Life and Death in Roman Carlisle makes an important contribution to the study of burials and identity in the region of Hadrian’s Wall. The book presents the results of excavations beneath Cumbria House, a new municipal building on Botchergate in the city centre. In Roman times this was the location of part of a roadside cremation cemetery associated with a fort established by the Roman army in AD 73. Those buried in this part of the cemetery died in the years just prior to and during the building of Hadrian’s Wall, when Luguvalium was emerging as the most important Roman military base and largest urban centre in northwest Britain. As a result of this swift rise in profile, the early settlement-edge funerary enclosures quickly went out of use, being swallowed up and overbuilt by the expanding extramural settlement.
Early Roman Carlisle would have boasted a vibrant multicultural population, and this is reflected in its burial evidence. Among the remains of some twenty cremation burials excavated at Cumbria House are the two most richly furnished examples from northern Britain. While the large assemblages of ceramic grave goods are unlike those of any other burials in the military north, close parallels are known from the France/Belgium border, in the former territory of the Nervii. The Nervians were described by Julius Caesar as having the fiercest fighters of all the Gallic tribes and this area was a major source of recruitment for the Roman army. Most of the pottery vessels placed in the graves were produced locally, probably at kilns within Roman Carlisle, and thus must have been made to order by those familiar with both the burial rites and the ceramic repertoire of the Nervian region.
The presence of a community of Nervians living in Luguvalium in the early second century is a new discovery but fits well with previous arguments made about the possible replacement of the Ala Gallorum Sebosiana with another unit from Gallia Belgica when the fort at Luguvalium was completely rebuilt around AD 105. Meticulously referencing the relevant literature from Roman Britain and the Continent, the authors explore the significance of the new data for our understanding of the make-up of Roman Carlisle’s population and the identity of its various garrisons.
Contents
List of Figure
List of Tables
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1: Roman Carlisle and the Cumbria House Excavations
Introduction
The Roman conquest up to the building of Hadrian’s Wall
Carlisle’s Roman forts
Luguvalium in the Flavian period
The extramural settlement in the 2nd century AD and beyond
Funerary and settlement evidence previously excavated in the area of Botchergate
Chapter 2: The Stratigraphic Sequence
Introduction
Phase 1 - Initial roadside plot division (late 1st – early 2nd century AD)
Phase 2 – The creation of funerary enclosures and burial plots (early 2nd century AD)
Phase 3 – The expansion of Luguvalium (early-mid 2nd century AD)
Phase 4 – Continued occupation (mid-2nd century AD)
Phase 5 – Reorganisation of space (second half of 2nd century AD)
Phase 6 - Abandonment (late 2nd century AD)
Phase 7 - Medieval
Phases 8 & 9 - Post-medieval and Modern
Discussion of Roman cemetery and settlement stratigraphy
Chapter 3: The Burials
Introduction
Catalogue
Inscribed Tombstone Fragment
Gaming Board fragment
Chapter 4: The Human Remains
Introduction
Types of deposits
Bone fragmentation, preservation and identification
Demography
Pathology
Aspects of Cremation and Funerary Practice
Summary
Chapter 5: The Roman Pottery
Introduction
Methodology
The pattern of supply
The Roman fabric groups
Discussion of fabric groups
Fine wares
Coarse wares
Comparison with other sites in Carlisle
The composition of the cremation burial group
Chapter 6: Interpreting the Roman Cremation Cemetery
Introduction
The Cumbria House site in the context of Roman Carlisle
Comparison with cemeteries in northern Britain
Comparison with cemeteries in southeast Britain
Comparison with cemeteries in Gallia Belgica
Conclusions: a community of Nervians at Luguvalium?
Appendix 1: Osteological Methods
Appendix 2: Osteological Results Tables
Appendix 3: The Animal Bone
References
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