Rocks 'n' Romans
As the resourceful Romans rolled out their conquest of the North, they relied on the rocks they found along the way. Tony Henderson reports.
What have the Romans ever done for us? the Monty Python team asked famously in their film Life of Brian.
Northumberland geologist Ian Jackson poses a variation on the theme: “What did rocks ever do for the Romans?
His answer is: “Pretty much everything.”
He should know, having spent 18 years surveying the geology of part of the North for the British Geological Survey.
Born in Carlisle, Ian studied geology and geography at Newcastle University and now retired, he lives at Bardon Mill near Hadrian’s Wall
“I was raised at one end of Hadrian’s Wall and went to university at the other end. The Wall has been a persistent thread in my life. Even when living well to the south I was a sponge, absorbing anything about this northern landscape and particularly connections between the rocks and the Romans,” he says.
Ian has written three books on the rocks which are a fundamental part of the landscape of Northumberland, County Durham and Cumbria.
His finely illustrated new book, The Rocks at the Edge of Empire, visits 50 locations which tell the tale of the Romans and the landscape of their northern frontier and in doing so straddles geology and archaeology.
The rocks they came across influenced their defences, provided building materials and the metals for their weapons and tools.
They used coal to smelt the metal and for heating, especially in their bath houses.
Around the Roman fort of Condercum in Benwell in Newcastle are up to 30 seams of coal. A dig in 2017 uncovered a building used for coal storage.
“From the evidence we have, the Roman military used coal all along the Wall,” says Ian.
Rocks ground their flour, copper and clay pots cooked their food.
Lead was an especially valuable resource. Lead caulking is still in place between the stone blocks water tank at Housesteads Fort in Northumberland.
Epiacum fort, also known as Maiden Castle, in the South Tyne Valley, is on the Maiden Way which heads towards Hadrian’s Wall and is thought to have guarded lead mining and processing operations in the area.
Lead, umber and ochre were ingredients in pigments, jasper and jet were worked into jewellery, gypsum prepared the dead for burial, and inscribed stone served as tombstones, monuments and altars.
Ian examines the challenges faced by the Roman army and its commanders, surveyors, craftsmen, soldiers and quartermasters as they forged a route through diverse landscapes and built their bases.
“For the Romans, an understanding of the landscape was not just desirable, it was essential. Their day today lives and the resilience of the infrastructure of the Empire depended on it,” says Ian.
The hard rock of the Whin Sill crags in Northumberland was an ideal barrier on which to site a 28-kilometre stretch of Hadrian’s Wall.
It has produced some of the most scenic views of Hadrian’s Wall country, such as Crag Lough at the foot of the Whin Sill cliff in Northumberland, a lake occupying a depression created by the last Ice Age.
But not every mile of the Wall went smoothly. From Byker in Newcastle to Wallsend there is a thick layer of clay and silt, the legacy of a glacial lake which covered most of Tyne and Wear.
This made for unstable ground and a part of the Wall near Segedunum fort at Wallsend has been found to have collapsed and been rebuilt, on as many as four occasions.
Proceeds from the book will go to the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne, which has long been immersed in Wall studies.
Society president, archaeologist David Heslop, says of the book: “It should spur the mind to look differently at everyday objects and structures so that, like the ancient surveyors, craftsmen and military quartermasters of our region, we too understand and appreciate the characteristics and qualities of the geological treasure house that is the north of England.
The Rocks at the Edge of the Empire, by Ian Jackson, published by Northern Heritage, £12.