stirling-1963-vol-1/05_070

Transcription

INTRODUCTION : THE ROMAN PERIOD

THE ANTONINE PERIOD
After an interval of some forty years Roman troops again advanced into Scotland early in the
reign of Antoninus Pius, and re-occupied the Lowlands. The milecastles and turrets of Hadrian's
Wall were now left unmanned, and a new frontier barrier, the Antonine Wall (No. 111) was
erected between the Firths of Forth and Clyde. The new Wall (Fig. 30) was thirty-seven miles
in length and was built of turf on a stone foundation about 14 ft. in thickness. In front of it
there was a broad ditch, and a short distance behind there was a road, the Military Way, which
not only provided through communication across the isthmus, but also served to link together
the nineteen forts, spaced at intervals of about two miles, in which the garrison was housed.
Since 1934, air-photography and excavation have considerably advanced our knowledge of the
anatomy of the Wall and its supporting works. The long-lost terminal fort at the eastern end,
Carriden, has been located, ¹ and the chance discovery of an inscribed altar has enabled the site
to be identified with Veluniate, the first of the forts on the Antonine Wall named in the
Ravenna Cosmography, ² where it appears as Velunia. Further west, certain buried remains of
the forts at Auchendavy ³ and Castlehill ⁴ have been observed and recorded from the air in the
form of crop-markings, while excavation has recovered the plan, and much of the complicated
structural history, of the fort at Duntocher. ⁵ An apparent gap in the frontier system as a whole
has also been partly closed by the detection of an auxiliary fort at Whitemoss, ⁶ near Bishopton,
and of a small patrol-post on Lurg Moor, ⁷ behind Greenock - these two works being evidently
elements in a chain of fortifications designed to prevent the vulnerable western flank of the
Wall from being turned by sea. Equally important is the discovery of two small defensive
enclosures, or fortlets, which are attached to the south side of the Wall itself at Wilderness
Plantation ⁸ and Glasgow Bridge. ⁹ A post similar to these has long been known to have existed
at Watling Lodge (No. 114), and, as each of these three posts in question lies approximately
half way between a pair of forts, it may be that they are members of a series which extended
for the entire length of the Wall, and which, like the milecastles on Hadrian's Wall, housed
the patrolling garrison - the fighting garrison being accommodated in the forts. On the other
hand, no trace has so far been found on the Antonine Wall of any structure akin to the turrets
of Hadrian's limes. Excavation has endorsed Macdonald's opinion that the curious turf
platforms known as "expansions" (Figs. 31 and 32), which project from the rearward side
of the Wall in a few paces, are stances for beacons. ¹⁰ But such beacons appear never to have
been numerous, and their position suggests that they were intended for long-distance
communication with the forward and rearward areas rather than for local signalling along the
Wall. Lastly, temporary camps, which were previously unknown in the vicinity of the Wall,
have now been identified from the air in some numbers. Such camps, consisting of a simple
rampart and ditch, were normally constructed wherever troops were concentrated for short
periods, and it has been suggested that two of the Stirlingshire examples - Little Kerse

1 P.S.A.S., lxxxiii (1948-9), 167 ff.
2 Ibid., xc (1956-7), 1.
3 J.R.S., xli (1951), 61.
4 Ibid.
5 Robertson, op.cit.
6 P.S.A.S., lxxxiii (1948-9), 28 ff.
7 J.R.S., xliii (1953), 105.
8 Ibid., xli (1951), 61.
9 Ibid., xlv (1955), 86.
10 P.S.A.S., xc (1956-7), 161 ff.

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