Hadrian's Wall Page 3

  The Vindolanda writing tablets are one of the most exciting discoveries from the area of Hadrian’s Wall. Written in ink on thin sheets of wood, an alternative to expensive papyrus, they consist of accounts, private letters, and military records. They are written in Latin cursive script, so many of the letters look different than the familiar style of inscriptions. So far, all of the tablets date to the decades just before Hadrian’s Wall, but new tablets continue to be found; a group of twenty-five turned up in excavations in 2017. This Vindolanda tablet is one of the most famous, sent by Claudia Severa to her friend Sulpicia Lepidina, inviting her to her birthday party. The women were the wives of prefects who commanded auxiliary units. After the main text, probably written by a scribe, another hand added the words ‘I shall expect you, sister. Farewell sister, my dearest soul, as I hope to prosper and hail.’ These were surely written by Claudia Severa herself, making them the earliest surviving handwriting by a woman in Britain, and probably in all of Europe.

  The peoples of the north never formed a permanent professional army in any way resembling the Roman army. Few men were full-time warriors in the sense that fighting and training to fight was their main occupation in life—such men would have been the chieftains and their armed followers. As was the case among other Iron Age peoples in Gaul and elsewhere, it is probable that a leader’s power was displayed by the number of warriors he kept in his household. The chiefs and such household warriors were likely to have the best equipment. These were men who rode in chariots, possessed good swords and perhaps mail armour or a helmet, and had the opportunity to train for war. In a small raid, the bulk or all of a force might consist of such well-equipped and highly motivated warriors, but in any larger army, these would be a small minority among the mass of ordinary tribesmen. Less well equipped, the latter might be brave and have some familiarity with weapons, especially if violence and theft between and within tribes were common. However, they would not be disciplined or used to obeying the orders of their leaders. As a general rule, the larger the tribal army was, the more clumsily it moved and manoeuvred, giving the Romans even more of an advantage in larger-scale warfare.5

  Raiding to seize cattle or captives, and perhaps also trophies as proof of manhood and prowess, was the most common form of military activity in the ancient world, and it is unlikely that northern Britain was an exception. The willingness and ability to plunder your neighbours, or their open submission to avoid such attacks, demonstrated to the wider world the strength of a leader or people. Caesar tells us of Germanic tribes that kept a depopulated strip of land around their borders as a warning to outsiders. This lower-level violence was probably the most common problem faced by the Roman army, whether it was directed against the Romans or their allies. The response over much of the empire was to assert dominance by proving that the empire and its army had a far greater capacity for violence than its enemies. The much-vaunted Roman peace was based on Roman victory and strength, and not the product of peaceful coexistence. Although such methods might intimidate, they also left a bitter legacy of hatred among the survivors of displays of Roman might, sowing the seeds for future conflict.

  Two

  HADRIAN: THE MAN, THE EMPEROR, AND THE GRAND DESIGN

  IN AUGUST 117, THE AILING Trajan died in Cilicia (modern southern Turkey). He was on his way back to Rome, his great eastern adventure having turned sour amid rebellions in the newly conquered territory and a simultaneous revolt of the Jewish population in Egypt, Cyprus, and Cyrenaica. Hadrian was the son of the emperor’s cousin, who, like him, was also from Italica in Spain. His Latin was tinged with a provincial accent, but from his youth he had adored all things Greek, earning himself the nickname Graeculus, or ‘little Greek’, and sported a neater version of a philosopher’s beard. He was forty-one, a clever man, albeit far too keen to show off his cleverness, and the closest male relative of the childless emperor. Rumour said that he had seduced the wives of other senators so that he could learn about their plans and so ease his rise to favour at the imperial court, but it was clear that the greatest passions in his life revolved around teenage boys.

  Map of Hadrian’s Wall and the supporting bases to the north and south of it. Although the Wall spans the narrowest part of the country, it is notable that in the west it extends for some way along the southern shores of the Solway Firth. This narrow, tidal stretch of water was clearly not felt to be a sufficiently strong obstacle in itself. Along the Cumbrian coast to the west and south, the system was extended by a line of towers, fortlets, and forts without the curtain wall. Although some of these installations were subsequently abandoned, a significant number of forts remained, suggesting that a threat was thought still to be real. No similar installations were built behind the eastern flank of the Wall, which was less easy to access by sea.

  Trajan had shown Hadrian some favour, but he stopped a good way short of marking him out as his heir. The emperor’s widow claimed that on his deathbed, her husband had at long last adopted Hadrian and named him as his successor. Not everyone was convinced, and the rapid execution of four prominent senators back in Rome fuelled suspicion, even though it deterred any open opposition. Hadrian was never truly popular with the Senate from then on, even though he was far from being a tyrant. Tact was not his strong point, and he lacked the ability to win affection from the nobility. For years the emperor openly paraded his lover, the Bithynian youth Antinous, declaring the lad to be a god after he drowned in the Nile in somewhat mysterious circumstances. Affairs of this sort were supposed to be discreet, not exuberantly public, and his only added to the secret resentment felt by most aristocrats. Hadrian does not appear to have cared much about the feelings of others. He spent lavishly on a major remodelling of Athens but crowned his achievement with an arch bearing the inscription ‘This is the city of Hadrian, not of Theseus’ (the city’s mythical founder).

  Insecure, given the doubts over his right to rule and his unpopularity, Hadrian had no desire to spend years regaining and securing territory in the east, and thus most of Trajan’s recent conquests were abandoned. There were to be no wars of expansion under Hadrian, but it was vital to retain the loyalty of the army and to demonstrate Rome’s continued military dominance, so he spent much of his reign touring the provinces and visiting the legions, watching them at drill, praising and rewarding them. No emperor since Augustus had travelled as much as Hadrian would during his reign, visiting almost every part of the empire. Such travel could be arduous, and he was praised for his endurance as well as the personal example he set, leading soldiers on route marches and eating the same rations issued to them. Hadrian had a mind for detail, and although he chose not to lead his soldiers in war, he was keen to show a deep interest in their lives, imposing strict discipline but moderating it with fair treatment and generous rewards for talented officers and men.1

  In Britain, Hadrian was faced with an outbreak of warfare, possibly inherited from his predecessor. An experienced governor from the Danube frontier was sent to take charge and achieved victory within a few years. In 122, another proven commander, Aulus Platorius Nepos, took over, arriving by July 17—one of those rare precise dates, in this case derived from a document issued to a discharged soldier. At some point during the same year, Hadrian went to Britain in person, staying for a few months. Around the same time, the provincial garrison was increased in size by the addition of a third legion, VI Victrix.

  Hadrian’s personal involvement in the decision to construct the Wall and in its design is clear. It is generally assumed that he gave the order after visiting the area, so that the surveying and construction began no earlier than 122. However, we know little about Roman planning methods and imperial decision making and cannot be sure that the project was not devised—and perhaps even begun—earlier than this, so that the visiting emperor could come and inspect progress. Timber used to construct a stockade along a section of the frontier in Germany was felled two years before Hadrian visited the region in 121, so it is possible there wa
s a similar advance order in Britain.

  The Rudge Cup is one of several bronze bowls which seem to have been made as mementoes of Hadrian’s Wall for soldiers or travellers to keep. It has the names of several of the Wall forts running around the top. In the centre are the letters BANNA, the Roman name for Birdoswald. Around the bottom is a heavily stylised picture of the Wall itself, with higher features at regular intervals. The latter may be turrets or perhaps are supposed to represent forts. They may have crenellations on top, something probable for turrets, milecastle towers, and forts.

  The initial design for Hadrian’s Wall was grand, if not as grand as it would become, and this is an indication of the emperor’s personal involvement. Hadrian was obsessed with architecture and loved designing great buildings, a passion reflected in his rebuilding of the Pantheon in Rome, with its spectacular domed roof, and in his sprawling villa complex at Tivoli. The Wall was more functional, but it made up for this in sheer size.

  The western section for thirty-one Roman miles (c. forty-six km) from Bowness-on-Solway was built of turf, timber, and earth, with a rampart some twenty feet (six m) wide at its base. The line was then continued by a stone wall for forty-nine Roman miles (c. seventy-three km) to the east, eventually ending at Wallsend on the Tyne. This wall was planned to be about ten feet (three m) wide and was free-standing, unlike the stone walls sometimes used in forts that were backed by an earth bank. Every Roman mile, there was to be a milecastle—a small fortlet, its north wall part of the Wall itself, and both north and south walls having a gateway. Between the milecastles and also forming part of the Wall itself were two turrets, which were built in stone, even on the Turf Wall. Throughout its length, the Wall was fronted by a wide and deep ditch, except where nature provided an even more formidable protection in the form of a cliff. To the west and then south of Bowness-on-Solway, following the coastline of Cumbria, the pattern of stone turrets and turf-and-timber fortlets continued for about twenty miles, but in this case there was no continuous wall or ditch.

  The surveyors marking out the line of the Wall appear to have begun near the coasts and worked inland. Construction work was undertaken by detachments drawn from the three legions, and there are hints of slight variations in the templates used by each one, even though we cannot allocate them to specific units. The Wall was not built section by section, completing everything before moving on to the next piece. Instead, parties started to build at locations all along the line, sometimes laying down no more than foundations and perhaps a few courses of stone, and elsewhere completing work, especially on turrets and milecastles.

  The Turf Wall in the west is likely to have been completed first, for the methods involved were faster and familiar to all the soldiers—most army bases were made using the same methods. It also seems that priority was given to the curtain wall (the Wall itself rather than the turrets and milecastles along it) in the sector running through the gentler country on the eastern side, especially from Wall miles 7–22. In the rugged central section, there was more concern to build turrets—and probably the northern wall of milecastles, which most likely had a tower over the gateway. This suggests a line of raised sentry stations, each capable of signalling back to a fort on the Stanegate Road just to the south. Milecastles near the routes along the river valleys cutting through the planned line of the Wall also came early in the schedule, guarding country readily infiltrated by raiders. Many turrets and milecastles were built with short sections of curtain wall abutting them, making it easier to bond with the main wall when it was finally joined to them.

  Major changes to the design of the Wall were then made—whether by Hadrian in person if his visit was to inspect a project already under way, or after consultation with him if it was only begun in 122. In the original design, only the small detachments of troops in milecastles and turrets garrisoned the Wall itself, and substantial numbers were stationed a mile or two to the rear in the forts on the Stanegate. There is no good evidence as yet for garrisons behind the eastern section of the Wall, but it is usually assumed that these existed or were planned on a similar scale to the bases on the Stanegate in the central and western sections. Whether or not this assumption is correct, a decision was then made that the number of troops serving near the Wall was to be drastically increased by the addition of forts actually on the curtain wall, each designed to hold a complete auxiliary unit.

  As its name suggests, Wallsend fort lies at the very eastern end of Hadrian’s Wall, where the Wall stops on the bank of the River Tyne, not far from the river’s mouth. The fort was constructed to house a cohors equitata with a theoretical strength of 480 infantry and 120 cavalry. As well as infantry barrack blocks, archaeologists have identified the four buildings in the southern half as combined barrack and stable blocks for the four troops, or turmae, of cavalry in the unit.

  As with the whole project, the new forts were not all constructed at the same time, and, again as with the wider project, over the course of time there were changes made to their specific design. At first, the new forts were laid out so that they projected well to the north of the Wall, with three out of the four main fort gateways beyond it, increasing the number of crossings giving access to the north. Presumably, this was judged to be excessive, and forts built later in the sequence lie behind the curtain so that it forms their northern wall, and there is only one grand double gateway leading through the Wall and giving access to the north. Eventually, there were fifteen forts on the Wall, each about seven to seven and one-half miles (10.5–11.5 km) apart, with at least three more on the line of the Stanegate continuing in full use for most of the life of the Wall.

  There are hints at interruptions in the building schedule, perhaps of changing priorities. Some sections of foundation or low walls appear to have been left open to the weather for one or more seasons before building resumed. It was difficult to build a free-standing wall much higher than about five feet without employing scaffolding, and the timber needed to make this scaffolding for so vast a project is likely to have been the biggest restriction on its progress. Much of this region, especially on the coastal plains, had been cleared of forest in the pre-Roman Iron Age by local farmers, so that less wood was readily available. Long stretches of the Wall were built over ploughed fields, the marks of the ploughing still there beneath the earliest layers of Roman occupation.

  At Housesteads and Chesters, construction of the forts required the demolition of turrets that had already been completed and show signs of occupation. In other cases, forts lay on top of planned or even completed milecastles. Excavations at Birdoswald have shown that the rampart of the Turf Wall was used to fill in the ditch so that the fort could be built over it. In this case the site was wooded, making it the exception to the general pattern of construction over cleared farmland. The timber felled to clear the site was immediately used in construction of the fort. Like milecastles, forts were built in the same material as each sector of curtain wall—turf and timber in the west and stone in the east. The only exception to this was that in early phases of the stone forts, some internal buildings were timber.

  Another change made soon after the decision to add forts was a reduction in the width of the Wall itself to around seven feet six inches (2.29 m). Scholars term this the Narrow Wall, as opposed to the Broad Wall. It is unclear how much Broad Wall was ever completed to full height, but the decision to reduce the gauge of the curtain greatly reduced the time and material needed in construction. Some milecastles were wholly or partly built to Broad Wall widths, whereas others were wholly Narrow Wall, providing evidence for the order in which they were constructed.

  After the fort decision was taken, although before all forts were planned and constructed, another feature was added behind almost the entire length of the Wall. This is known as the Vallum, because in the eighth century, the Anglo-Saxon monk Bede mistook it for an earlier earth wall. Its principal feature is a ditch, so the name ought to be Fossa, but Vallum has stuck and is still used by scholars. The ditc
h of the Vallum was about twenty feet (six m) wide, with sloping sides so that its flat bottom was somewhat narrower. Spoil from the ditch was raised into a twenty-foot-wide mound on either side, set back some thirty feet (9 m) from the edges. The width of all the Vallum’s elements appears to match a Roman measurement known as an actus of 120 Roman feet (c. 35.5 m). For much of its length the Vallum ran close to the Wall, widening to allow room for milecastles and forts, but in the central section it stayed on the lower ground rather than climbing the crags, so that the interval between the Wall and Vallum was wider. There were causeways across the Vallum for each fort, and a handful are known to have been added to permit access from certain milecastles through the north mound. The north-south Roman road known today as Dere Street after its Anglo-Saxon name (and providing the foundations for the modern A68 road) was provided with both a crossing over the Vallum and its own gateway through the Wall to the west of Milecastle 22, and similar provision is assumed for the other major north-south road running via Carlisle.