century, the Elizabethans installed light artillery defences at the castle during the threat from the Spanish Armada in 1588. And, as recently as 1940, pill boxes were concealed in the walls to defend the south coast against potential invasion by German troops, and both British and Canadian troops were stationed in the castle.

On the right is the postern gate, the rear entrance to the castle leading down to the harbour

The castle is well sign-boarded and has a small exhibition room, with clear well-illustrated explanations of the castle’s construction and history. Given the castle’s violent past, it’s no surprise to see a large cannon in the inner bailey – well, a late-16th-century demi-culverin gun, to be more precise  – and a large stack of trebuchets, the big round stones used in slingshot machines. The stone foundations of the wooden chapel are also easy to see, and the font still sits in place in what would have been the nave.

After exploring the castle, up the towers and down the dungeon, we circled the outside of the Roman fort and wandered around the streets on either side. To the east is the tiny village of Pevensey, and to the right is Westham (the HAMlet WEST of the castle, hence the name). Each has its own church and historic buildings. The Anglican Church of St Nicholas in Pevensey dates from the early 13th century and is a splendid example of early English Gothic architecture, with fine medieval stained glass windows above the High Altar. I was particularly taken with the tall Victorian spiral staircase in the bell tower. In Westham, St Mary’s Church may well be the first Norman church in England, with the earliest parts of its construction dating from the late 11th century.

Church of St Nicholas

St Mary's Church

As well as the church, Pevensey also boasts The Courthouse, the smallest town hall in England, many ancient domestic buildings and The Old Mint House. As the name implies, coins were once minted in this 650-year-old 28-room building but it has a long and colourful history which also includes the visits of kings and tales of hauntings. The Smugglers Inn, built in 1527, is also supposed to be visited by a young lady ghost.

The Old Mint House

Westham also has its share of historic buildings, with both the timber-framed Oak House and the Old Dial House dating from 1500 and both are Grade II listed. Several properties in both of these towns were for sale, so if you fancy a small slice of historic England for yourself – and you have plenty of money – now’s your chance.

Left, the Oak House and, right, Smugglers Inn