Jana Brejlová
MCR, 1. ročník
THE ROMAN TIMES
IN BRITAIN
Říjen 2005
RAMZ1
The Britain before The Romans
Before the Romans invaded, the Celts ruled Britain. The Celts were divided up into different
tribes ruled by kings or chiefs who lived in hill forts.
In Celtic Britain there were no towns, as such. Most people were farmers who lived in round
thatched houses made from wood. There were no roads. And neighbouring tribes would often
quarrel, which sometimes led to vicious battles between them.
For 400 years, Rome brought a unity and order to Britain that it had never had before. Prior to
the Romans, Britain was a disparate set of peoples with no sense of national identity beyond that
of their local tribe.
1. Caledonian Confederacy
2. Damnonii
3. Selgovae
4. Votadini
5. Carvetii
6. Novantae
7. Brigantes
8. Parisi
9. Coritani
10. Cornovii
11. Deceangli
12. Ordovices
13. Demetae
14. Silures
15. Dobunni
16. Catuvellauni
17. Iceni
18. Trinovantes
19. Cantiaci
20. Regnenses
21. Atrebates
22. Belgae
23. Durotriges
24. Dumnonii
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The Roman Invasion
Why did the Romans invade?
In 55 B.C. the Roman general Julius Caesar conquered France (At that time the country was
called Gaul, and the Romans called it Gallia). The Gauls fought hard against the Romans and had
been helped by their friends in Britain. Caesar was upset by their assistance and decided to teach
the Britons a lesson. As the story goes.
Julius Caesar made two attempts to invade Britain, first in 55 B.C. and then again in 54 B.C.
Both times the British warriors and the rotten British weather made his army give up and return
to Gallia. Caesar had some interesting comments concerning the natives: „All the Britons paint
themselves with woad, which gives their skin a bluish color and makes them look very dreadful
in battle.“
Nearly a hundred years later in 43 A.D. the Emperor Claudius sent another army to invade
Britain. This time the Romans were successful, Roman Britain had begun!
The Invasion
Some Celts decided to make peace with the Romans in return for keeping their kingdoms. These
people were called client kings, and they had to agree that once they died the Romans could take
over their lands.
Other British leaders, such as Caratacus, carried on fighting against the Romans until they were
captured.
In some parts of Britain there were still fierce battles against the Romans. For example at Maiden
Castle (a huge hill fort near Dorchester in Dorset), where the Romans won the battle.
Britain became a part of the Roman empire – it was a province ruled by a governor and its
people paid taxes to the Romans. They wanted the gold, silver and bronze and also the timber
and men which Britain had.
The Roman history of Britain
By AD 47, the legions had penetrated as far south-west as Cornwall, as far west as Wales and as
far north as the Humber. The Romans began constructing a system of military roads, founded
Londinium (modern London) and built a crossing over the Thames (near the site of present
London Bridge). By AD 60, the frontier had been pushed further and more tribes had been taken
under Roman „protection“.
In 61 A.D. the Romans faced their most serious problem yet - the Celts were rebelling. Boudicca
queen of the Iceni, led uprising against the Roman occupiers, but was defeated and killed by the
Roman governor, Suetonius Paulinus.
Between 75 and 77 AD the Roman conquest of Britain was complete and Julius Agricola became
an imperial governor. But the Romans could not conquer „Caledonia“ as they called Scotland,
althouhg they spent over a century trying to do so.
Once the Romans invaded Britain they had to defend it against constant attack from Celtic tribes
and from people trying to invade. To do this, they built forts around Britain for the soldiers to
live in. At first they were built of wood, later they were built of stone. E.g. the Saxon Shore fort
at Portchester was so big that hundreds of years later people built a whole castle in just one
corner of it!
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The threat from Scottish Barbarians grew, and in 122 A.D. the Emperor Hadrian ordered his
soldiers to build a wall between Roman Britain and Scotland so called Caledonia. The wall was
seventy-five miles long and two to three metres thick and there were forts along it.
About ten years later the Romans built another – this time Antonine’s
Wall. But by AD 160, the Romans again had abandoned their gains
north of Hadrian's Wall as too difficult to maintain.
By AD 216, Britain had been divided into two provinces. Britannia
Superior, comprising south and west, had two legions based at Caerleon
and Chester, and Britannia Inferior, the north, had one legion at York
and auxiliary troops in forts and on Hadrian's Wall. In the south, there
followed a period of relative peace in Britain until 300.
In 367, there was a concerted land and sea invasion of the British
province by the Picti (Picts) of Northern Britain, the Irish, Scoti (also
from Ireland), Attacotti (reputedly a cannibal - and probably an island tribe), and some Saxons. Hadrian's Wall was overrun. The invasions
continued and by 400, three non-Roman kingdoms were established
north of Hadrian's Wall - Strathclyde (south central „Scotland“),
Gododdin (modern Lothian) and Galloway. South-east Britain continued
to prosper.
The Angles (from Schleswig-Holstein), Saxons and Jutes (from Jutland)
invaded and settled extensively in southern and central Britain from the
late fourth century onwards.
These Germanic peoples continued to arrive throughout the fifth and sixth centuries, forming the
South Saxon Kingdom (or Sussex), the West Saxon kingdom (or Wessex), and the East Saxon
kingdom (or Essex).
Roman control of Britain came to an end as the empire began to collapse. In AD 409 Rome
pulled its last soldiers out of Britain and the Romano-British, the Romanised Celts, were left to
fight alone against the Scots, the Irish and Saxon raiders from Germany. The following year
Rome itself fell to raiders. When Britain called to Rome for help against the raiders from Saxon
Germany in the mid-fifth century, no answer came.
The Roman influence
The Roman army left Britain over 1,500 years ago. They left behind a huge legacy. Many types
of animals and plants were brought to Britain in Roman times e.g. sweet chestnut trees and
chickens.
And that is not all. The Romans completely changed Britain. They brought their culture, way of
life, administration and architecture.
When we travel many people still measure distance in miles and until recently we measured most
things in feet and inches. All these are Roman measurements.
Reading and writing were also introduced by the Romans. Before the Romans arrived nobody in
Britain knew how to read or write. Stories and knowledge could only be passed on by word of
mouth.
The Romans also helped the English language. Many words in English and Welsh have been
borrowed from the Latin language. For about a thousand years after the Romans left nearly all
books in Britain were written in Latin.
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The Romans give the Britain its name – it comes from the Greco-Roman word „Pretani“ so
called inhabitants of Britain.
What did the Romans bring to Britain?
The most obvious characteristic of Roman Britain was its towns, which were the basis of Roman
administration and civilisation. Many grew out of Celtic settlements, military camps or market
centres. There were three types of towns in Roman Britain – coloniae with Roman settlers,
municipia – large cities where the whole population was given Roman citizenship and the third
one were civitas which included the old Celtic tribal capitals. At first these towns had no walls
and later all towns had thick stone walls. Each town was built to a plan. The romans liked
everything to be organised and orderly. The streets were laid out in a criss cross pattern. Usually
they would have two main streets that divide the town. Smaller streets led off these at right
angles.
Many of these towns were at first army camps and the Latin word for camp, castra, has remained
part of many town name to this day e.g. – Gloucester, Winchester, Chester and many others.
Outside the towns, the biggest change during the Roman occupation was the growth of large
farms, called „villas“. These belonged to the richer Britons who were, like the townspeople,
more Roman than Celt in their manners. Each villa had many workers. The villas were usually
close to towns so that the crops could be sold easily.
Another important feature is road system. When there was trouble soldiers needed to march
from one part of the country to another quickly. As a result the Romans built proper roads
instead of muddy tracks because they were easier to walk along. This also made travelling
around Britain easier for everyone. You can still see the remains of some Roman roads today.
The Romans constructed over 10,000 miles (15,800 km) of roads in Britain.
When the Romans came, they introduced a system of politics were the whole country was
governed from one capital town. In Britain, this was Camulodunum (Colchester), but around the
time of the Boudiccan rebellion of 60/61AD, this became Londinium (London).
Life in Roman times
Family life
The average Roman family consisted of father, mother, children,married sons, their family, and
slaves. If you did not get married by the age of 15-16, you were punished. The person who
decided who his children marry was the head of the house, the father. The family was very
important to the Romans. Women were under control of their husbands but controlled how the
house was run.
Life in Roman times for women was quite hard. The father was the most important member of
the family. He had the power of life or death over everyone. When a new baby was born it would
be laid at its father's feet - if the father picked the baby up it would live, and if he ignored the
baby it would be taken away to die. Mothers and children were never seen as important.
From the 1st century B.C. women began to have more rights and could divorce unkind husbands.
But they were never seen as really being equal to men.
The Roman schools
Rome did not have any public schools. Most children went to private school or studied at
home.Their subjects were reading, writing, and arithmetic. In many homes, the slaves taught the
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children.These slaves were called the pedagogues. Before the age of fourteen, they studied Latin
and Greek.
The Romans used only 7 letters to represent all numbers . .
I = 1 V = 5 X = 10 L = 50
100 D = 500 M = 1000
C=
The Roman Games
The two games that the Romans liked to watch the most were chariot racing and gladiator fights.
Chariot races were the most popular of all. The Circus Maximus could have twenty-four chariot
races a day.
A racing chariot was a small two-wheeled cart, pulled by fast horses. Racing was very dangerous
and riders often fell off and were killed. There were four teams : the Reds, Blues, Greens and
Whites. People supported one team and cheered on its drivers - just like supporting a football
team today.
Gladiators were slaves or prisoners made to fight each other, or wild animals, in front of crowds.
These fights were a part of events called "the games". They took place in huge open-air buildings
called amphitheatres. At the end of a gladiator fight the emperor would often give a "thumbs up"
or a "thumbs down" signal. This was to show whether he wanted the loser to live or to die.
The Spas and Baths
Visiting of bath or thermae was extremely popular among Romans and the people of Britain
begun to enjoy it as well. But the main reason for going to the baths was not just washing the
body. It was also a place where some people went to meet friends and spare time. Large bath
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houses had restaurants, games rooms, snack bars, libraries, and even sport facilities. Baths could
be very hot where people sat round as in a sauna or very cold. Men and women either had
separate bath houses or used the same one at different times.
Most of the Roman baths were free, but those baths that had a nominal fee, had the fee to keep
out the slaves and the poor who could not afford it. If you were a Roman, you would know that
the public baths were as much a way of life as they were a place to wash.
It is most likely that you would have felt uncomfortable going to the bathroom at any other
Roman bath, for that matter. Romans were far less shy about bodily functions than we are.
Acts we consider private—bathing and going to the toilet—were done by the Romans in public
and without shame. The seats of the toilets at Roman baths are close together. And there is little
historical evidence that men and women had separate bathroom (or bathing) facilities.
The best example of roman thermae is Bath near Bristol, where the buildings have remained
remarkably intact for the last 2000 years.
Ordinary people
The Roman occupation brought about many changes to life in Britain, but these developments
mainly affected the upper classes, those who could afford to build heated villas and visit the
baths. To the ordinary farmer of Iron Age the Roman invasion did not affect his day to day living
to a great extent and for some time he continued to wear his Celtic woollen clothes, live in his
thatched round hut and feed his family on the food that he himself had grown.
What did the Romans leave behind?
On the whole Roman institutions and culture were not enormously influential on the British
Celts. The Celts in the north and in Wales fiercely resisted Roman culture, and the Romans never
even set foot in Ireland. And Romans more greately respected and tolerated Celtic institutions
and religions in Britain, so there was considerably less assimilation then in Gaul. Because of this,
when the Romans left Britain, there was a renaissnace of Celtic culture. The British, however,
had learned a very important concept from the Romans: political unity.
In the end the Romans left behind them just three things of value: that was Welsch Christianity,
the roads and the importance of certain new cities, especialy that of London.
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Used sources:
Literature:
An Illustrated history of Britain – David McDowall, Longman
Web sites:
http://www.britannia.com/history/tribes.html
http://www.smr.herefordshire.gov.uk/roman/life_index.htm
http://www.romans-in-britain.org.uk/
http://www.the-orb.net/encyclop/early/origins/rom_celt/romessay.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/romans/
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/romanway1.shtml
http://www.romanbaths.co.uk
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/timelines/britain/rom_invasion.shtml
http://atschool.eduweb.co.uk/nettsch/time/romans.html
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