Title: Vindolanda, challenging perceptions of faith, cultural cohesion and identity on a military settlement.
Speaker: Andy
Abstract:
Vindolanda, a small auxiliary fort on the northern frontier of Roman Britain, is perhaps most remarkable for the discoveries that have been made there over the last 36 years, rather than the place itself. The most important of those discoveries have been the writing tablets, small, thin postcards, which dutifully record fragments of the daily lives and aspirations of four out of the ten known or presumed garrisons from the site. While illuminating, the tablets do not offer us the full story of Roman occupation at Vindolanda, and it is only when these documents are put into the contexts from which they were discovered, and compared with other evidence from the site, that a more textured picture can be drawn from what it was like to live at Vindolanda form the end of 1st century to the end of the 4th century. The picture is one of great diversity, a military site that offers evidence of different cultures from practically all corners of the Roman world, but not all in the same period, and not always living in harmony with their neighbours, the Brittunculi.
More information:
University of Liverpool