Dodecahedron Mystery Solved?

Modelling glove made with a dodecahedron

It is quite some time since I was last persuaded to don my Roman arms and armour (for good reason, I’ve still got the chafe marks on my shoulders to prove it) but an opportunity presented itself recently when my office was flash-mobbed by the Curator of Egyptology, Campbell Price, with visiting researcher Regina Degiovanni who proceeded to give me an impromptu demonstration of how to make a pair of Roman gloves using a bronze dodecahedron… I feel I should point out that Manchester Museum has a wonderful knitted Coptic sock in its Egyptology collection, making us a popular port-of-call for experimental archaeologists who seek to puzzle out how people in antiquity rose to the challenges that everyday life threw at them, such as how to knit themselves a pair of socks, or, as in this case, a pair of gloves.

Coptic sock in the Egyptology collection with Regina’s instruction

Except that I suspect the reverse was true: presented with the mystery of what the bronze dodecahedra found in the north-western provinces of the Roman Empire were for, the intrepid experimental archaeologists arrived at the ingenious solution that they were used for knitting gloves. Sadly the wonderful archaeology collection at Manchester Museum is not blessed with an actual example of a dodecahedron but Regina had managed to obtain a 3D scan of one. Generations of Romanists, Classical scholars and archaeology students have long debated the purpose of these enigmatic objects. With ten sides, containing circular openings or apertures of different diameters and surmounted by knobs where the planes intersect, the famous dodecahedra have long defeated academic enquiry. The someone hit on the solution that they were used for knitting and Regina showed how it was done and asked me to model the fingers of the gloves (see photo).

Finger gloves and dodecahedron

Regina had been in contact with living history interpreters who dressed as Roman soldiers and they had talked about the need to cushion or insulate their hands against metal arms and armour, which not only chafes but in cold weather can be very uncomfortable to carry or wear. I happened to have a replica Roman spear lying around the office and so it was, literally within a minute, my calm orderly existence talking to Sam our Conservator before going to meet my 2 o’clock appointment was turned upside down and I found myself posing for a photo, pilum and dodecahedron in hand, wearing knitted finger stalls. I don’t suppose many people can say they’ve done that.

The fingers of the glove

One thing is for sure: the gloves certainly helped to take the chill off the metal spear I was holding. Whether this does indeed solve the mystery of the dodecahedra is another question. What we need is some use wear analysis of the surface of the knobs on the outside of actual archaeological examples of dodecahedra using a stereomicroscope or a metallographic microscope to see if indeed there is any evidence of threads having been looped around the knobs consistent with the process of knitting. If this does indeed prove to be the case then activities for public programmes in the Museum for the foreseeable future can expect to be dominated by the experimental knitting of gloves to go with our Coptic sock. Does a new career modelling experimental archaeological knitwear beckon I wonder? Watch this space.

Roman Finds Group Meeting at Manchester Museum 8th October 2014

Roman military diploma

The last week has been rather busy, not least because of the Roman Finds Group meeting that was held at Manchester Museum on 8th October, which I helped to organize. The group is aimed at people, museum curators, archaeologists and those who share an interest in Roman archaeology. First up was Paul Holder, who works at the University’s library and who is leading authority on Roman military diplomas. It was Paul who published Manchester Museum’s incomplete military diploma from Ravenglass, arguably awarded to a man perhaps from Heliopolis in the Lebanon who was recruited into a regiment from the Roman Army of Britain when an expeditionary force went out to help suppress the serious Judaean revolt during the reign of Hadrian in the 130s AD.

Norman Redhead talking about the recent work at Castleshaw Roman forts

Norman Redhead, County Archaeologist and Director of Greater Manchester Archaeological Unit talked about recent work at Castleshaw Roman forts. This was not the first time the site had been excavated and Norman described the various interventions at this fascinating early Roman military frontier site, which lies between Slack, near Huddersfield, and Manchester. In the 18th century the antiquary Percival sketched two forts here and the people’s poet Ammon Wrigley did some work, but the first serious archaeological work was directed by Francis Bruton over two seasons in 1907-8. Rosser and later Thompson during the late ’50s and early ’60s carried out further work for the University of Manchester, helping to clarify the relationship between the earlier and larger fort for an auxiliary cohort, and the smaller, later fortlet for a garrison for as few as 50 men. There was a community programme excavation on the site during the mid 1980s.

The earlier fort was occupied between about AD 79 and the mid-90s AD and the fortlet between 105 and the early 120s AD. This tight chronological framework means that finds from the site can be closely dated. Unfortunately the soil conditions were prejudicial to the survival of many materials. One coin of Vespasian could only be documented because its imprint had been preserved in the soil, and even samian was very abraded. Glass objects survived very well, however.  Other finds included a lava quernstone, melon beads of glass and faience, rusticated ware greyware sherds, an onyx intaglio depicting Minerva, and a little Black Burnished ware, which must have entered the North of England shortly before the fortlet was decommissioned in the 120s AD. The finds from the most recent work will go to the Saddleworth Museum. Manchester Museum has the finds from the university-led excavations.

Handsome trumpet brooch from the Knutsford hoard

Vanessa Oakden, Finds Liaison Officer for the Portable Antiquities Scheme spoke about the Knutsford Hoard which was found by a metal-detectorist and included 103 coins, three trumpet brooches, finger rings and vessel fragments. Unfortunately the point of deposition had been ploughed out and the hoard dispersed but there was still a dense concentration of metalwork over some 20 x 10 metres. Some of the coins were still stuck together from their time in the container. The coins included denarii struck for Mark Anthony’s legions, and issues of Vitellius, Hadrian and Antoninus Pius and those struck for imperial ladies such as Sabina, Lucilla and Faustina II. Vanessa compared the hoard contents with another Roman hoard found at Church Minshull, which had 58 denarii and trumpet brooches. The trumpet brooches were similar to the beautiful Carmarthen brooch. The more complete brooches helped explain the rosette mount found loose in the Knutsford hoard. It looks as though the Knutsford hoard was deposited in the 190s AD. It may represent the private wealth of a soldier, landowner or merchant, and is perhaps indicative of the importance of the salt trade in the economy of the area. For further details  look this up on the Portable Antiquities database (LVPL -B44185/2012 T406).

A visit to the Manchester Museum store

The last session before lunch was presented by yours truly and I showed some of the Roman treasures from Manchester Museum’s archaeology collection, such as the Manchester word-square and talked about a couple of breakthroughs that had enabled us to provenance a previously unattributed sizeable collection of Romano-British pottery excavated by Prof.Donald Atkinson at Gayton Thorpe in Norfolk during the 1920s and a Romano-British pot from Longendale, purchased from some young lads who had found it hidden amongst some rocks. When first encountered in the store the latter shared its storage box with two unannotated small format black and white photographs showing the place of discovery and a cryptic note saying it was to be collected ‘by a gentleman’. A discussion of this acquisition turned up in an issue of Transactions of the Lancashire and Cheshire Antiquarian Society and the mysterious gentleman turned out to be Christopher Hawkes. This presentation was followed by a visit to the Museum archaeology store where I’d got out a selection of interesting material, including small finds from Castleshaw excavations, late iron Age metalwork from Bigbury, a complete set of decorative zoomorphic feet for a box or casket and an interesting but undoubtedly fake Mithras figurine. In this I was ably assisted and supported by Irit Narkiss, a member of the Museum’s conservation team, to whom thanks are due.

Wooden combs from Vindolanda

After lunch we were treated to a wonderful talk by Barbara Birley who presented the preliminary findings of her study of wooden combs from Vindolanda. The anaerobic soil conditions preserved a range of objects made of organic materials, including textiles, leather shoes, writing tablets and the combs. Vindolanda has yielded some 140 combs and this turns out to be the largest site collection to date (Roman London has only yielded 40). Most date from c.AD 85 to the 160s. Some of the combs were marked with graffiti or stamped with a maker’s mark. Some may have been used by professional hairdressers. Some were decorated with fretting and some had a copper alloy plate. The carefully-recorded excavations allowed the combs to be plotted spatially. One particularly interesting example came with its own leather carrying pouch or case.

Gaming counters from Chester

Our next speaker, Gill Dunn, talked about recent finds from the Chester amphitheatre site. There were two phases of building and the dep0sits contained a fragment from the hilt of a sword and remains of fast food consumed by the crowds, such as swans, geese, duck, and chicken, and fish bones from salmon, eels and carp. In fact there are few sites with such a range of domestic fowl. There were pieces of ceramic portable ovens that were probably made at Holt. The glass included pieces of facet cut vessels and are indicative of relatively high status table ware. A large collection of gaming counters (above) – of particular interest to me because of the set found outside Manchester Roman fort – appear to have been redeposited from elsewhere. Metal finds included mail links, hob nails, tools, and iron finger rings.

Enamelled Romano-British metalwork

The next speaker, Justine Bayley, talked about enamelled Roman objects. Enamel is glass fused to a metal sub-strate. Enamelling occurs on small decorative objects such as brooches, belt plates, seal boxes, studs, fittings and fasteners and votive stands, and occasionally is found on larger vessels, such as the Staffordshire Moorlands pan. Sometimes larger objects were made in separate pieces and soldered together. Some were clearly made a souvenirs for people to take away with them after a posting in the province. Reconstructions of enamelled metalwork showed just how gaudy the enamelled material was originally.

Matt Ponting talking about Roman coin analysis

Our next speaker, Matt Ponting of University of Liverpool, presented results of a programme of sampling of silver Roman coins. Earlier work in this area had sampled the surface of the coins but this gave variable and misleading results because the Romans treated the coin blanks to brighten the surface. This project showed that the Julio-Claudian emperors had a fine silver coinage until Nero reduced the fineness from 93% to 80% silver. The results of the recent sampling were more consistent than earlier readings. This brought the  denarius into line with the coinage of the Greek East and resolved problems with tax collection. The speaker also showed how studying isotopes from the samples might indicate the sources of the silver that was used. Some issues can now be characterized as using Spanish silver, some Gallic. It may be possible to identify a fingerprint for recycled metal. Matt acknowledged the institutions that had allowed sampling of coins in their collections, which include the Manchester Museum.

Scan of a coin showing differences in the metal.

Our last speaker, Rob Philpott, from Liverpool Museum discussed finds from the Roman port of Meolls. In the mid 19th century Abraham Hume reported large numbers of mostly metal discoveries on the foreshore when that stretch of coastline was undergoing rapid erosion by the river.  Activity seems to have started during the later Iron Age  and there are Roman finds even before the region was absorbed into the Roman province. Meolls was an important trading centre on the edge of the tribal territory of the Cornovii, close to that of the Brigantes. The exploitation of salt in the North West may lay behind  the economic transactions that we can detect in the coins and other metalwork found at Meolls. Sadly many of Liverpool’s finds were lost during bombing in World War II but more material has been recorded from the vicinity since then, including tantalizing objects from a later period such as a St Menas flask and a small hoard of Byzantine coins. Such discoveries are often explained away as redeposited souvenirs collected by British servicemen during the first and second World Wars but in some cases the original contextual information appears impeccable. A 6th century AD context for such finds in such a location, easily accessible by water, cannot be lightly dismissed.

St Means flask

Meolls reminded me strongly of a Roman port at Faxfleet, near Brough on the Humber Estuary in East Yorkshire, where large quantities of Roman pottery dating from the later 1st and early 2nd centuries AD was found. Its location close to the confluence of  a number of tributaries flowing into the Humber would have made it a useful location for trade. Unlike Meolls, most of the material found was ceramic. Another site further along the estuary at Redcliff, like Meolls, shows evidence of Roman trade some decades before the Romans came to northern Britain.

There was a great mix of papers at this meeting and my thanks to all those who presented or helped with the day.

Roman Finds Group Meeting at Manchester Museum 8th October 2014

Enamelled buckle from Barton Street, Manchester

 

The Roman Finds Group is holding its next day meeting at Manchester Museum on Wednesday 8th October 2014. The theme of the conference will be Finds from Manchester and the North West. At the time of writing we expect the speakers will include:

 

Paul Holder (University of Manchester) – Recent finds of Roman Military Diplomas from Britain

Norman Redhead (Greater Manchester Archaeology Advisory Service) – Finds from Castleshaw Roman Fort

Vanessa Oakden (P.A.S.) – Finds beneath our Fields: The Knutsford Hoard

Bryan Sitch (Manchester Museum) – Manchester Museum collections

Barbara Birley (Vindolanda Trust) – Keeping up appearances: the wooden hair combs from Vindolanda

Gill Dunn – Recent finds from Chester focusing on finds from the amphitheatre

Justine Bayley – Enamelled Roman objects

Matthew Ponting (University of Liverpool) – Recent analysis of Roman coins (title tbc)

Rob Philpott -(Liverpool Museums) Roman finds from Meols on the North Wirral shore

 

Brougham patera

Some details are still to be confirmed but we’re hoping to also have presentations about the Roman salt-working industry in the region, recent analyses of Roman coins, and finds from excavations in Manchester. If you missed the earlier call for papers and have something you’d like to talk about, get in touch with Bryan Sitch now as it may still be possible to fit you into the programme.

The Roman military diploma from Ravenglass in Manchester Museum’s archaeology collection

The day will start with registration and coffee from 9.30am and the first talk at 10.00am. A relatively long lunch break is planned so there will be time to see material in the reserve collection as well as exploring the museum and finding something to eat.

For more information and bookings please contact Bryan Sitch, Deputy Head of Collections, Manchester Museum, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL (bryan.sitch@manchester.ac.uk). All bookings must be made before 3rd October but as places are limited early booking is advised. Cost: £15 for RFG members and students and £20 for others (includes tea and coffee but not lunch); cheques should be made payable to the Roman Finds Group.

The final programme will appear on the RFG website nearer the time, and will then be emailed to all those who have booked for the day.

Engaging with the Roman Army

Students in the basement meeting room

Last Friday afternoon I led a handling session and seminar at the Museum about Roman military archaeology. It was one of those rare occasions when the content of what you have been asked to do happens to coincide with your specialism. It is testament to the interest of the students that they came on the last day of the autumn term just a fortnight before Christmas.

Handling objects used in the seminar

I arranged the seating in the basement room in a square  with myself in the middle with objects on a table.  I passed things round for the students to see and handle. I always make a point of explaining at the beginning that I’m not there to assess them, and that my role is simply to open up the collection for study and discussion.

Replica Roman sword and scabbard

Fortunately we have some replica material in the collection: a shield, a helmet, a sword and scabbard, a dagger and some pieces of mail armour. Arms and armour are, after all, what people tend to think about when you talk to them about the Roman army.

I also showed a plaster cast of the inscription from one of the Manchester altars  set up by a praepositus or commander of a detachment under its own flag or standard, known as a vexillation. This was a detachment of Raetians and Noricans from what is now Switzerland and Austria in Eastern Europe. I also reminded the students of the Museum’s intriguing auxiliary diploma from Ravenglass that was awarded to a Syrian and which is on display in Ancient Worlds.

We talked about pay and Keith Sugden, Curator of Numismatics, kindly supplied a selection of coins of the various 1st and 2nd century emperors, in whose reign the province of Roman Britain had been created and extended, including a commemorative DE BRITANN silver denarius of the emperor Claudius (AD 41-54)  and one of the famous Britannia asses of the emperor Antoninus Pius (AD 142-158).

Tutor, Andy Fear, joins the discussion

Finally I showed them melon beads, gaming counters and pottery from a building just outside Manchester Roman fort, perhaps frequented by soldiers of the garrison when they went off duty in search of some R ‘n R.

Roman enamels workshop in Malton, North Yorkshire

About ten days ago I managed to escape the lead-up to the opening of Fragmentary Ancestors and quit the office in order to re-engage with beautiful and fascinating objects in someone else’s collection. In this case it was the Malton Museum collection which sadly lost its home in the centre of the town a few years ago. A number of dedicated volunteers have been keeping the idea of the Malton Museum and its brilliant collections alive in the popular imagination by organizing events featuring objects from the collections. I went to a seminar earlier in the year on Roman glass led by Prof Jenny Price, who is a specialist in this subject.

Today’s seminar was led by Justine Bayley who retired from English Heritage about three years ago. Justine talked to us through a number of fine enamelled pieces from the Roman Malton collection, and mould fragments from Castleford, courtesy of Wakefield Arts, Museums and Heritage.

Justine Bayley at the Malton enamels seminar

The Malton Museum seminars are a great way to get very close to fascinating objects the greater part of two thousand years old for a very modest fee and a great opportunity to learn about them from leading experts in the field. One of the wonderful things about today’s seminar was being able to look at the colourful objects under a binocular microscope, which  brought out the bright colours.

Studying Roman enamels under a binocular microscope

Enamelled Roman belt buckle from Barton Street, Manchester

We show a group of enamelled bronzes on the ‘How do we know?’ table in the Ancient Worlds archaeology displays at Manchester Museum. In order to understand fully how people in antiquity did things sometimes you have to try and repeat the process yourself. This can be very informative because you are learning by doing. Manchester Museum acquired some replica enamelled objects from the British Museum that came from this branch of experimental archaeology. Manchester Museum’s examples were made by H.W.Axtell of the British Museum.

Replica dragonesque brooch

Replica enamel-decorated Roman brooch in Ancient Worlds

Of course with the last two images, the replicas are shown as we might find them today with their patina. The actual appearance, as Justine showed us in one of her publications, would have been far more garish and, frankly, bling-ish! See Justine Bayley’s paper ‘Bling bling & Co: Tout ce qui brille a Morat et marsens n’est pas or’ in Archeoquiz Enquetes Archaeologiques Fibourgeoises (2012), pp 114-5.

Reconstruction of wheel brooch courtesy of Justine Bayley

Enamel was used to decorate a range of small decorative objects including brooches, seal-boxes, buckle plates, button-and-loop fasteners, studs, votive stands and a few larger objects such as vessels. Justine showed us an image of a beautiful inkwell decorated with panels of millefiori enamel.

Enamel decoration like a stick of rock. Image courtesy of Justine Bayley.

Enamel is essentially glass that is fused to the metal and is brightly coloured  and usually opaque. It dates from the 1st into the 2nd centuries AD, after which it ceased to be fashionable. The site of Nornour came up in conversation as a place where lots of enamelled Roman bronzes were found. It reminded me that Dan, one of the Visitor Services Assistants at Manchester Museum, shared some photos he’d taken of a visit to one of the museums in the Scilly Isles.

Consultation about Scanning the Head of Worsley Man

Powerful high intensity scanning equiment at the HMXIF, University of Manchester (photo: Sam Sportun)

In an earlier Blog I wrote about scanning the head of Worsley Man  as part of a research project carried out by a team of specialists from Manchester and Nottingham universities and other organisations . 

One of the new findings to emerge from the recent study was the discovery of a previously undocumented third cervical (neck) vertebra, which had a section created by the chopping action of a sword, or, just possibly, the action of a saw. The team wanted to study the section in more detail using a high resolution scanner to verify how the head was removed from the body. This may appear macabre but there is evidence that some bog bodies were dismembered and parts disposed of in different locations, possibly marking the  boundaries of a territory or for other reasons that we can only speculate about.

Last week Sam Sportun, Senior Conservator at Manchester Museum, and I went over to the Henry Moseley X-ray Imaging Facility on the university campus to speak to staff about the practicalities of scanning Worsley Man’s head. We’d like to know whether the section of the damaged vertebra was cut or sawn; whether the cord buried in the flap of soft tissue that survives does indeed go around the neck as a garotte; and what is the composition of anomalous material in a tooth? But the technology will investigate more nuanced questions which we are only just beginning to appreciate.

However, before we reach that point we’d like to gather any comments about the proposed work.  Human remains in museums are an important source of information for learning about life in the past. We accept that material of this kind has different meanings to different people and we’d welcome any comments in advance of scanning Worsley Man.

When John Connelly came across the human head whilst was stacking peat blocks on Worsley Moss in August 1958 little can he have  imagined the long-term research ramifications of his discovery. The head has been the subject of a Coroner’s Inquest, an exhibit in a Pathology display, a museum specimen and now the proposed subject of a detailed scanning.

Incidentally if anyone knows of Mr Connelly or his family we’d be really interested to hear from you.

Castleshaw Roman Forts Again

Castleshaw Roman fort, standing in the join between two of the earthern ramparts (centre foreground)

A few weeks ago I posted a blog about a visit Christine and I made to Castleshaw Roman forts in the Pennines near Oldham. This followed the visit by the Friends of Castleshaw Roman forts to Manchester Museum see finds from the excavations that took place there during the early 1900s. I see that the blog has mysteriouisly disappeared so I thought I’d redraft it, taking advantage of the fact that since I first wrote it, the Son of Mars exhibiton has opened at the Museum of Lancashire in Preston. This exhibiton celebrates the work of archaeological illustrator, Graham Sumner, and includes a number of his wonderful paintings of Roman soldiers and Castleshaw Roman fort. 

Landscape at Castleshaw

The fort site is at the top of a valley overlooking a couple of reservoirs. The best way to get to the site is along the A62 and follow signs to Castleshaw Centre (on Waterworks Road). There is a small car park and the fort is on a hill on the other side of the road. You approach the fort across a fairly steep field. The fortlet can be seen very clearly on the AA route planner website if you go onto satellite. The photo above is looking back down the slope through the corner of the fortlet. There was a fort for an auxiliary unit or regiment of about 500 men covering 2.5 acres here from the 70s AD. It was abandoned for a time after AD 85 and early in the 2nd century it was re-occupied by a smaller contingent of about 80 men. A fortlet was built within the original footprint of the fort. It went out of use about 120 AD.

Graham Sumner’s reconstruction of Castleshaw Roman fort on the information panel at the site

All this is explained in the information panel on site, which features authoritative reconstruction illustratrations by Graham Sumner.

Interpretation panel at Castleshaw

There is  a long history of antiquarian interest in the site and a number of excavations were carried out during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. People’s poet, Ammon  Wrigley, leased the field containing the fort and dug a number of trenches in 1898. There is a photograph of this work in Sam Seville’s With Ammon Wrigley in Saddleworth (1984). A few years ago I came across a piece of Roman tile from Castleshaw with Ammon Wrigley’s name written on it that probably comes from this work.  Wrigley is better known as a poet, however, and his lengthy poem Castleshaw  was inspired by the Roman explorations. This is one of the verses:-

Now we see a phantom people
Meet them on the paved way,
Watch them at thier daily labours,
Here within their walls of clay;
But the scenes of pomp and warfare
Who can picture, who can tell
What the tide of Roman conquest
Washed upon this moorland fell?

The first serious work was done by Bruton Andrew and Lees in 1907-8. This is the material in the Manchester Museum archaeology collection. There are sherds of Roman pottery including samian ware, mortaria or grinding or mixing bowls and coarse wares; melon beads; glass fragments including part of a ribbed bowl, and a number of pieces of wood, possibly to be identified as the pilum muralis, the stake used to defend a rampart.

Friends of Castleshaw Roman forts visit to see material from the 1907-8 excavations at Manchester Museum

Sadly some rather spectacular pieces of leather that had been preserved very well in the acidic moorland environment  cannot be located. The photograph shows the uppers of Roman sandals or boots comparable to what has been found at Vindolanda.  They have been missing since at least the 1970s. It woud be brilliant if we could find out what happened to them.

Uppers of Roman shoes from the Pit at Castleshaw – what happened to them?

if you want to find out more about the forts and the potential for further archaeological work, Norman Redhead has written an article in the Saddleworth Historical Society Bulletin (vol.42, no.3, autumn 2012, pp.65-75). Ken Booth’s Roman Saddleworth, the History, Archaeology and Visible Remains of the Roman Occupation of an area in the Pennines  (Saddleworth Archaeological Trust, 2001) is available from the Saddleworth Museum in Uppermill.  There is a small display about Castleshaw in the museum. A visit to the site and the museum in Uppermill is warmly recommended. On a fine day with a picnic, it’s a treat.

Saddlworth Museum display of Castleshaw finds

Incidentally I’d like to thank the anonymous elderly couple who kindly guided me the last part of the way to the car park after I’d taken a wrong turn at the reservoir on Sat.20th July.  I think I mentioned where I worked and why I was trying to find the fort but I didn’t catch their name.

Visit to Hadrian’s Wall with the Friends of Castleshaw Roman Forts

Further to the recent visit by the Friends of Castleshaw Roman Forts to the Manchester Museum to see the finds from the 1907-1908 excavations at Castleshaw, near Manchester, I went on the excursion to Vindolanda Roman fort yesterday organised by the Friends.  

Roman milecastle at Cawfields on Hadrian’s Wall

When we arrived at Vindolanda it was pouring with rain and rivulets were streaming down the coach windows. We made a beeline for the newly refurbished museum and saw the new displays, featuring some of the writing tablets for which the site is famous. Afterwards the weather had settled down and  we stopped off at Cawfields milecastle on Hadrian’s Wall to stretech our legs before the long journey back to Uppermill. The vallum, the earthwork that protected the wall from the south, stood out very clearly as this photo shows.  

The vallum at Cawfields

The new displays at the Vindolanda Museum are well-designed. One of the first cases you see is a particularly handsome case of Roman samian ware pottery. Though visually striking, the new displays seem not to offer the level of detailed information visitors used to enjoy in the old displays. The displays of Roman pottery are more generic and do not give the dates when the various wares were used on the site.

Roman samian pottery on display at Vindolanda

I particulary liked the mass of Roman leather sandals. Objects made of organic materials survives remarkably well in the anaerobic conditions on this site.

Leather sandals on display at Vindolanda Roman fort

 It made me think of the missing leather objects from Castleshaw Roman fort excavated in the early 20th century. They were last seen before the 1970s. Perhaps they will turn up like the neolithic stone axehead found in the Botany department of the Museum last week… If anyone out there has seen them or knows what hapened to them do please let Manchester Museum know.

Uppers of Roman shoes from the Pit at Castleshaw – what happened to them?

Friends of Castleshaw Roman Forts Visit the Museum

Friends of Castleshaw Roman forts at the Manchester Museum

On Friday 12th July members of the Friends of Castleshaw Roman forts came to the Manchester Museum to see finds from the excavations that took place in 1907. I got out a lot of the finds from the store and took them up to the seminar room in the Collection Study Centre. The session was organised by Norman Redhead Heritage Management Director (Archaeology) at the Greater Manchester Archaeological Advisory Service, University of Salford. Norman is in the early stages of a community project to promote interest in what must be one of the most spectacular locations for a Roman fort in Britain. It is on a spur leading off the Standedge, the most important crossing point of the Pennine moors, between Marsden in West Yorkshire and Diggle in Greater Manchester.

Aerial photo of Castleshaw Roman fort and fortlet (courtesy of GMAAS)

It was here that the Romans ceated a fort to control movement across the Pennines during the governorship of Julius Agricola in the late 70s AD. The fort was garrisoned by an auxiliary regiment of the Roman army until about AD 90 and replaced about AD 105 by a smaller fortlet, which sits inside the larger auxiliary fort. At this time the garrison was only about 100 men.  Some time in the 120s the fortlet too was abandoned. The site was excavated in 1907 by Francis Bruton and during the late 1950s and 1960s by Rosser and Thompson.

All the material ought to date, therefore, from the 70s to the 120s AD. This seems to be the case with the glass and the pottery. Pieces of rusticated ware have been found. There are pieces of samian ware although the surface has not survived very well. A piece with gladiators was featured in the 1911 report. Pieces of amphora used to transport wine, olive oil and fish sauce or garum were found though curiously there are relatively few body sherds. Were they weeded out by the Edwardian excavators? There are quite a lot of mortaria, some with stamps.

Mortarium stamp from Castleshaw

I speculated that they may have been making special mashes to feed to the horses that pulled wagons crossing the pass. There are also pieces of Black Burnished ware which was coming into northern Britain from the 120s with the building of Hadrian’s’ Wall. My favourite piece is a piece of tile with a stamp which reads COHIIIIBR(E?) – the fourth cohort of Breuci (?). These were men originally recruited in the Balkans.

Tile stamp from Castleshaw

Finds from the 1907 excavations at Castleshaw

Further work was done by Rosser although the finds from that dig have vanished mysteriously. Sadly the excavator killed himself. Francis Thompson continued the work. One of the discoveries was a pit with broken pieces of beaker pottery, which we have in the Museum. I got out the most complete beaker – which also happens to be the most complete prehistoric pot in the Manchester Museum archaeology collection. Perhaps people in prehistoric times, 4000 years ago, were attracted by the view.

This was probably the first time in many years that the material has been out on a table for people to see. It was great to see a selection of the finds. Although metalwork had not survived particularly well and even the samain pottery looked as though the surface had deteriorated badly in the acidic conditions, some things had survived in very good condition. The glass for instance: there are broken pieces of a beautiful pillar-moulded bowl and several shards from a square vessel with raised circles on the base. There were also three glass gaming counters and a fragment of a glass bangle or bracelet and a number of melon beads. It is not clear whether some of these could have belonged to women or whether men were using them. All of these can be found amongst the Roman finds from  Manchester.

There is great potential to look at the 1907 finds again with the benefit of all the research that has been done since then. Let’s hope Norman’s proposed project with the Friends of Castleshaw Roman forts is successful! You can find out more by reading Norman’s article ‘Renewed interest in the Castleshaw Roman Forts’ in Bulletin of the Saddleworth Historical Society Vol.42, no.3 (autumn 2012), pp.65-74.

Going Potty for Ancient Worlds

Samian pot from Manchester about to undergo conservation

The pace of work is really hotting up now that we’ve entered the last few weeks leading up to the opening of Ancient Worlds on 25th October. As well as checking proofs of the text and the layouts of the displays, we have been taking delivery of loan objects for the new displays and gathering in objects that, in some cases, have only recently been excavated.

The photo above shows a fragmentary Roman samian bowl that was found on the former Tom Garner Motors site at the junction of Great Jackson Street and Chester Road. It was found with a rather nice Roman altar dedicated to the Mother Goddesses back in 2008. The altar is on display in the Museum’s Manchester Gallery. The kind people at Pre-Construct Archaeology kindly got the pot to us, together with a flagon, about ten days ago. They are being worked on by two conservation students who are doing a placement with the Museum, Shiree Roberts and Gabby Flexer from University College London and the University of Durham respectively. Both are studying for a Masters in conservation.

The next photo shows the pot reconstructed.

Shiree working on the Roman samian pot

When I called in earlier today to check on progress Shiree was busy in-filling joins and matching the in-fill to the colour of the samian bowl.

Maximus Factor? A cosmetic job on the samian bowl from Manchester.

It’s a work of art as much as it is a science and you really have to take your hat to the dedicated students who come and work on placements here and make the material presentable to the general public.

Samian pot nearing completion of its makeover

The Roman altar was found by Sarah Duffy of Bolton who was working for Pre-Construct Archaeology on what was only her second dig. It would be great if we could establish contact with Sarah to record an interview about what it was like to discover these Roman antiquities. If you’re out there Sarah and reading this do please contact us at the Manchester Museum.