Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums Blog » Arbeia Roman Fort & MuseumTyne & Wear Archives & Museums Blog » Page 2

The Victorian Press and the Fort

Alex Croom — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 08:57:23 +0000

I have just been helping to choose some objects from the fort for an exhibition celebrating 150 years of the Museum in South Shields, and had to check up a bit on the history of one of the objects, which is a fragment of statue.

Thanks to a newspaper report at the time, we know it was discovered just before 11 July 1881. This is some six years after the end of the formal excavations that took place after the land was sold off to developers, so it was found by the workmen building the houses that ended up covering much of the site. We are very lucky that the local newspapers were interested in the discoveries and often reported on them, and even more lucky that some people kept the relevant cuttings! And there were lots of newspapers back then – not just the Shields Gazette and Daily Telegraph (to give it its full name) but the Shields Daily News and the Shields Dispatch (three newspapers just in South Shields!), as well as the Newcastle Daily Chronicle, Newcastle Daily Journal, and Tyne Mercury.

The 1875 excavation of the headquarters building

The cuttings contain some fascinating little snippets, like the ‘resident of South Shields, who should from his calling and position should have been the first to aid the [excavation] committee in their work… deliberately mutilated two of the largest and most interesting stones which have been lifted from the forum [headquarters building]…In spite of warnings … this person broke off large pieces of the stone ‘to see what kind of stones they are’‘ (Gazette, 20 April 1875), or the ‘impudent forgeries’ of early Christian items sold to collectors as genuine finds from the site. There is also the report on the council meeting discussing the gift of land that would make up the later Roman Remains Park, where one of the council members said that ‘there were now no Roman Remains whatever; they had all been taken away long since… It was simply a heap of old stones, and to spend money on them would be a perfect waste of the public money’ (Gazette, 3 July 1879).

Some of the newspaper reports still have the adverts and other news reports round them, which are just as interesting to read. Alongside adverts for a dentist who has removed 50,000 teeth in 30 years and the soap that is ‘the Delight and Wonder of the Domestic Household’, is one for the ‘Royal Museum Bar’, which rather caught my eye.

Altar your Preconceptions

Alex Vent — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 15:16:50 +0000

I have worked at Arbeia Roman Fort and Museum for nearly four years now and I’ve only just been on a full tour of the site! I know I should be ashamed of myself and I am!

But I’m glad I finally got around to doing it because there’s so much more to Arbeia than I thought. Obviously I already knew all the essentials I need for my job like dates and how a fort would have looked during Roman times but I’d never fully appreciated the vast and varied history of the site. Occupation began as far back as the Iron Age and certainly didn’t end with the departure of the Romans.

With each of these blogs I’m going to attempt to provide a little-known truth about the history of Arbeia and hopefully bring the site to life!

Altar your preconceptions!

After the departure of the Roman Army in approximately 410AD, Arbeia and its rich history were forgotten for over 1000 years. The land was farmed and communities sprung up but the Romans remained buried in time. Then, in 1672 a spectacular discovery was to change all of this and begin the story of Arbeia’s rediscovery.

1672 AltarAltar Text

Enhanced Image of AltarAltar Text

A farmer was ploughing his fields when he came across a stone inscription. It was sent off to Oxford where experts discovered that it was a Roman altar dedicated to the gods, thanking them for allowing the safe journey back to Rome of Caracalla and Geta.

They were the feuding sons of the Emperor Septimius Severus who had visited Arbeia as part of his campaign to occupy and pacify Scotland, a mission which had achieved some degree of success. In AD211 he died in York, the rumour being that his own son, Caracalla, had bribed the doctor to hasten his death! Ahh, families!

Imperial Seal showing Caracalla, Septimius and Geta. Found at Arbeia Roman Fort

After their return to Rome, tensions mounted between the two brothers, resulting in Caracalla stabbing Geta to death in front of their mother. Caracalla himself was later murdered by his own soldiers as he relieved himself behind a palm tree! Hmmmm….Karma?

After the discovery of the altar, the site remained as farmland for another 100 years. Obviously the investigation of Roman finds was not high on the list of priorities for 17^th Century farmers!

Many people believe that excavations at Arbeia didn’t begin until 1845 but it has since been discovered that in 1796 the area was dug up, in a fairly amateur fashion, by Nicholas Fairless, a wealthy local magistrate. He had recently visited Pompeii and was spurred on by this experience to make his own grand discoveries. I know how he felt – I always come back off holiday with big plans and ideas which rarely come to fruition! However, to give him his dues, Nicholas did set to work straight away and made some very interesting discoveries.

He had heard about the 1672 altar so he knew there must be more Roman remains in this area and with the help of some friends and local miners he uncovered a Bath House. This has unfortunately yet to be rediscovered. Rather tragically, Nicholas was later killed by striking miners who were unhappy about the working condition at their colliery.

It seems violence and bad luck have followed this altar from the day it was first offered up to the gods. I’m sure it’s all coincidence but just to be on the safe side, I’ll keep my distance from now on….

The altar can be seen as part of the permanent collection at Arbeia Roman Fort and Museum in South Shields. For more information go to:

http://www.twmuseums.org.uk/arbeia/news/secrets-of-the-altar-revealed/

Excavations at Arbeia

Alex Croom — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 08:44:29 +0000

The excavations here at Arbeia are now in their third week. The team (made up of volunteers from Earthwatch) are actually digging just outside the wall of the fort itself, hoping to pick up some of the civilian settlement that built up outside the military base. This is a new area of excavation, only opened last year, and is a deep pit right next to our offices. I’m hoping we can convert it into a swimming pool when the dig is done, but think I might be over-ruled on this one.

On the finds side, there have been two interesting objects this week, both slightly unusual. One is a small fragment of a brooch and the other is the rim of a small glass vessel with handles. This is good news for the dig, but not so good news for me, who is supposed to be able to identify these things.

OK, so the brooch is not exactly photogenic, and won’t ever be appearing in a museum near you any time soon, but for me it’s intriguing. I get to do some detective work to try to find more complete parallels in order to pry its story out of it.