Each day from my study window I trace the line of Hadrian’s Wall. Here at the northern edge of a now-defunct empire we still live in the shadow of the largest of the world’s Roman artefacts. It is our regional unique selling feature.
Our “international profile” as a “truly world-class tourist destination” has a distinctly aquiline nose. The military necklace of turrets, forts and milecastles runs from Bowness in the west to Newcastle in the east, a total of 78 miles.
Historians still debate the purpose. Hadrian insisted that the gods had ordered him to “keep intact the empire”, “to divide Romans from the barbarians”.
The Romans had a word for us; the brittunculi – nasty little Brits. This ethnic divide is eloquently illustrated at the start of Tullie House’s recently opened Roman Frontier Gallery.
The replica of a tall tombstone, now incongruously in Hexham Abbey, shows a young Gaulish officer/standard bearer on horseback in full parade armour. He carries the imperial standard. His stirrupless foot boots a cowering naked enemy in the backside. The barbarian, who resembles me, ineffectually waves a short sword.
The image sets the stage for a very remarkable and long-overdue exposition of the Roman occupation of Britain. The vast majority of artefacts and records for these centuries come from the Romans. The colonised left no written records.
Soldiers were recruited from the wider reaches of the empire, including north Africa and Syria. Local British recruits could have been sent to Switzerland, Romania and Algeria. Britain was a tough posting. Only 4% of the empire’s territory required 10% of the total imperial forces.
Imperial outpost
What did Romanisation really mean? Tullie House seeks to tell stories exploring the social consequences of invasion. Early in the exhibition visitors are reminded of the great clichéd blockbusters of the screen as Julius Caesar; Quo Vadis; Cleopatra; Spartacus; Gladiator; Ben Hur; The Robe; I, Claudius; and others fight for our attention.
So too does Monty Python’s film, Life of Brian and the inevitable quotation, now so beloved of curators and designers: “Apart from better sanitation and medicine and education and irrigation and public health and a freshwater system and baths and public order – what have Romans done for us?”
Adjacent words from Tacitus provide an immediate riposte, a frank delineation of imperial policy and tactics: arcades, baths, and sumptuous banquets – the unsuspecting Britons spoke of such novelties as “civilisation” when, in fact, they were only a feature of their enslavement.
The exhibition shows the day-to-day domesticity of military life, not so much under canvas, but sub pellibus in specially constructed eight-man goatskin tents – six to sleep – two to guard.
Visitors are invited to test the weight of the average military backpack. Endearingly, on display is a soldier’s sewing kit – needles and bobbins of thread for darning socks and stitching shirts packed in a small box, forerunners of those kits we purloin from modern hotels.
We learn of the root vegetables, herbs and livestock the Romans imported to supplement their diets. A fragment of an amphora advertises “top quality old Tangiers Tunny Relish” – the famous garum made from the fermented intestines of fish.
Mixed with wine, it made a culinary sauce. Diluted with water it was supplied to the legions as a tonic or a medicinal treatment for bites, dysentery, constipation and the removal of unwanted hair or freckles.
In one cabinet, two contrasting cultural pieces co-exist. A finger ring carved from a single piece of Baltic amber has a relief carving of Minerva. Nearby is a fragment of blue glass, a piece from a souvenir charioteer cup made for the masses.
The sheer scale of imperial travel is shown. An inscription, recording the visit of the emperor Septimius Severus and his sons Caracalla and Geta to Britain has the latter’s name deleted. We know that when Severus died in York, Caracalla slaughtered his brother, deleting all documentary mention of Geta.
Last year I saw an identically defaced stone in the National Museum of Damascus – a ruthless censorship of news at the two extreme ends of the empire.
Divided communities
The gradual accumulation of exhibits illustrates how Roman military precision, administrative expertise and ease of living was gradually eroded in Britain by political corruption and by the need ultimately to transfer troops to other war fronts.
One modern display, Living Frontiers, gives modern examples of politically constructed hard partitions. Just as Hadrian’s Wall divided communities, created customs posts, checkpoints and excuses for abuse, so do modern-day barriers; those between the US and Mexico, the western Sahara and Morocco, Israel and Palestine, and so on.
I had thought that this display might be a foolish gimmick but the juxtaposition is powerful and salutary.
This small gallery, built on the site of Carlisle’s first Roman fort, has an importance beyond its 500 square metres. It is brilliantly conceived and beautifully executed. I was struck by the obvious deep concentration of visitors.
They lingered, pondered and considered. Museological provocation is a tricky art form. It is easy to excite folk sensually with artefacts, much harder to make them think.
I visited a week after the gallery opened and there were already many handwritten visitor comment labels. One states what I was struggling to articulate: “I have visited Hadrian’s Wall numerous times… this is the first time I have seriously considered the social and personal consequences of the wall.”
In recent years a great deal of money has been spent wisely and magnificently in Newcastle and Vindolanda on blockbuster displays extolling the Romans.
This superb gallery in Carlisle, so valuable in its intellectual achievement, cost a mere £1.5m, less than it would have cost for the local football team to hire a decent goalkeeper. Politicians and the Treasury, please note.
Peter Lewis is a writer and a past director of Beamish
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Our “international profile” as a “truly world-class tourist destination” has a distinctly aquiline nose. The military necklace of turrets, forts and milecastles runs from Bowness in the west to Newcastle in the east, a total of 78 miles.
Historians still debate the purpose. Hadrian insisted that the gods had ordered him to “keep intact the empire”, “to divide Romans from the barbarians”.
The Romans had a word for us; the brittunculi – nasty little Brits. This ethnic divide is eloquently illustrated at the start of Tullie House’s recently opened Roman Frontier Gallery.
The replica of a tall tombstone, now incongruously in Hexham Abbey, shows a young Gaulish officer/standard bearer on horseback in full parade armour. He carries the imperial standard. His stirrupless foot boots a cowering naked enemy in the backside. The barbarian, who resembles me, ineffectually waves a short sword.
The image sets the stage for a very remarkable and long-overdue exposition of the Roman occupation of Britain. The vast majority of artefacts and records for these centuries come from the Romans. The colonised left no written records.
Soldiers were recruited from the wider reaches of the empire, including north Africa and Syria. Local British recruits could have been sent to Switzerland, Romania and Algeria. Britain was a tough posting. Only 4% of the empire’s territory required 10% of the total imperial forces.
Imperial outpost
What did Romanisation really mean? Tullie House seeks to tell stories exploring the social consequences of invasion. Early in the exhibition visitors are reminded of the great clichéd blockbusters of the screen as Julius Caesar; Quo Vadis; Cleopatra; Spartacus; Gladiator; Ben Hur; The Robe; I, Claudius; and others fight for our attention.
So too does Monty Python’s film, Life of Brian and the inevitable quotation, now so beloved of curators and designers: “Apart from better sanitation and medicine and education and irrigation and public health and a freshwater system and baths and public order – what have Romans done for us?”
Adjacent words from Tacitus provide an immediate riposte, a frank delineation of imperial policy and tactics: arcades, baths, and sumptuous banquets – the unsuspecting Britons spoke of such novelties as “civilisation” when, in fact, they were only a feature of their enslavement.
The exhibition shows the day-to-day domesticity of military life, not so much under canvas, but sub pellibus in specially constructed eight-man goatskin tents – six to sleep – two to guard.
Visitors are invited to test the weight of the average military backpack. Endearingly, on display is a soldier’s sewing kit – needles and bobbins of thread for darning socks and stitching shirts packed in a small box, forerunners of those kits we purloin from modern hotels.
We learn of the root vegetables, herbs and livestock the Romans imported to supplement their diets. A fragment of an amphora advertises “top quality old Tangiers Tunny Relish” – the famous garum made from the fermented intestines of fish.
Mixed with wine, it made a culinary sauce. Diluted with water it was supplied to the legions as a tonic or a medicinal treatment for bites, dysentery, constipation and the removal of unwanted hair or freckles.
In one cabinet, two contrasting cultural pieces co-exist. A finger ring carved from a single piece of Baltic amber has a relief carving of Minerva. Nearby is a fragment of blue glass, a piece from a souvenir charioteer cup made for the masses.
The sheer scale of imperial travel is shown. An inscription, recording the visit of the emperor Septimius Severus and his sons Caracalla and Geta to Britain has the latter’s name deleted. We know that when Severus died in York, Caracalla slaughtered his brother, deleting all documentary mention of Geta.
Last year I saw an identically defaced stone in the National Museum of Damascus – a ruthless censorship of news at the two extreme ends of the empire.
Divided communities
The gradual accumulation of exhibits illustrates how Roman military precision, administrative expertise and ease of living was gradually eroded in Britain by political corruption and by the need ultimately to transfer troops to other war fronts.
One modern display, Living Frontiers, gives modern examples of politically constructed hard partitions. Just as Hadrian’s Wall divided communities, created customs posts, checkpoints and excuses for abuse, so do modern-day barriers; those between the US and Mexico, the western Sahara and Morocco, Israel and Palestine, and so on.
I had thought that this display might be a foolish gimmick but the juxtaposition is powerful and salutary.
This small gallery, built on the site of Carlisle’s first Roman fort, has an importance beyond its 500 square metres. It is brilliantly conceived and beautifully executed. I was struck by the obvious deep concentration of visitors.
They lingered, pondered and considered. Museological provocation is a tricky art form. It is easy to excite folk sensually with artefacts, much harder to make them think.
I visited a week after the gallery opened and there were already many handwritten visitor comment labels. One states what I was struggling to articulate: “I have visited Hadrian’s Wall numerous times… this is the first time I have seriously considered the social and personal consequences of the wall.”
In recent years a great deal of money has been spent wisely and magnificently in Newcastle and Vindolanda on blockbuster displays extolling the Romans.
This superb gallery in Carlisle, so valuable in its intellectual achievement, cost a mere £1.5m, less than it would have cost for the local football team to hire a decent goalkeeper. Politicians and the Treasury, please note.
Peter Lewis is a writer and a past director of Beamish
Project data
- Cost £1.5m
- Main funders European Regional Development Fund; Northwest Regional Development Agency; Renaissance Northwest; Carlisle City Council; MLA Renaissance North West
- Exhibition design Redman Design
- Project management in-house
- Main fit-out contractor Wood-Mitchell Building Group
- AV and IT fit-out DJ Willrich
- Display cases ClickNetherfield
- Interactives Sirius
- Audiovisual and multimedia Centre Screen; DJ Willrich; Zed Productions
- Mountmaking National Museums Liverpool
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