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| 0:02 | · | Britain used to be divided east and west by this I'm in a quite a substantial ditch here We've got |
| 0:08 | · | a massive bank up to one side just there That'll tell us something important very shortly I'm sure |
| 0:14 | · | But the best thing about this structure just have a look up the top of the bank here Okay So |
| 0:20 | · | if I climb out of the ditch from this point I can see this heads in that direction south for quite |
| 0:26 | · | some distance And if I can spin the camera around without dropping it well we head off to the north |
| 0:33 | · | in that direction for quite some distance too Now broadly speaking I'm in the center of southern |
| 0:37 | · | Britain Geographically well I'm splitting the west from the east So what exactly is going on here now |
| 0:44 | · | if you like your history you've probably heard of a few historic walls in Britain Hadrian's wall in |
| 0:49 | · | the north the Antonine wall even further north and maybe even Offers Dyke and Wansdykes in the early |
| 0:56 | · | to Middle Ages Well now we have another to add to that list Of course it was already on the list but |
| 1:03 | · | looking at the sheer scale and size of this one the direction well I feel it's quite important |
| 1:07 | · | that we talk about it and we try and understand who constructed it what were they doing were they |
| 1:12 | · | protecting the west from the east perhaps how long was it so many questions And maybe those questions |
| 1:18 | · | will help us try and understand the history at the time Welcome to the story of the Bockerley Dyke |
| 1:30 | · | dyke Okay So what exactly can we see today it turns out quite a bit and it's really odd for |
| 1:43 | · | so many reasons So as I'm stood in what I consider to be the middle of the extent of this wall this |
| 1:49 | · | is Martin Down and I'm just inside Hampshire Now the wall and huge bank on that side and the ditch |
| 1:57 | · | that I'm stood in this side not a lot on that side at the moment Well that went at least 2 or 3 km in |
| 2:02 | · | that direction to the north and at least 2 or 3 km in that direction to the south Did it extend |
| 2:07 | · | further is a bit of a question that we'll come to shortly because that plays an important part |
| 2:12 | · | Now if I walk to the other side of the wall if I step through the wall to the west well |
| 2:18 | · | then I'm in Dorset So the modern county border of Hampshire and Dorset actually follows this |
| 2:23 | · | earthwork in significant part Again this could be useful later Well it's a bit windy up here on the |
| 2:30 | · | top of the bank so forgive that But we have an amazing view to the east We can see what we're |
| 2:35 | · | defending against We can see anything incoming towards us Great position Now I want to show you |
| 2:41 | · | something else really crucial but we're going to get out the wind and head that way south about a |
| 2:46 | · | kilometers So one or two km south of where I started And this is Blagdon Hill And it's |
| 2:55 | · | said to be the the greatest extent of this earthwork representing what it used to be |
| 3:00 | · | and used to look like when it was what it was And up here on that hill you really get a sense of it |
| 3:08 | · | Let me climb down into the ditch I'll tell you that we have from width to width that way 27 m |
| 3:17 | · | Now I'm now 5 m from the uh the top of the bank way up there I'm 3 m on this side from the actual |
| 3:26 | · | sort of ground level And don't forget this would have silted up quite a bit And the view here I can |
| 3:31 | · | see from miles I feel like I can almost see back to Ssbury This really rivals things like offers |
| 3:37 | · | dyke and wands dyke But it gets even weirder Now back up to what I referred as the middle |
| 3:42 | · | part of this the Martin down section Things get really curious because this section here is even |
| 3:48 | · | wider largely because it's double ditched as we head north So think of your double ditched hill |
| 3:54 | · | for Okay so there is a lot we can see but what about what we can't see okay so I'm just walking |
| 4:03 | · | up to the top of the ridge here ahead of me This is Stonehill Gate and I'm around a kilometer or |
| 4:10 | · | two south of where I was with the earthworks of Buckley Duck I mean the mad earthworks Now |
| 4:16 | · | according to the old maps well they stop further north of here before we get to this point here |
| 4:22 | · | But but here is the thing The earthworks do continue just with a notable difference |
| 4:31 | · | They're much smaller We're talking maybe a meter instead of 5 m Now this sounds more |
| 4:37 | · | like a boundary ditch like Grim's Ditch and such of the late Bronze Age early Iron Age Okay so take |
| 4:43 | · | a look at this This is part of that smaller line How well that comes out on camera I don't know |
| 4:50 | · | But there is the ditch bank I'm on the counter scarp And that line carries on from Boccoli Dyke |
| 4:58 | · | carries on four or 5 km south keeps on going almost until Verwood direction where it hits |
| 5:03 | · | a valley bottom in a river Now if it's like this on the southern end well I wonder what |
| 5:08 | · | it's like on the northern end I wonder how far north it goes that way and what kind of a huge |
| 5:13 | · | structure we're actually looking at that divided this side on the west that side on the east |
| 5:22 | · | Okay so here things get a little bit messy but this is good So let's map this as we go Now we |
| 5:29 | · | can flip this drone shot and stick it on the Bley Dyke that is on the maps And we can also |
| 5:33 | · | map the current A354 and the Roman road Yep back to that shortly Now do you remember I |
| 5:41 | · | told you just earlier what we saw back at the junction uh the defensive work split into two |
| 5:48 | · | as we head further northwest away from that junction So I'm now to the northwest Well |
| 5:53 | · | they start to split into potentially three different directions Now two start to head |
| 5:58 | · | almost due west and one importantly continues on the northn northwest alignment The one we see back |
| 6:04 | · | towards the south This is labeled as great ditch banks However the single most important thing I |
| 6:11 | · | can see here have a look through this hedge just here Yep there it is as as expected Well we have |
| 6:18 | · | a significant piece of earthwork We've got a um a wall a defensive structure clearly and we've |
| 6:25 | · | got a ditch in front of it So we're defending that side We're defending the southwest This |
| 6:30 | · | side however things change that side of the road As we continue our journey northwest well |
| 6:36 | · | we don't see these strong earthworks anymore we see more of the linear boundary type earthworks |
| 6:42 | · | we saw way back to the south on the other end of this bokeley dyke So while we're seeing a pattern |
| 6:48 | · | here significant earthworks in the main middle section and more like a demarcation on either |
| 6:54 | · | end either side while this is great we feel like we're getting somewhere and don't forget we've |
| 6:59 | · | got great ditch banks marked on many a map again to the northwest of here So could this one have |
| 7:06 | · | carried on that way would it have been another new line over there we've got so many questions |
| 7:10 | · | Perhaps the biggest one is have we dug here at all can we gain some context from those digs |
| 7:16 | · | and do we know who exactly was defending that area there from whatever was coming in from the |
| 7:22 | · | east so Richard Cult came here in the 1700s and he was puzzled and I can completely understand |
| 7:32 | · | why There is a lot to unpack He identified some of the features here but went with the notion that |
| 7:37 | · | this was indeed just a Roman settlement This is good He does some really good diagrams and tries |
| 7:43 | · | to understand the landscape here But there is one person that would enter the scene here and |
| 7:49 | · | they would change everything we know about this landscape They change our understanding of this |
| 7:54 | · | wall this east west divide in steps Augustus Pit Rivers I love that name Now Augustus does |
| 8:03 | · | a lot of work here and firstly he notes what we can see Now Pit Rivers makes some wonderful |
| 8:08 | · | diagrams of this all along it various shapes and sizes but more importantly than all of that for |
| 8:14 | · | us now he speculates how far this wall went Now bear in mind I'm four or five miles northwest |
| 8:20 | · | of Bockley junction back in that direction and even up here one of the routes that he |
| 8:25 | · | speculated well there's an old map this has great ditch banks and that would have been in the field |
| 8:30 | · | just beyond this hedro just here through here into that field too there is nothing left now |
| 8:36 | · | in either side nothing from aerial shots nothing from the liar and even this route |
| 8:41 | · | way here the track that I'm on shows no signs of it because it's been metal however we know |
| 8:45 | · | it was there because they marked marked it on those maps late 1800s And also Pit Rivers does |
| 8:51 | · | speculate that it came out this far and maybe beyond another 5 or 10 miles to the northwest |
| 8:58 | · | Now a quick side note I want to say how much I love Pit Rivers here His writings really |
| 9:03 | · | highlight that any prior research here tends to rely on guesswork of towns and battles and |
| 9:08 | · | campaigns and he wants to stick with hard solid facts and evidence He even quotes Mr |
| 9:13 | · | green in writing and the making of England History indeed can hardly be attempted with |
| 9:18 | · | any profit until the scattered records of research among the roads the villas and the tombs etc of |
| 9:24 | · | this period have been in some way brought together and made accessible I love that So pit rivers we |
| 9:32 | · | digs The year is 1888 And Augustus Pit Rivers Here's the farmer via a friend that seems to be |
| 9:44 | · | digging into one of these huge banks here just the other side of the road at Wood Yates Farm |
| 9:49 | · | He's dressing all of his field in the soil from this bank Augustus Prit Rivers is alarmed by this |
| 9:56 | · | and learns that the farmer also found five Roman coins within it So it inspires him and |
| 10:01 | · | he writes to Sir Edward Hulse who owns all the land here and he says "Can I do some digging?" |
| 10:07 | · | But not just for soil for the land I'd like to do some proper archaeology So those initial coins |
| 10:13 | · | found by the farmer dated 268 AD to 350 AD Now pit rivers didn't have any context of those and their |
| 10:21 | · | placement So to ensure they weren't just later coins scattered on top of the soil or silk he dug |
| 10:27 | · | and he dug deep And in one significant section 30 ft south of the road he found nearly 500 coins The |
| 10:34 | · | key was of course the latest dated one that turned out to be honorious emperor between 393 AD and 423 |
| 10:44 | · | Side note Augustus Pit Rivers actually agreed with Sir Richard Halt [ __ ] on the town that was here |
| 10:50 | · | the settlement and he said it was indeed Vindo Cladia which broadly translated in his eyes to |
| 10:56 | · | um white bank or white ditch Not sure that completely works but we'll run with it |
| 11:02 | · | So Pit Rivers established that this was very late Roman or very early post Roman Now that |
| 11:08 | · | sounds like a nice tidy conclusion but that was only the start because as he was excavating a |
| 11:14 | · | drainage ditch for the settlement here well that went further west and he found another |
| 11:19 | · | ditch and another wall Now because of the way this interacted with the drainage ditch he knew that |
| 11:25 | · | this was earlier than the former So importantly for us Augustus Pit Rivers did some excavations |
| 11:32 | · | on what he referred to as Bocali Junction So it's the bit just ahead of me now where the |
| 11:37 | · | road crosses through the dikes and of course so does the Roman road So he excavated in detail the |
| 11:43 | · | Roman road in order to give us the following sequence One the Roman road was constructed |
| 11:51 | · | no reason to doubt soon after 43 AD Two the rear dyke was constructed sometime after 364 |
| 11:58 | · | AD blocking the Roman road off completely Number three the rear dyke was then filled in Number four |
| 12:05 | · | the Roman road was then laid back on top of the rear dyke as a repair to the route Number five |
| 12:11 | · | the fordikeke was then constructed on top of this newly repaired road sometime after 393 AD |
| 12:19 | · | And never was the Roman road repaired after that time So that was this section kind of complete |
| 12:25 | · | for Augusta's Pit Rivers We have two different phases of construction seemingly blocking off |
| 12:30 | · | the main route west from here But what Augustus found next opened up yet more questions Now as I |
| 12:37 | · | head around half a kilometer or so south to go and show you something quite bizarre Well I'm |
| 12:43 | · | continually staggered by the sheer size and scale of this earthwork In both phases this must have |
| 12:50 | · | taken some significant manh hours Hundreds and thousands perhaps of people all working hard here |
| 12:57 | · | to block off a route They were scared and they feared something coming in from the west This |
| 13:02 | · | is quite a substantial piece of history here and I'm still confused as to why it's not talked about |
| 13:08 | · | more So next up is a really curious feature called the epilment or the shoulder And it's |
| 13:17 | · | not easy to get to but have a look at this The feeling was that perhaps this was the top end |
| 13:24 | · | of an earlier boundary The shoulder bit sticks out as if it was to protect something Pit rivers |
| 13:31 | · | opened up trenches to the west and he found nothing So it didn't go any further than this |
| 13:36 | · | at any point So he opened up a trench on the main part of this shoulder Okay So he found he |
| 13:43 | · | found nothing that he could reliably use to date that apple He found a few surface bits |
| 13:49 | · | and pieces of materials but nothing sort of deep enough that he could say yeah well this |
| 13:53 | · | is definitely the date Now the line of the wall goes there the straight line I say the straight |
| 13:58 | · | line and of course this eplement goes off almost perpendicular in that direction for about 10 m and |
| 14:04 | · | then just stops Now since that point others have conducted from his finds that we could be dating |
| 14:10 | · | this to sometime after 325 AD Well that really just confuses matters even more because that |
| 14:17 | · | implies we now have potentially three different phases of construction three different times in |
| 14:23 | · | a 100redyear period that we needed to defend that side the west from whatever was coming in from the |
| 14:29 | · | east So with that in mind one can possibly back up something that Pit Rivers postulated here So |
| 14:35 | · | this entire defensive wall could have been built on top of a much earlier British linear earthworks |
| 14:41 | · | And by that I mean late Bronze Age early Iron Age You remember earlier on in the video we |
| 14:46 | · | saw to the south side and to the north side of this large wall we saw the more softer linear |
| 14:53 | · | earthwork Well perhaps come the 4th century we needed to build a much stronger defensive wall |
| 14:59 | · | and we needed to build it quick So we already have this line which crosses the Roman road |
| 15:04 | · | Why not build on top of that and use that earlier earthwork as a marker for |
| 15:08 | · | this okay so we have a huge east west divide here We don't know what it was for at this |
| 15:20 | · | stage and we don't even know how long it was Some have speculated 10 mi in that direction |
| 15:26 | · | 10 mi in that direction We just don't know at this stage And of course I've only just heard |
| 15:30 | · | of this in the last sort of year or so when I was researching the Roman road that sits just |
| 15:35 | · | behind us So I guess now here I'm on site and I can see it and touch it and I can get an idea |
| 15:40 | · | of the absolute massive scale behind it Well now I kind of want to try and piece it together and |
| 15:46 | · | put into context what Augustus Pit Rivers did with what we know about those eras in history |
| 15:54 | · | So we're clearly defending the west from whatever was to the east Now we have the |
| 15:59 | · | longestablished settlement of old serum And we have what appears to be a blockage protecting |
| 16:05 | · | a huge stretch of open downland behind us This could have been seen as a vulnerable gap through |
| 16:11 | · | which the lifeline of the Roman road traveled So we have a possible initial date of 325 AD |
| 16:18 | · | down that end Now when I researched that era of Roman history I can't find anything really obvious |
| 16:23 | · | It stands out of why you'd need this behind me right now to defend Who knows and we also |
| 16:29 | · | remember that date was a bit sketchy It was based on some of Augustus Pit River's finds he wasn't |
| 16:33 | · | too sure about But what he was sure about is that coin earliest date 364 AD or soon thereafter And |
| 16:40 | · | lo and behold a bit of research shows us we have the great conspiracy or the great crisis |
| 16:49 | · | We have the picss crossing from Hadron's wall from the north And we have the Scotty from what |
| 16:54 | · | is now Ireland from the west And importantly perhaps for us we have the Saxons arriving from |
| 16:59 | · | Germania And the southwest it said that the entire north and west was overwhelmed Cities |
| 17:06 | · | were sacked But the south and the east not quite Perhaps we have news of this |
| 17:10 | · | spreading fast throughout Britain And perhaps do we have news that Venta Belgaram has been |
| 17:15 | · | taken And will Serum be next and don't forget if you're building in haste which you probably were |
| 17:20 | · | for whatever reason well then you may well follow a line that was already here Don't |
| 17:25 | · | forget we have evidence either side of that huge linear late Bronze Age early Iron Age |
| 17:32 | · | boundary A year or so on and we have relative peace Theodors had driven |
| 17:43 | · | barbarians back to their homelands Now this ties in very nicely with |
| 17:47 | · | Pit Rivers saying that soon after the rear dyke was constructed it was filled |
| 17:51 | · | back in again We have the repair of the Roman road but that's where my guesswork |
| 17:56 | · | stops because sometime after 393 we have the wall going up again perhaps towards the end of the |
| 18:09 | · | Roman rule in Britain And we have the more grander version the Ford dyke and perhaps one that went on |
| 18:15 | · | even further We have evidence of that potentially in a field to the northwest marked on the maps Now |
| 18:23 | · | of course when that ford dyke went up this more grander version and it blocked the Roman road in |
| 18:28 | · | the route west once again well it was never taken down and the Roman road was never repaired So are |
| 18:35 | · | we seeing areas now once again protecting from the incoming Saxons that date of 393 AD does indeed |
| 18:42 | · | mark the earliest point at which this could have been built So could we be talking very late Roman |
| 18:48 | · | era or very early post Roman my feeling is probably an obvious one I guess we have the |
| 18:55 | · | date 393 or thereafter Well perhaps for 10 AD when we see the removal and withdrawal of |
| 19:01 | · | troops from Britain of the Romans Onorius even himself said "Well the Britain will have to look |
| 19:08 | · | after their own." And maybe that's what this is Maybe this wall is again we're just rebuilding |
| 19:14 | · | the wall that was already here refortifying it because now we have no Roman protection and we |
| 19:19 | · | don't know what's coming in from the east Or maybe we do know what's coming in from the east |
| 19:23 | · | But one thing that still staggers me right now even after learning all about this is it |
| 19:28 | · | it's not that well known This is a huge piece of history right here in our landscape and it could |
| 19:34 | · | go on for miles in either direction It really did divide East and West Britain on more than |
| 19:40 | · | one occasion So come and have a look at it Come and see it and maybe ask if we can do |
| 19:44 | · | some more archaeology on it Either way click on the like button I'll see you this time next week |
