Towns
What sort of town was Camulodunum (Colchester)?
A colony of Roman veteran soldiers.
At least 90%
Why were shrine sites often the focal point of small metalworking industries?
Pilgrims expected to be able to purchase souvenirs like votive statuettes, metal votive letters and messages for gods, curse tablets.
What sort of work were slaves doing in Roman Britain?
Tilling soil, turning water wheels, mining, shepherd and herdsmen, sexually exploited.
What sort of town was Roman Viroconium Cornoviorum (Wroxeter)?
How do we know what tribe it governed?
A civitas (government centre)
It controlled the Cornovii (it's in the name)
What is a villa?
Country houses surrounded by estates. They were the focus for a community that might include several generations or branches of a family, their servants, estate workers and probably slaves. Villas included a main house (often grand and pretentious!), barns, housing for estate workers, fields, etc.
What foodstuffs did the Romans in Britain import and from where?
Amphorae of wine, olive oil, olives, fish sauce from Turkey, Lebanon and the Mediterranean.
Give one good and one bad effect the Roman's had on health in Britain.
Good
They introduced new forms of medicine.
They had enough iron in their diet to prevent anaemia.
Romano-British were taller than their predecessors – 1.7m for men and 1.6m for women.
Bad
They brought with them unfamiliar diseases that the Britons had no immunity against (leprosy, tuberculosis, polio and gout)
There were more dental problems due to the sugars in their crops.
Describe the buildings used for entertainment in a Roman town.
Theatre - speeches and plays.
Amphitheatre - fights.
Identify three non-food farm products that were produced in Roman Britain
Woollen coats, wool rugs, leather shoes, bone objects (weaving frames, pins, combs, hinges, gaming pieces).
Why was timber so important to the Romans? What was it used for?
The Latin word for timber, materia, is the origin of the English word ‘material’. It was used to construct early forts and public buildings (later replaced by stone), towns, housing, ships, carts, tools, writing tablets, sculpture, fuel.
Give one example of a merged Roman/British god.
Mars Camulos (a war god)
Sulis-Minerva (a nourishing mother goddess)
Describe the sanitary buildings in a Roman town.
Public baths - hot and cold pools and exercise yards. Used for bathing, exercise and also as meeting places.
Public latrines - toilets.
Public wells and water supplies.
Describe Fishbourne Palace.
The most elaborate villa in Roman Britain is Fishbourne. This large and well-decorated ‘palace’ may have been the home of the client king Togidubnus or may have been used by the Roman governor (or both at different times).
An elaborate and substantial stone-walled villa, which included a courtyard garden with colonnades and a bath suite.
The full-size palace with four residential wings surrounding a formal courtyard garden of 75 by 100 metres was built in around 75–80 CE, incorporating the villa in its south-east corner.
Why is pottery a useful source of information for historians and archaeologists? What can be learnt from it?
Broken pottery absorbs traces of foodstuffs and is dumped in huge amounts. They can show evidence of the movement of food and trade. They were also often used for storage (eg. coin hoards).
Identify one piece of archaeological evidence that shows slavery existed in Roman-Britain.
A document dating to c. 75-125 talks about a slave girl called Fortunata who was bought for 600 denarii by an imperial slave Iucundus.
Leg irons have been found at Caistor-by-Norwich.
What was the most important building in a Roman town?
What was it used for?
The forum-basilica complex.
It consisted of an open piazza surrounded by commercial buildings on three sides. The fourth side was the basilica which was used for the town council and court.
What food and associated items have survived from Roman-Britain? What archaeological evidence exists?
An amphora found in the Thames still contained 6000 olives. Amphorae with labels attached (wine, olives, brine). Preserved wooden barrels. Grain carbonised by fire – an example from London burnt during Boudicca’s revolt was imported from the Mediterranean.
Give one of the two pieces of evidence provided by the Roman geographer Pliny the Elder on mining lead in Britain.
1. British lead “used to make pipes” was abundant and more easily extracted than the lead in Gaul and Spain.
2. A law was passed to limit production of British lead so that the prices wouldn’t be driven down through an oversupply.
Give an example of a Romano merchant who travelled between Britain and the rest of the Roman empire.