GhostOfClayton

There's a Channel 4 documentary on tonight (Monday 4th Feb 2013) at 2100 (GMT) all about this interesting find. Hopefuly, it will answer more questions than it raises.

One of the central buildings in the Auxiliary fort at Housesteads is porportedly a hospital. I think the truth is, though, that there's no real evidence for it being anything else, so that has become the most likely guess. I'm sure it wouldn't take UNRV members long to think of other possible uses, though.

Is that dynasty the Flavians?

Sorry about that. I was using an image from North Lincolnshire council's website, which now seems to have been removed (great pitty!). It was from the mosaic mentioned here. It doesn't really matter now, but it was the centerpiece of that wonderful mosaic, and was Ceres, as evident by the presence of a cornucopia.

Interesting that it's clearly at a reasonable altitude. Former military installation maybe? Or maybe a very early settlement? Very wooded - my guess is mainland Italy

A subject of significant magnitude! It may help this contributor if someone starts by breaking it down into manageable chunks?

I feel I must back Virgil61's comments, particularly on tax. Whilst there is some inconclusive evidence that lowering rates of tax can offer a short- or even medium-term boost to a state's/country's overall economic growth, there is no evidence that this growth is sustainable in the longer term. Quite the reverse. It's like a bucket with small hole in it. You can keep pouring water in, and for a while the bucket will be full, but it will always steadily dribble away through the hole. The only way to keep it topped up, is to keep adding water, which is fine if your resources are infinite. Nothing is. The long term solution to the bucket problem is to fix the hole, and ensure the bucket stays in good order. To translate the metaphor back to the real world, a strong social, economic and logistical infrastructure is the only way to underpin sustainable economic growth in the long term. Unfortunately, the quickest way to achieve this is to pay for it through taxation. Efficiency savings sound wonderful, but can only ever trim round the edges if done properly (ie for sound, rather than politcal reasons). Plus which, there inevitably comes a point where the costs of implementing the measures (having already implemented the cheaper ones) outweigh the actual savings. In short, no-one thinks that tax is a good thing, but while it remains the only way to fund a strong social infrastructure, it's the lesser of two evils. Has this thread wandered off-topic?

Just to give context. Prof. Beard appeared on the BBC's 'Question Time' programme (the BBC's flagship political panel discussion programme) which was broadcast that week from the town of Boston. Since the accession countries joined the EU, Boston has undergone a significant population growth, primarily from Eastern Europe and consisting of economic migrants moving into Boston to work in the agricultural sector, which is massive in the immediate area. Part-time and temporary jobs picking, and preparing vegetables are plentiful, and there are well documented issues with filling the labour demand from the local population - the perception is that no local would be prepared to work that hard for so little money, but given the sheer demand for labour, that can only be a small part of a very complex issue. As inevitably as night follows day, the burgeoning migrant population has been followed by percieved extra pressure on local services (though no clear evidence for this has been documented). Emotions in the town from the right side of the political spectrum have been running high for some time, as you can imagine. Prof. Beard was dragged involuntarily into the fray by commenting that a recent Boston council report (which failed to uphold many of the right's views) was probably correct. This did not endear her to the 'kick them all out, they're stealing our jobs and our women' brigade who seem threatened by inteligent women, and more so by those who are more interested in what they say and do, rather than how they look. Needless to say, protected by the anonimity of the internet, many threw reasoned argument out of the window and resorted to outright mysogeny and hero-worship of UKIP (the 'everyone-knows-we're-racists-but-we-can't-admit-we-are-it's-political-correctness-gone-mad' party). To protect against litigation, it's only my opinion that UKIP are racists. They don't actually say they are. They merely have policies that racists would be naturally attracted to. In my opinion.

You�ll be needing a little historical background for today�s story, so here goes. As the Allies started to gain the upper hand in World War II, they started to plan out their strategy for following a retreating army back to Berlin. Any wartime leader with any sense would dynamite bridges as they retreated over them, and the assumption was that the retreating Nazi army would do the same. So the stickiest problem for the Allies would be getting tanks in sufficient numbers across the Rhine. To this end, they fine-tuned a device that had been first designed to help with the D Day landings, namely the DD tank (or swimming tank). In order to perform this fine-tuning, and also to practice the actual crossing, they needed a river whose width, flow, river bed consistency, banks, etc. provided Rhine-like conditions, and they chose the lower River Trent. A base was set up just outside a small village, and the work began. A Valentine DD (Swimming) Tank being deployed From the age of 4 to the point where I married Mrs OfClayton and couldn�t afford to buy a house there, I lived in the village where that base had been, (though I hadn�t known anything about the base until recently - This was a shame, as my 8 year old self would have loved to have known that, especially as the remains of the base were a regular destination for my childhood wanderings). Even as a very young child, I had exploring feet. In those days, you were kicked out of the house after breakfast with no thought for your health, safety, destination, etc. Thoughts of you never crossed your parents� minds until hunger brought you back to the house some indeterminate time later. And me and my friends explored widely . . . though not as widely as we would have liked. The trouble with living on the banks of a significant river was that you only had 180 degrees of direction to explore, and setting out in an unplanned random direction, meant that half the time you ended up on the river bank with no further option than to explore up- or down-river. So, quite often, we�d end up at the floating tank base. The only thing remaining of that base was a large ramp made from concrete, and surfaced with railway sleepers, (used by the swimming tanks to get into the river), along with a concrete track leading to it from an old sand quarry. We never thought to question what it was. It was just �there�, and always had been. A great place to play. That is to say, it was a great place to play. Nowadays, the parents of any children found playing on a river bank unsupervised would be charged with whatever you get charged with if society deems you�re a neglectful parent with little or no concern to your child�s safety. All parents were like that back then . . and yet here I am, still alive! So the years passed, I grew up to be a man, and the time came (only recently) when I heard that my childhood haunt had this wonderful historic significance, and that a talk all about it was to be held by a historian in the village hall. It was a great talk. Very enlightening. I won�t bore you with the detail � you may not find it as interesting as I did. Afterwards, I noticed a small group of fellow residents of the sleepy little village of Aquis of the Romans, and went over to talk to them. �We�re all going to Bottom Pub,� they said. �Do you fancy coming along?� I did fancy coming along, but that left me with a small problem. Some explanations are necessary: Firstly, you need to know that the village in question sits on a large, steep escarpment, mostly at the top, but with quite a few houses at the bottom. There are two pubs, one at the top of the hill, and one at the bottom. Inevitably, the pub at the bottom became known as �Bottom Pub�. Strangely, the pub at the top was never called �Top Pub�. I don�t know why. In my youth, from when I started going to pubs, I would drink in Bottom Pub. For about five years, it was my �local�. Then, unexpectedly, I was banned. I know what you�re thinking. �GhostOfClayton is a bit of a wrong �un. It�s not surprising he was banned from a pub, the kind of things he no doubt got up to.� Allow me to defend myself. Late one Friday night, much like any other Friday night, myself and two of my friends decided not to take advantage of Bottom Pub�s somewhat flexible opening hours, and left to walk up the hill. Unbeknownst to us, soon after we left, some local low-life decided to bend the radio aerial on a car in the car park. The car in question belonged to a �gentleman� we used to refer to as Crab. He was a moderately successful local businessman in his late forties, who habitually walked sideways when drunk. . . which was very often indeed. An unlikable character who went on to hold the record in the local police station of the individual caught driving with the highest blood alcohol level. In short, just the sort of person that would end up getting their aerial bent outside a pub. Anyway, Crab left the pub soon afterwards and, finding his bent aerial, got a bit cross. With an anger fuelled by a long Friday night�s worth of beer, he got into his car and raced up the hill. The first three unfortunates he found was us and, assuming we were the culprits, he leapt out of the car and grabbed the nearest (me). Now, he wasn�t a big man, and I had a significant height and weight advantage over him, but he didn�t hesitate to tackle me because he had the advantage of wielding what can only be described as a home-made machete, which he proceeded to hold to my throat. Not only did he feel the need to make, or have made, (let�s not mince words here), a bloody big knife, but he also felt the need to carry it in his car, ready for just such an occasion! I told you he was unlikable, didn�t I? I don�t remember how, but we talked him down without harm to any of us, but we did. I think we agreed to hand over money to replace his bent aerial. One way or the other, we lived to see another Friday night. However, on that Friday night, on walking into the pub, we were instantly barred by the landlord, who had heard about the affray, and also judged us to be guilty. Other than being justifiably piqued at this miscarriage of justice, it didn�t bother me too much. There was, after all, another pub in the village. We drank there for a few years until I met the future Mrs OfClayton, and spent less time in the pub. The incident was largely forgotten (apart from a strange incident about 10 years later when Crab made a comment in my presence in the top pub implying he was apologising for wronging me), until the other day. Did I go to Bottom Pub or did I respect my ban and stay away? I�ll leave that one on a cliff-hanger, and fill you in next time.

Fair point. Let's call it 8km. I would have asked "is it coastal?", but the coastline then would be different to the coastline now.

I'll go as far as to say that: i) It's in mainland Italy ii) It's within 5 miles of the coast Am I right?

British Museum Exhibition - Life and death in Pompeii and Herculaneum Date: 28 March

Remembered with great fondness! "Freedom for Tooting!"

Caligula, Nero, Elagabalus, etc. spring readily to mind.

Was it in the Roman province of Belgica?

If I were in charge, these people would be the first against the wall

Interesting. Was this a bit of graffiti, do you know?

The sleepy little village of Aquis of the Romans boasts a fine labyrinth of significant age, but uncertain origin, and it is justly famous, at least in the local area. (I've attached a photo). I was giving a talk at a local museum the other night, unrelated to the labyrinth, but concerning a historic structure located right next to it. Inevitably, there was interest in the Labyrinth during questions after the main talk. One lady asked if it had any religious significance. I stated I didn't know, and then found myself saying that I was unaware of Labyrinths having any religious significance to Romans, but then I thought "do I really know that"? So, the question is: What, if any, significance did the Labyrinth hold in Roman society? (Religious or otherwise)

Is this place connected to the continental part of the Saxon Shore fortifications?

I think the shield wall may have been more stable than you might intuitively think. There's a body of thought that each man in the SW was held in place by a man behind, and probably another behind him. The guy behind is strongly motivated to keep the front guy in place. This would be both through fear of having to take his place, but we mustn't forget that the drilling (both physical and mental) reinforcing of the importance of the SW would have been constant. Let's face it, you had a better chance of surviving behind a stable SW than in a free for all you weren't trained much for.

Sorry - lost the plot there - looking at wrong page - ignore.

As far as the current statue is concerned, this is a tough one. It looks late empire to me. Let's be really bold and say 5th century (or even after).

Agreed, it's definately either some fundamental difference between the threads (or forums), or an individual's settings within the thread/forum.

Interesting one. The setting looks like Rockbourne or Wall, but the masonry most certainly does not. The scenery looks fairly British, but on the grounds I don't recognise it, I'll start the ball rolling with this: It's somewhere outside the Britannia.

Is it Cicero?