Listed 12 sub titles with search on: Information about the place for wider area of: "DERBYSHIRE County ENGLAND" .
CHESTERFIELD (Town) ENGLAND
BROUGH-ON-NOE (Town) ENGLAND
Navio (Brough-on-Noe) Derbyshire, England.
Roman auxiliary fort controlling the Peak district. The Buxton milestone shows
its Roman name. There are four periods on the site: 1) An initial Flavian earth
and timber fort lasting to ca. A.D. 120. 2) Reoccupation ca. A.D. 154-158, attested
by an inscription of the governor Iulius Verus found reused in the sacellum of
the later principia. While the latter was presumably of stone, the granaries and
barracks were of timber and the orientation of the fort had been reversed. 3)
Severan rebuilding in stone of at least the granaries and the principia, with
remodeling of the timber barrack-blocks. 4) Early 4th c. reconstruction of the
barracks as half-timbered structures, and rearrangement of the granary and praetorium.
The end of the military occupation appears to have occurred shortly after A.D.
350, with no trace of a disaster.
The Antonine inscription was found early in this century, but excavations
began only in 1938-39. They revealed a Flavian fort dismantled in the late Trajanic-early
Hadrianic period, probably in the prelude to the construction of Hadrian's Wall.
The Flavian site seemed to show considerable differences in alignment from its
Antonine successor; and this was confirmed in 1966-69 with the excavation of much
of the praetentura of the later fort. The Flavian plan faced in the opposite direction
from that of its successors. Elements of the Flavian praetorium and granaries,
for instance, appeared in the later praetentura on the N side of the Antonine
via principalis. This implies that the early fort faced SW. The defenses on that
side lying within the later retentura had already been discovered. At the NE end
Flavian construction trenches were found sealed beneath the mass of the Antonine
rampart, indicating that the Flavian defenses must have extended farther N. The
N side of the fort must therefore have been subject to erosion from the Noe river
during the 30 or so years between the abandonment of the original fort and the
Antonine reoccupation. The reconstructed dimensions of the Flavian site would
therefore make it at least 1.24 ha, large enough, like Castleshaw, to accommodate
a small infantry cohort.
Less is known of the middle periods of the fort's history. The Severan
reconstruction fits in with developments elsewhere in the Pennines, although continuous
occupation throughout the 3d c. cannot be proved. The fourth and final phase,
however, is more fully documented. The praetentura of the fort was occupied by
six buildings, the outside pair of which were certainly stables aligned per strigas.
They measure 40.5 by 8.4 m, with the weight of the roof carried on the outside
walls and a wall runnnig down the center; mucking-out drains prove that they were
stables. The other half of the building in the area excavated appeared to be a
workshop or smithy rather than living accommodation. Coin evidence points to the
beginning of this occupation period as shortly after the reign of Carausius, and
continuing to the middle of the 4th c. By implication, of course, the garrison
in the late period must have been at least partly mounted, but it is not known
whether the first cohort of Aquitanians known in the Antonine period was still
stationed here.
A postern was apparently created in the E defenses in the early 4th
c., but its function is not clear. Like the E gate, it led to the side of the
hill on which the vicus lay, close to the line of the Batham Gate, the Roman road
leading S to Buxton. A bath building probably lay close to the Noe at the E edge
of the vicus.
G.D.B. Jones, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Feb 2006 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
LITTLE CHESTER (Town) ENGLAND
Derventio (Little Chester) Derbyshire, England.
Mentioned as Derbentione in the Ravenna Cosmography (name from the Celtic name
of the river Derwent). The earliest Roman occupation of Derventio almost certainly
took the form of a fort on the high ground W of the Derwent. The date of its foundation
is obscure, perhaps A.D. 55-65. Later, in the governorship of Cn. Julius Agricola
(A.D. 78-85), a new fort site was adopted on low ground across the river. The
only certain information, from the road pattern of this area, is that the site
was an important junction of N-S and E-W routes.
Occupation is attested during the Hadrianic and Antonine periods and
may well have been military in character. In the 3d or early 4th c. a circuit
of defenses incorporating a stone wall was built, enclosing 2.4 ha; their purpose
is not clear. Outside them to the N, Ryknield Street was lined with stone buildings,
presumably in an extramural vicus. A group of pottery kilns 0.8 km to the E were
active in the early 2d c., producing leadglazed vessels as well as more common
wares. Finds from the area are in the Derby Museum and Art Gallery.
M. Tood, ed.
This text is from: The Princeton encyclopedia of classical sites,
Princeton University Press 1976. Cited Feb 2006 from
Perseus Project URL below, which contains bibliography & interesting hyperlinks.
Receive our daily Newsletter with all the latest updates on the Greek Travel industry.
Subscribe now!
