I've always thought that it was interesting the Romans built the Antonine Wall where it is, and declared that to be the end of the empire in Britannia.
There would have been a long march across a sinky, sucky, midgie-infested bog to the south, then a long climb up a hill that's just steep enough to be annoying, and then when you get to the ridge overlooking what's now the Kelvin Valley - where Bar Hill fort is - there's just another even bigger wetter bog with lochs to wade through, hoaching with midgies, and an even bigger set of very steep hills beyond.
Inhabited by angry armed locals.
You know what, lads, if Antonius wants the land to the north of it then Antonius can come and claim it for himself, okay? Who's with me? Build the camp here? Build the camp here, then.
And now, if you brought a Roman soldier 1900 years forwards, I wonder what they'd make of it? Nothing left of the empire, except a few weirdly straight roads a little north of Glasgow, some half-buried ruins that the local high school kids get taken to on field trips during the day and go up to and smoke weed at night, and a few of those local kids have bigger noses than you might otherwise expect.
That’s exactly why they built a fort there. It was miserable to get to and an easy place to spot the angry locals coming.
If you look at that landscape with a Roman officer’s brain (lead addled as it might be), it makes a lot of sense. The Antonine Wall sits on the narrowest useful neck of Britain, between the Firth of Forth and the Firth of Clyde, so you get a frontier from sea to sea with the minimum amount of digging and building. Bar Hill in particular is one of the highest points on that line; you schlep through bog and up an annoying slope precisely so your fort sits on a ridge with a commanding field of view over the Kelvin valley and the approach routes beyond.
The Romans aren’t thinking “this is the end of the world forever, we’re too lazy to go farther.” They’re thinking in terms of administratively useful lines. A frontier, in Roman terms, isn’t where patrols stop but where taxation and permanent stone architecture stop. They had marching camps and temporary posts further north and they pushed beyond this line in the Flavian period, and they continued to raid and campaign beyond it even with the Antonine Wall in place. But they wanted one clear, surveyable, defensible line they can tie into fleets on both coasts and run roads along. Hence the miserable hilltop with a great view.
It’s also politics. Hadrian had his nice sensible stone wall farther south. Antoninus Pius needed a military accomplishment to put on the resume, so he pushes the formal frontier forward and a new line, new forts, new distance slabs proudly recording how many Roman feet of wall each unit built. From that perspective, the legionary is not merely damp and covered in midges but also being used as a bullet point in the emperor’s performance review.
It would be interesting to know if there are any modern economic implications from these ancient road networks. Like economic advantages that regions that had Roman roads 2,000 years ago, have today, with all other factors being held constant.
I've always thought that it was interesting the Romans built the Antonine Wall where it is, and declared that to be the end of the empire in Britannia.
There would have been a long march across a sinky, sucky, midgie-infested bog to the south, then a long climb up a hill that's just steep enough to be annoying, and then when you get to the ridge overlooking what's now the Kelvin Valley - where Bar Hill fort is - there's just another even bigger wetter bog with lochs to wade through, hoaching with midgies, and an even bigger set of very steep hills beyond.
Inhabited by angry armed locals.
You know what, lads, if Antonius wants the land to the north of it then Antonius can come and claim it for himself, okay? Who's with me? Build the camp here? Build the camp here, then.
And now, if you brought a Roman soldier 1900 years forwards, I wonder what they'd make of it? Nothing left of the empire, except a few weirdly straight roads a little north of Glasgow, some half-buried ruins that the local high school kids get taken to on field trips during the day and go up to and smoke weed at night, and a few of those local kids have bigger noses than you might otherwise expect.
That’s exactly why they built a fort there. It was miserable to get to and an easy place to spot the angry locals coming.
If you look at that landscape with a Roman officer’s brain (lead addled as it might be), it makes a lot of sense. The Antonine Wall sits on the narrowest useful neck of Britain, between the Firth of Forth and the Firth of Clyde, so you get a frontier from sea to sea with the minimum amount of digging and building. Bar Hill in particular is one of the highest points on that line; you schlep through bog and up an annoying slope precisely so your fort sits on a ridge with a commanding field of view over the Kelvin valley and the approach routes beyond.
The Romans aren’t thinking “this is the end of the world forever, we’re too lazy to go farther.” They’re thinking in terms of administratively useful lines. A frontier, in Roman terms, isn’t where patrols stop but where taxation and permanent stone architecture stop. They had marching camps and temporary posts further north and they pushed beyond this line in the Flavian period, and they continued to raid and campaign beyond it even with the Antonine Wall in place. But they wanted one clear, surveyable, defensible line they can tie into fleets on both coasts and run roads along. Hence the miserable hilltop with a great view.
It’s also politics. Hadrian had his nice sensible stone wall farther south. Antoninus Pius needed a military accomplishment to put on the resume, so he pushes the formal frontier forward and a new line, new forts, new distance slabs proudly recording how many Roman feet of wall each unit built. From that perspective, the legionary is not merely damp and covered in midges but also being used as a bullet point in the emperor’s performance review.
Previously discussed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45864341
online viewer: https://itiner-e.org/
It would be interesting to know if there are any modern economic implications from these ancient road networks. Like economic advantages that regions that had Roman roads 2,000 years ago, have today, with all other factors being held constant.
Impressive dataset—very valuable for exploring Roman road networks."
"A great tool for historians and archaeology enthusiasts alike."
"High-resolution data like this opens up new possibilities for research on the Roman Empire.
[flagged]