The Archaeology of Britain: An introduction from ... - waughfamily.ca

Roman Britain: civil and rural society
• 161 •
TOWNS
Much excavation and publication has centred on towns, for they were central to the Roman way
of life, and even today commendatory words such as ‘civilized’ and ‘urbane’ derive from Latin
words for town. Their cultural importance, to say nothing of their administrative usefulness,
caused the Roman authorities to encourage the development of towns. Thus the appearance,
development and disappearance of towns reflects as nothing else the impact of Rome on Britain
(Wacher 1995). Traditionally, Roman towns in Britain have been placed in a classificatory hierarchy
based on their rank in the Roman administrative system, but to the archaeologist there is a simple,
two-fold grouping on size and morphological grounds.
Large’ towns
The group of ‘large’ towns comprehends the major centres, those that the Romans ranked as
coloniae, and the civitas-capitals. The coloniae were originally purposive foundations by the Roman
authorities at Colchester, Gloucester and Lincoln, where veteran legionaries were settled; later
York and probably London were given the title as an honour. A civitas was a unit of local government
based on the territories of the late Iron Age tribes and administered by the Romanized tribal
elite; each civitas was run from a principal town.
Despite differences in rank, these ‘large’ towns shared many characteristics. They were formally
laid out on an orthogonal street-grid. They contained a range of public buildings in Romanderived
form for administration and leisure. Chief amongst these was the forum/basilica complex,
which was the administrative seat of the governance of the civitas. Each ‘large’ town also had a set
of public baths, not just places for getting clean but also principal centres for leisure and social
activity. These would entail a water supply and a sewerage system for the town. Other buildings
for leisure and entertainment might
include an amphitheatre (for games
and spectacles) or, more rarely, a
theatre (for plays and mimes), along
with temples. No certain example of
a circus or hippodrome for horse
and chariot racing has yet been
found in Britain, and the theatres
and amphitheatres tend to be small
and unimpressive compared with
continental examples.
All of these activities were
derived from Roman culture and
took place in Roman-style buildings,
yet they represent a British
phenomenon, for it would have been
the local elites of the civitates who
would have paid for them (not the
Roman authorities). By choosing so
to do, the Romans and to their social
sub-ordinates their acceptance of
Roman these elites demonstrated
both to ways and of the
Mediterranean ideal of euergetism
(civic benefaction).
Figure 9.2 Plan of the civitas-capital at Silchester, Hampshire, showing the
grid plan, defences, public and private buildings.
Source: Boon, G.C., 1974. Silchester: the Roman town of Calleva. Newton Abbott:
David and Charles