Free Republic

Roman remains uncovered in central London in 2022 were revealed Tuesday to be an "extremely rare" Roman tomb.The "completely unique" Roman mausoleum was uncovered at the Liberty of Southwark site in London, right between The Shard, Borough Market, and London Bridge station, according to Metro. It is believed to be the most in-tact Roman tomb to be discovered in Britain, but no coffins or human remains appear to have been discovered at the site, the Guardian noted.More than 100 coins, pottery fragments, roofing tiles, and bits of metal have been found at the site, along with a beautiful mosaic. The...

A silver ring unearthed in an Essex field may be connected to a famous Roman jeweller's hoard found in Norfolk in 1985, a historian has said.The ring is inset with a carnelian carving of the god Apollo. It was found by a metal detectorist near Chelmsford...The ring seemed to be from the same workshop as the Snettisham hoard of carved gemstones, she added.The large hoard was found buried in a pot during building work and included 110 unmounted gemstone intaglios - carved gemstones used as seals - silver jewellery and ingots, 110 coins and tools, Its contents are now at...

A team of archaeologists have unearthed evidence of the world’s first cash machine dating back to the Roman empire, buried for centuries in an unassuming field in Hatfield, England...The discovery, located in what appears to be the wall of an ancient bakery at the heart of the commercial Roman town, sheds light on how cash was the cornerstone on which the ancient community was founded and clearly shows the Romans were indeed keen on their ‘dough’.The mysterious fragments and collection of Roman coins, dated to the year AD 289, are traces of one of the world’s first automated monetary distribution...

Roman artifacts including coins, glass beads and brooches turn up in many Irish counties, especially in the east. Cahill Wilson investigated human remains... using strontium and isotope analysis and carbon dating. Remarkably, this allowed her say where they most likely spent their childhood. One burial site on a low ridge overlooking the sea in Bettystown, Co Meath, was dated to the 5th/6th century AD using radiocarbon dating. Most of the people were newcomers to the area, Cahill Wilson concluded. The clue was in their teeth. Enamel, one of the toughest substances in our body, completely mineralises around the age of...

Juvenal's claim was dismissed as poetic exaggeration until archaeological discoveries suggested that the Romans may, after all, have extended their power across the Irish Sea. In 1927 a unique group of burials was unearthed on Lambay, a small island off the coast of County Dublin... Irish archaeologist Barry Raftery plausibly suggests that the burials may represent Britons fleeing reprisals after the Romans crushed a revolt by the Brigantes in the year 74... At Drumanagh in County Dublin, trial explorations have revealed traces of a Roman coastal fort on a promontory jutting into the Irish Sea. The 40-acre site is defended...

The object was listed in the George Petrie Catalogue compiled by the antiquarian William Wakeman in 1867. With the work of the Inventory Project, the object was identified in the Museum crypt and matched with its Petrie catalogue record... The extent of the Roman influence in Ireland has long been debated. The Classical texts imply that due to Ireland's peripheral location, it was not a desirable destination. However the archaeological record has been helping to shed more light on the actual events of this time. Roman objects discovered in Irish contexts exist but they are relatively uncommon, and subsequently the...

Uncovered outside the Roman fortress in Caerleon by a team of staff and students from the School of History, Archaeology and Religion, the port is only the second known from Roman Britain and sheds new light on Wales' role in Roman Britain. The well-preserved remains of the port are located on the banks of the River Usk just north of the city of Newport and include the main quay wall, as well as the landing stages and wharves where ships would have docked and unloaded their cargoes. The team made the find during their on-going excavations of the 'Lost City...

Aerial flood maps of Britain are revealing more than just at-risk regions - they have also led to the discovery of several Roman roads. Amateur archaeologists have been able to use the flood-mapping technology to trace the paths of Roman roads which have remained buried under the land for some 1,600 years. The aerial flood maps were created by aircraft equipped with laser scanners which measure the distance between the aircraft and the ground. Using light detection and ranging (Lidar) technology, the Environment Agency was able to detect the areas of Britain which are most at risk of flooding. The...

Britain's longest road, built almost a century ago, may actually have been used for 10,000 years. Archaeologists were stunned to discover evidence of a Mesolithic settlement alongside the A1, which stretches 410 miles from London to Edinburgh. The site, near Catterick in North Yorkshire, is believed to have been used by people travelling north and south as an overnight shelter, similar to today’s motorway service stations. Items discovered at the settlement include flint tools that date back to between 6000 and 8000 BC. Archaeologist Steve Sherlock said: “This was a place that people knew of – a place they could...

British Pre-Roman Roads Lead to Genesis by Brian Thomas, M.S. * Archaeologists uncovered the remains of a well-maintained and well-built British road beneath an ancient Roman road in 2011. This evidence contrasts what modern texts teach about primitive-pagan peoples inhabiting the land before Caesar conquered it and even draws into question the long ages of human development suggested by evolution. The ancient road, just south of Shrewsbury, was cobbled and even engineered with a camber for draining off water. The Daily Mail reported, "[It] even has a kerb fence system to hold the edge in place."1 Researchers used carbon-dating to...

The findings of Graham Robb, a biographer and historian, bring into question two millennia of thinking about Iron Age Britain and Europe and the stereotyped image of Celts as barbarous, superstitious tribes... "They had their own road system on which the Romans later based theirs," Mr Robb said, adding that the roads were built in Britain from around the 1st Century BC. "It has often been wondered how the Romans managed to build the Fosse Way, which goes from Exeter to Lincoln. They must have known what the finishing point would be, but they didn't conquer that part of Britain...

A suspected Iron Age road, made of timber and preserved in peat for 2,000 years, has been uncovered by archaeologists in East Anglia. The site, excavated in June, may have been part of a route across the River Waveney and surrounding wetland at Geldeston in Norfolk, say experts. Causeways were first found in the area in 2006, during flood defence work at the nearby Suffolk village of Beccles. It is thought the road is pre-Roman, built by the local Iceni tribe. In AD60, the Iceni ambushed one Roman legion and sacked Roman settlements at London and Colchester before being defeated.

The route had long been known as a lost Roman road... dig director Tim Malim noticed that the road had twice been rebuilt, and knew its history could be dated using a technique that tells you when buried mineral grains were last exposed to sunlight. The unexpected result was a more than 80% chance that the last surface had been laid before the Roman invasion in AD43. Wood in the foundation was radiocarbon-dated to the second century BC, sealing the road's pre-Roman origin. And Malim thinks a huge post that stood in 1500BC close to the crest of the hill...

The landmass and the seas have been stretched and flattened Enlarge Image The Tabula Peutingeriana is one of the Austrian National Library's greatest treasures. The parchment scroll, made in the Middle Ages, is the only surviving copy of a road map from the late Roman Empire. The document, which is almost seven metres long, shows the network of main Roman roads from Spain to India. It is normally never shown to the public. The parchment is extremely fragile, and reacts badly to daylight. But it has been on display for one day to celebrate its inclusion in Unesco's Memory...

Feet have trodden on a stretch of Roman road for the first time in 1,600 years. A section of the road has been fully uncovered in the final stages of an archaeological excavation on the former Shippams factory site in Chichester city centre... Jo Taylor, of Pre-Construct Archaeology, which has been carrying out the project with Gifford Archaeology, said the road probably dated from the late first century AD. Postholes on the southern side indicated some form of settlement, which was probably domestic. District council archaeological officer James Kenny said it was a privilege to stand on a Roman street....

Reporting from London — It isn't much to look at: a gray lump of rock behind an ugly metal grill, attached to an even uglier building. You have to crouch down to see it, and its admittedly modest (or maybe nonexistent) charm can seem trifling compared with the glories of St. Paul's Cathedral or Westminster Abbey. Unloved and neglected, lost in the shadows of gleaming bank towers and the bustle of a city hard at work, the London Stone gets short shrift from the tourist hordes and even Londoners themselves. But it's one of the city's most ancient and storied...

English Heritage is conducting stabilisation work at the site Archaeologists have found traces of a Roman settlement at a 5,000-year-old landmark man-made hill in Wiltshire.English Heritage believes there was a Roman community at Silbury Hill about 2,000 years ago. The 130ft Neolithic mound near Avebury - one of Europe's largest prehistoric monuments - is thought to have been created some 3,000 years earlier. Experts carrying out a project to stabilise the hill say the site may have been a sacred place of pilgrimage. Human activity English Heritage geophysicist Dr Neil Linford said: "We are really excited by this discovery...