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The Roman Occupation of The Central Fenland

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 November 2011

T. W. Potter ,
Catherine Johns ,
David Hall ,
Mark Hassall  and
David Shotter
T. W. Potter
Affiliation:
Department of Prehistoric and Romano-British Antiquities, The British Museum, London
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Extract

The purpose of this paper is to draw together the results of a campaign of excavation and field-survey in the March area of the Cambridgeshire Fens. The work was carried out between 1958 and 1964, at a time when the last earthwork sites in the region were coming under the plough. That the excavations were undertaken before the destructive contemporary programme of deep cultivation began is a matter of some importance. Study of the earthwork sites showed that the third- and fourth-century buildings lay only a few inches below the surface and, although often constructed in stone, never possessed more than shallow footings. We may surmise that, unless a well preserved pasture site has escaped attention, deep ploughing has stripped off most traces of late-Roman structures on these Fenland settlements. Only the lower fills of the larger ditches and pits are likely to have survived intact.

Type
Articles
Information
Britannia , Volume 12 , November 1981 , pp. 79 - 133
Copyright
Copyright © T. W. Potter 1981. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

* It is a pleasant duty to place on record my gratitude to the many farmers in the March area who allowed us to excavate and survey their land, often at considerable inconvenience: these include the late Alderman Burton of Doddington, Mr Martin and Mr Vawser of March, Mr Cross and Mr Smith of Stonea, Mr Hudson of Wimblington and the CWS Estate, Coldham. The work was largely carried out by a team from March Grammar School (now the Neale-Wade School) and the work of direction was shared with my brother, Christopher Potter, who has contributed greatly to this and other papers. We were fortunate to have the advice and encouragement of Peter Salway, Brian Hartley, Joan Liversidge, Mary Cra'ster, and Sir Harry Godwin, all of whom did much to aid our amateur investigations. I also owe a great debt to the colleagues who have contributed to the preparation of this paper, amongst them Philip Compton, who drew FIGS. 6–10, Ralph Jackson, Ian Longworth, Mark Hassall, Stuart Needham, Rob Perrin, Iris Phillips, Francis Pryor, Valery Rigby, David Shotter and Gillian Wilson. We were always greatly helped by Jack Ward of March and by the late W. L. Hanchant who was Curator of Wisbech Museum and a tireless scholar of local history; while to the present Curator of Wisbech Museum, Rosalinda Hardiman, special thanks are due for providing both information and objects for study and for sorting out the records. I am also especially indebted to the Fenland Field Officer, David Hall, who has been more than generous in making available information and maps of the results of his outstanding work of ground-survey; and I would like to pay special tribute to Catherine Johns who, apart from writing a significant proportion of this paper, has aided its preparation in every possible way. My thanks are also due to the British Museum for providing the facilities to produce this paper and to John Wilkes for expert editorial guidance. Finally, I would like to acknowledge the special debt to my father, formerly Headmaster of March Grammar School, and to my mother, who suffered but still encouraged the archaeological work described in this paper.

1 Churchill in C. W. Phillips (ed.), The Fenland in Roman Times, RGS Research Memoir (1970), 134 f., referred to below as Phillips 1970; Sir Harry Godwin, Fenland: its ancient past and uncertain future (C.U.P., 1978), 86 f.

2 The findspot is not certain; cf. Piggott, S., Procs. Prehistoric Soc. xvi (1950), 4–5.Google Scholar

3 Pryor, F. in Burgess, C. and Miket, R. (eds.), Settlement and Economy in the third and second millennia B.C., British Archaeological Reports 33 (1976), 41 f.Google Scholar

4 For a recent discussion of Iron Age pottery styles in this region and publication of a comparable group from Vicarage Farm at Fengate, cf. F. M. Pryor, Excavation at Fengate, Peterborough, England: the first report, Royal Ontario Museum (1974), 35 f.

5 For an Iron Age vessel and a La Tène iii brooch from Coldham, cf. the catalogue of British Museum objects, infra, p. 95.

6 Drainage can be excluded since, with the possible exception of the Rodham Farm Canal, no artificial cuts can be dated to this period. For Grandford, cf. T. W. and C. F. Potter, Procs. Cambs. Antiq. Soc. (PCAS below), in press; B.M. Occ. Pap. (1981), in press.

7 For the first report, cf. PCAS lxviii (1978), 21–46.Google Scholar

8 ibid, in press; B.M. Occ. Pap. (1981), forthcoming.

9 Salway in Phillips 1970, 8–9.

10 cf. Longthorpe II (Britannia v (1974), 38–9)Google Scholar; and Frere, S. S., Britannia (Cardinal, 1974), 107.Google Scholar Scole should probably be excluded from the list of possible post-Boudiccan forts in East Anglia (East Anglian Archaeology v (1977), 224).Google Scholar cf. also Webster, G., Boudicca (Batsford, 1978), 105 f.Google Scholar

11 Phillips 1970, 189 (River Ouse at St. Ives); cf. also ibid., 272 for a possible depot at Eye, and for late third-century kilns close to the Car Dyke in Lincolnshire, B. B. Simmons, Roman Tile Kilns at Heckington, Lines., Car Dyke Publication 3 (Spalding, 1977).

12 As at Verulamium (Frere, S. S., Verulamium Excavations I, Soc. Antiquaries Res. Report xxviii (1972), 160 f.)Google Scholar, Colchester (Crummy, P., Britannia viii (1977), 79)Google Scholar or Brampton (East Anglian Archaeology v (1977), 86).Google Scholar

13 The implication that is sometimes made (e.g. VCH Cambs. vii (1978), 56)Google Scholar that the Fens were an area where coins were little used is clearly mistaken; cf. the evidence presented by Shotter, infra, p. 120.

14 Were it not for the absence of defences, Grandford could in many ways be compared with some of the more modest settlements discussed in Rodwell, W. and Rowley, T. (eds.), Small Towns of Britain, BAR 15 (1977).Google Scholar

15 Considered further in the final section.

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19 Registration number 1866.12–3.57. H. B. Walters, Catalogue of Roman Pottery … in the British Museum (1908), M.2495.

20 1857.8–6.1 and Walters M.2479. Illustrated in J. W. Brailsford, Guide to the Antiquities of Roman Britain (1951 and 1964), pl. iv, 13.

21 cf. another British Museum sherd, 1856.7–1.239, Walters M.2511 from London.

22 Note 20, above.

23 Walters M.2485.

24 Note 18, above.

25 Hull, op. cit. (note 17), fig. 53, 1.

26 In particular, we should like to thank Mr R. Perrin for his comments.

27 Webster, op. cit. (note 18).

28 Roach Smith, op. cit. (note 16).

29 British Museum 1871.7–14.18, Walters M.2483.

30 Hull, op. cit. (note 17), fig. 53, 13 and p. 93.

31 British Museum reference: 1870.12–8.1–74.

32 For Flaggrass and Stonea, cf. infra.

33 PCAS lviii (1965), 12–37Google Scholar; the dates quoted here correct those in the published report on the excavation.

34 PCAS xliii (1949), 14.Google Scholar

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36 Fox, C., Archaeology of the Cambridge Region (Cambridge, 1923), 263.Google Scholar There are cruciform brooches, apparently from Wisbech, in Wisbech Museum.

37 For comments on the Iron Age, Saxon and Medieval objects respectively, we should like to thank our colleagues Valery Rigby, Leslie Webster and John Cherry.

38 Still not adequately published (British Museum, 1844.2.–23.1–9); cf. Peal, C. A. in PCAS lix (1967), 19 f.Google Scholar; Liversidge, J., PCAS lii (1959), 9.Google Scholar

39 Emilie Riha, Die römischen Fibeln aus Augst und Kaiseraugst (Augst, 1979).

40 We are indebted to Ralph Jackson for his help in identifying the ironwork.

41 cf. Phillips 1970, 218 f.; T. W. Potter, PCAS lxvi (1975–1976), 23–54. For a summary of recent excavations see below under ‘Roman Britain in 1980’.

42 Stonea Camp : Phillips 1970,4 and 218; J. Dyer in P. J. Fowler (ed.), Archaeology and the Landscape (1972), 226–7. The pottery is published in PCAS lviii (1965), 29–31.Google Scholar

43 Allen, D. F., Britannia i (1970), 18Google Scholar; cf. also J. Evans, The Coins of the Ancient Britons (1890), 586–7; and Num. Chron. (1839), 89, for a hoard from March.

44 Now in Peterborough Museum; identification by Miss C. M. Johns.

45 Frere, S. S., Britannia (Cardinal, 1974), 93.Google Scholar

46 Now in the Wisbech Museum; they average 1 × 1 × 0.75 in.; cf. Phillips 1970, 218.

47 Phillips 1970, sites 4494, 4593W (pp. 218–19).

48 Peckover MS; cf. PCAS xliii (1949), 16.Google Scholar

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50 No temple has ever been securely identified in the Fens, although a n altar is reported from Whaplode (Phillips 1970, 302) and there is a ‘double-box’ cropmark at Elm (Phillips 1970, 322). For a sanctuary complex on the Fen-edge at Hockwold, cf. Phillips 1970, 248–9. For a general discussion of the evidence, cf. VCH Cambs. vii (1978), 84 f., and 80–2.Google Scholar

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53 Painter, K. S., The Water Newton Early Christian Silver (British Museum Publications, 1977).Google Scholar

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56 Dedicated to Mars Alator : H. B. Walters, Catalogue of the Silver Plate in the British Museum (1921), no. 231, p. 60; also Toynbee, op. cit. (note 52), no. 27.

57 Painter, op. cit. (note 53), nos. 10, 14, 18.

68 ibid., no. 11.

59 Fleischer, R., Die römischen Bronzen aus Österreich (Mainz, 1967), no. 26, p. 43 and Taf. 23.Google Scholar

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62 Toynbee, op. cit. (note 60), pl. xvii, a b and p. 81. Brailsford 1964 (note 20), pl. xxiv and p. 60.

63 Fleischer, op. cit. (note 59), no. 35, p. 48.

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65 Phillips 1970, 218, site 4199S; this account supersedes the summary given there.

66 Now in Wisbech Museum. The earliest reference to the place-name cited by Reaney (Placenames of Cambridgeshire and the Isle of Ely (1943), 256) is to 1251 and it was common land in 1589.

67 Procs. Prehist. Soc. East Anglia vii (1933), 258 ff.Google Scholar

68 In Phillips 1970, 68–9.

69 cf. especially Brisay, K. de, Antiq. Journ. lviii (1978), 31–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

70 Phillips 1970, 69.

71 Brisay, K. de (ed.), Salt (Colchester, 1975).Google Scholar

72 Contra Hallam in Phillips 1970, 70 and B. B. Simmons in South Lincolnshire Archaeology i (1977), g; cf. Bestwick in de Brisay, op. cit. (note 71), 70. A. L. F. Rivet and C. Smith (The Placenames of Roman Britain (1979). 120 and 451) suggest Droitwich, Worcestershire, to have been Ptolemy's Salinae, and Middlewich to have been the Salinis referred to in the Ravenna Cosmography.

73 In Phillips 1970, 70; a mid second-century termination is suggested.

74 By no means all of the collection has been relocated. The bulk is in Wisbech Museum, and a representative group (including the illustrated pieces) has been placed in the British Museum.

75 Swinnerton, H. H., Antiq. Journ. xii (1932), 239–53CrossRefGoogle Scholar; B. B. Simmons in de Brisay, op. cit. (note 71), 33–6.

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81 I. D Margary, Roman Roads in Britain (1973), 230–2.

82 Phillips 1970, site 4298, p. 221.

83 Phillips 1970, site 4398, 216–8 and 221–2.

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85 JRS li (1961), 182Google Scholar; Phillips 1970, 328–9.

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89 PCAS xliii (1949), 11.Google Scholar

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91 Sir Harry Godwin, op. cit. (note 1), 86.

92 Summarised in the site gazetteer in Phillips 1970.

93 Key to abbreviated references: Babington, C. C., Ancient Cambridgeshire (Cambridge, 1883)Google Scholar; Fox, C., The Archaeology of the Cambridge Region (Cambridge, 1923)Google Scholar; PCAS=Proceedings of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society; NC= Numismatic Chronicle; VCH= Victoria County History.

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98 N. Shiel, op. cit. (note 95), 83.

99 T. W. Potter, ‘Excavations at Grandford’, PCAS forthcoming; B.M. Occ. Pap. (1981), forthcoming.

100 J. Evans, The Coins of the Ancient Britons (1890), 586; Allen, D. F., Britannia i (1970), 18.Google Scholar

101 T. W. Potter, op. cit. (note 99).

102 In Phillips 1970, 167.

103 Simmons, B. B. (South Lines. Arch, i (1977), 8)Google Scholar has emphasised that none of the pottery from recent field survey on the silts pre-dates the Hadrianic period; a similar conclusion emerges from David Hall's sample from fieldwork in Cambridgeshire. On the other hand, surface finds are much less prolific than they were 20 years ago and known early sites seem to be producing small and, often, unrepresentative groups.

104 Salway in Phillips 1970, 9 f., 165.

105 Clark, J. G. D., Antiq. Journ. xxix (1947), 145–63Google Scholar; for the Hadrianic date, B. R. Hartley in Phillips 1970, 126. The function of the canal as a catchment system, draining overflow from the uplands is discussed by Pryor, A., Durobrivae vi (1978), 24–5Google Scholar, and by Simmons, B. B., The Lincolnshire Car Dyke (Boston, 1975).Google Scholar

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108 cf. Hallam, S. J. in Antiq. Journ. xliv (1964), 19–32CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and in Phillips 1970, 51 f.

109 Phillips 1970, 216 (site 4185).

110 Unpublished coins include issues of Antoninus Pius (2), Marcus Aurelius, Commodus, Severus Alexander and Postumus. For the site, JRS xiv (1924), 225Google Scholar; Phillips 1970, 216 (site 4389N).

111 e.g. Whaplode Drove (Phillips 1970, 302) was evidently a large centre with ‘Romanized’ buildings.

112 C. Peal, A., PCAS lx (1967), 19–37Google Scholar provides a general account. Phillips 1970 gives a full list of findspots. cf. also Manning, W. H., Britannia iii (1972), 248.Google Scholar

113 Peckover MS, Wisbech; PCAS xliii (1949), 16.Google Scholar

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115 S. Stalleybrass, B.M. Occ. Pap. (1981), in press. These notes do not take account of King's, A. important paper ‘A comparative survey of bone assemblages from Roman sites in Britain’, Bull. Inst. Arch. London xv (1978), 207–32.Google Scholar

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126 In H. P. R. Finberg (ed.), The Agrarian History of England and Wales (1972), 216 f.

127 Sources: Phillips 1970, Wisbech Museum.

128 Hartley in Phillips 1970, 168.

129 Pryor, A., Durobrivae vi (1978), 24–5Google Scholar; B. B. Simmons, The Lincolnshire Car Dyke (1975).

130 I. D. Margary, Roman Roads in Britain (1973), 230–2.

131 I am especially grateful to Mrs Westland of March for providing me with a copy of this photograph. The log corduroy recalls the ‘sticks’ beneath the road described by Garrood (Antiq. Journ. xviii (1938), 76–7).Google Scholar

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