Romans in the news

Important collection rediscovered during house-clearing includes numerous rare speciesAn internationally important collection of shells, including specimens from Captain Cook’s final voyage, has been rediscovered 40 years after it was thought to have been thrown into a skip.More than 200 shells have been returned to English Heritage, which will put some of them on display in Northumberland this week. Continue reading…

Previously unknown settlement in Small Hythe was once an important infrastructure linkA “very rare” clay figurine of the god Mercury, one of fewer than 10 ever found in Britain, has been discovered at a previously unknown Roman settlement that once sat next to a busy port – but is now 10 miles from the sea.The site of the settlement, in the modern hamlet of Small Hythe (or Smallhythe), near Tenterden in Kent, now sits among fields, but was once an important link in the Roman empire’s import and infrastructure network in southern England and the Channel. Continue reading…

Archaeologists and naturalists astonished to find yolk and albumen that may reveal secrets about the bird that laid itIt was a wonderful find as it was, a cache of 1,700-year-old speckled chicken eggs discovered in a Roman pit during a dig in Buckinghamshire.But to the astonishment of archaeologists and naturalists, a scan has revealed that one of the eggs recovered intact still has liquid – thought to be a mix of yolk and albumen – inside it, and may give up secrets about the bird that laid it almost two millennia ago. Continue reading…

First such piece to be found in Britain is ‘incredibly well-made’, say experts, and remarkably preservedArchaeologists in London have made the “exceptionally important” discovery of a complete wooden funerary bed, the first ever discovered in Britain.The remarkably preserved bed, described as “unparalleled” by experts, was excavated from the site of a former Roman cemetery near Holborn viaduct, central London, alongside five oak coffins. Prior to this dig, only three Roman timber coffins in total have been found in the capital. Continue reading…

Archaeologists find remains of insects that ‘hitchhiked’ here nearly 2,000 years agoFrom plumbing to public baths, the Romans left their mark on Britain’s health. But it may not have all been positive. Archaeologists working at Vindolanda, a Roman garrison site south of Hadrian’s Wall in Northumberland, have unearthed fresh evidence that the Romans also brought us … bedbugs.Dr Andrew Birley, who heads the Vindolanda archaeological team, said: “It is incredibly rare to find them in any ancient context.” Continue reading…

British Museum, LondonFrom monsters to messiahs, from rebels to republics, from sex workers to chilled-out lovers, this wildly enjoyable blockbuster delivers a Rome for everyoneAbout halfway through this wildly enjoyable delve into Roman military history, you see an eerie object: a cuirass, a piece of torso-fitting armour that looks too big, as if it were created for a giant. It makes you think the legions that dominated so much of Europe, north Africa and the Middle East two millennia ago must have been full of truly invincible men.Then you discover this is a relic not of a Roman triumph but one of the most devastating defeats its legions ever suffered. It was found on the battlefield near today’s village of Kalkriese, Lower Saxony, where German warriors massacred the legions led by Publius Quinctilius Varus in 9 AD. The legionary who wore this armour may have been slaughtered after the battle, on the ground, to judge from leg irons with which he was apparently restrained. Or perhaps he was paraded as a trophy? It feels incredibly intimate to be so close to an event that has become a kind of historical horror story. “Varus, where are my legions?” yelled Brian Blessed as Augustus in I, Claudius. Continue reading…

It was the defeat that traumatised Rome, leaving 15,000 soldiers slaughtered in a German field. As a major show explores this horror and more, our writer finds traces of the fallen by a forest near the RhineIt is one of the most chilling passages in Roman literature. Germanicus, the emperor Tiberius’s nephew, is leading reprisals in the deeply forested areas east of the Rhine, when he decides to visit the scene of the catastrophic defeat, six years before, of his fellow Roman, Quinctilius Varus. The historian Tacitus describes what Germanicus finds: the ghastly human wreckage of a supposedly unbeatable army, deep in the Teutoburg Forest. “On the open ground,” he writes, “were whitening bones of men, as they had fled, or stood their ground, strewn everywhere or piled in heaps. Near lay fragments of weapons and limbs of horses, and also human heads, prominently nailed to trunks of trees.”Survivors pointed out the spot where Varus had killed himself, and the place where the military standards had been flaunted by the victors. “A living Roman army,” writes Tacitus of Germanicus’s visit, “had come to bury the dead men’s bones. No one knew if the remains he was burying belonged to a stranger or a comrade.” Three whole legions, perhaps 15,000 men, had been slaughtered – as well as the slaves, women and children who would probably have been with them. Continue reading…

National Museums Scotland restores soldier’s brass guard, only the third of its kind known to existA spectacular brass guard that would have protected the sword arm of a high-ranking Roman soldier some 1,800 years ago has been reconstructed from more than 100 fragments found at Trimontium, the Roman fort complex in Scotland.The extraordinary jigsaw puzzle has been pieced together by National Museums Scotland (NMS) in Edinburgh, and the arm-guard will now be lent to the British Museum’s forthcoming exhibition on life in the Roman army. Continue reading…

Teenage ruler has become genderqueer icon but historians including Mary Beard advise caution over ‘tall stories’There are legendary dinner parties, and then there are the stories told about those thrown by the Roman emperor Elagabalus. The teenage ruler, who managed just four years as emperor before being assassinated at the age of 18 in AD222, would serve bizarre dishes like camels’ heels or flamingos’ brains to guests, stage themed nights when all the food was blue or green, or release lions or bears to roam among the diners.On one famous occasion, according to a Roman historian, those present at a dinner were suffocated to death under an enormous quantity of rose petals; another saw guests seated on slowly deflating whoopee cushions – their first recorded use in western history. Continue reading…

Women across the world are asking men how often the ancient civilisation pops into their head – and the answer is frequently startlingName: The Roman empire.Age: More or less wound up by 476AD, although it still occupies a significant amount of territory today. Continue reading…