4-ROMAN 32-66 24/8/06 4:54 am Page 2 CHAPTER VIII INTERNAL STRUCTURES Given the fact that camps accommodated soldiers, their significant height when the camp was built), others remain as baggage, horses, mules and supplies for a relatively short substantial mounds within the camp perimeters, as at space of time and accommodation took the form of leather Brompton (the SE corner) and Stretford Bridge. At Llanfor I tents, their interiors contained few, if any, built features, and the W defences of the camp carefully skirted the margin of a those which did exist rarely reveal themselves as large Bronze Age barrow (which must have stood to an archaeological entities. Structures that we do know of within appreciable height); hence, a kink in the course of the camp camps include tribunalia – earth or turf platforms used for defences where the ditch curves inwards in order to avoid the ceremonial or auguratorial purposes – illustrated on Trajan’s mound. It is interesting to note that the same barrow proved no column, rubbish and latrine pits, and cooking facilities – obstacle to the presumably slightly later ‘supply base’ at hearths and ovens. In respect of the last named structures Llanfor, which incorporates it within the enclosure. On large-scale excavations within the 45-ha (110-acre) camp at occasion, however, the mound, instead of being excluded, as is Kintore in Aberdeenshire has now produced evidence for over the case at Hindwell Farm I, was actually incorporated within 180 ovens and numerous pits. But such large-scale excavations the angles of the defences, as at Bromfield (the SE corner) and within temporary camps are uncommon. Moreover, the Kintore Stretford Bridge I, thus potentially forming an elevated look- ovens have produced a variety of dates suggesting that not all out point, though, of course, the mound may have been were necessarily Roman in date (Alexander 2000; Cook & levelled by the builders. At Stretford Bridge I the crop-mark of Dunbar 2004). It may be occasionally difficult to distinguish an oval, ditched enclosure – probably a prehistoric funerary or features contemporary with the camps from those of earlier or ritual monument – lies within the NW part of the site and may later date, especially when revealed as crop-marks, and the also have affected the tented arrangement in this quadrant. ovens at Kintore are a case in point. At others, disturbances More problematical are archaeological features of such as the tile-stone quarries and bomb or shell craters at Y indeterminate date, either pre-dating or post-dating the Pigwn are evidently of more recent origin, as are the hollows building of the camp. Settlement sites are a case in point. For to the rear of the ramparts at Esgair Perfedd and Arosfa Garreg example, a substantial semicircular defensive enclosure, (these are clearly later at the former since they cut through possibly of late prehistoric date, is located within the NW what appear to be post-Roman features; see p. 135). corner of Blaen-cwm Bach. The RCAHMW (1976, 25) In the case of the crop-mark evidence this requires analysis suggests that the NW circuit of the enclosure was left to determine whether it relates to the presence of unfinished, though it is equally possible that these defences archaeological features which are earlier, contemporary or were partly levelled, presumably by the camp-builders; in which later than the usage of the camp. case the enclosure is earlier. An equally strong case can be made for the enclosure being later than the camp, since it would EARLIER AND LATER STRUCTURES have been sensible for the camp-builders to level the entire site. Camp I at Hindwell Farm has two rectangular enclosures The presence of man-made features such as prehistoric – probably late prehistoric/Romano-British farmsteads – settlement sites, ceremonial and burial monuments is not within the E part of the site, one situated actually on the line of uncommon on camp sites, and in some instances appears to the NE defences. The latter, if early, would have required the have affected the layout. Some of these are of considerable infilling of its ditch when, or before, the camp was built. antiquity and would probably have caused minimal, if any, At Arosfa Garreg a solitary hollow measuring ca.1.5m inconvenience to the camp-builders, such as the palisaded across is situated immediately to the rear of the rampart on the enclosure of Neolithic date which lies beneath the E part of ESE side and about 22m from the NE corner. This is very Hindwell I, or the similar ‘Meldon Bridge’- type enclosure similar to a series of hollows (a total of 25 noted after the last which lies beneath Walton II and possibly Walton III, or the site visit) to the rear of the rampart on all four sides of the circular enclosure, also of probably late Neolithic-Early camp at Esgair Perfedd. These attain a maximum depth of Bronze Age date, which lies beneath Walton I and II. More 0.4m and measure ca.2m x 1.5m, with the long axis at right common, and with a greater propensity to affect the internal angles to the rampart. Those on the N and E are the most dispositions of the camp, are burial monuments, specifically numerous and are accompanied by upcast mounds. St Joseph round barrows. Whilst mostly surviving as ring-ditches, as at (1969, 125, Fig.10) considered them to be quarry-pits. Whilst Glanmiheli (where two ring-ditches are known) and Bromfield it is tempting to suggest that they may have been pits for the (four barrows, at least two of which may have survived to a disposal of rubbish, or functioned as latrines, or even 32 4-ROMAN 32-66 24/8/06 4:54 am Page 3 Figure 23. Aerial view of the W corner and parts of the SW and SE sides of Hindwell Farm I in 1979, showing a series of pits running within the camp ditch. (Copyright reserved Cambridge University Collection of Air Photographs CJW 79). NPRN 302933. ovens/cooking-emplacements (as at Blaen-cwm Bach), some Inchtuthil plateau (Fig. 7) (Pitts & St Joseph 1985, 229-39, of these appear to post-date peat-cutting in the interior, which Fig 71-72; Pl. XXXVIII, XXXVII, XXXIX). Alternatively, effectively rules them out as ancient features. The rock-cut they have taken the form of a single row of pits just within the oven at Blaen-cwm Bach was entirely infilled and invisible on line of the rampart, as at Bromfield, where they follow the the surface. The use of the hollows at Esgair Perfedd and curve of the NE corner and continue for some 60m to the W, elsewhere as rifle-pits in the context of earlier-twentieth- or appear as a very faint linear mark or row of pits, resembling century military manoeuvres is a strong possibility. a ditch or palisade at Hindwell Farm I. At the latter they are intermittently visible along the NW and SW sides, running CONTEMPORARY FEATURES parallel with the camp ditch and approximately 4m from its inner lip (Fig. 23). They have similarities to the inner ditch of Where contemporary features have been recognised within the campaign base at Rhyn Park (Shropshire), but whether camps in Britain they are sometimes revealed through crop- they represent a ditch or some other feature remains to be marks, such as rows of pits in the interior, as at Glenlochar tested by excavation. Pits dug for rubbish disposal, and (Frere & St Joseph 1983, 27-9, Fig. 15), Dalginross and the so- particularly to serve as latrines (cf. excavated examples at called ‘labour-camps’ at Inchtuthil and elsewhere on the Inchtuthil), must have been common, as were features that 33 4-ROMAN 32-66 24/8/06 4:54 am Page 4 when excavated have proved to be connected with food- from the excavations at Kintore. preparation. Cooking areas or field ovens have been readily Further knowledge of the interiors of the camps in our area identified during excavations on camps in Scotland: for example is limited. The benefit of the excellent survival of the remains cooking-hollows at Lochlands III (Stirlingshire), Lyne II in upland settings means that they do not produce evidence on (Peeblesshire) and possibly Inveresk (East Lothian), and field aerial photographs, unlike a few lowland crop-mark sites. In ovens (and on a large scale) at Kintore (Aberdeenshire) and addition there has been very little work undertaken on the Beattock Bankend (Dumfriesshire) and Pathhead I (Midlothian). interiors of these sites with the exception of Bromfield, which At Blaen-cwm Bach three cuttings to the rear of the rampart did produce evidence for internal features. Excavations on on the WSW side, and one in the SW corner, produced temporary camp sites in Wales have been limited and evidence of wood-ash, but the most significant discovery was concentrated on defence sections. The two geophysical that of a rock-cut pit, ca.0.75m in diameter and 0.25m deep surveys have also produced limited evidence for their interiors. with a ‘tail’ or stoke-hole extending about 1.5m to the E Where undertaken at Hindwell Farm it has not shown features (Chouls 1983). This feature was invisible on the surface and it which need be Roman, whilst at Llanfor the situation is almost certainly represents an oven. At Bromfield no fewer complicated by the existence of two later, permanent Roman than four ovens were excavated in 1991 (Hughes, Leach & military sites and a vicus, together with a veritable palimpsest Stanford 1995), three of which lay close together in a row of archaeological features ranging from the Bronze Age to some 3.5-5m from the course of the camp ditch, the fourth medieval times.