Chapter 3

The Roman Occupation

The first settlement of any size and importance in the Cockermouth area was the Roman fort of Derventio, on the site of present-day Papcastle. Before considering this site in detail it will be helpful to understand something of why the Romans came, what they found here and what effect their stay had on the district.

They began a serious occupation of the south of the country in AD 43, where they found an Iron Age culture fairly well developed on a basis of arable and stock farming with pottery makiog and textile manufacture. Pushing northwards through the forest they encountered the Brigantes, a confederation of tribes centred on York. Though wild and warlike, they had evolved some degree of civilisation, having a king and queen, using gold coinage and living in small communities. The Romans formed an alliance with the confederation, which enabled them to concentrate on organising the south of the country.[1]

The alliance broke down in AD 69 as a result of pro-Roman and anti-Roman factions amongst the Brigantes. The Romans postponed their intended invasion of Wales and came north, driving King Venutius from his stronghold near Richmond to establish a new town on Ingleborough. [2] His pro Roman wife Cartimandua divorced him. By AD 74 the native peoples had retreated into the dales and the invaders stopped for four years at a temporary fort on Stainmore, facing through the gap into unconquered Cumbria, while they again turned their attention to conquering Wales. [3] This being accomplished by 78, Julius Agricola, appointed legate of Britain in that year, pushed north to the Forth-Clyde line, but the invaders abandoned much of Scotland by AD 96.

Meanwhile further south people were settling down under Roman rule, Britons near the towns tending to adopt Roman dress, education and language. Agricola’s policy of conciliation seems to have been successful during his six years of governorship.

A system of roads and forts was developed in the Lake District very broadly around AD 90 with the two-fold purpose of separating sections of the local population so as to control them more effectively and of securing supply routes, such as that from Ravenglass to Ambleside and beyond. The Romans came as conquerors rather than as settlers, so chose sites for their military value, [4] but they were to remain for three and a half centuries, as long as from the end of the reign of James I in 1625 to the present day.

The method of occupation was to make a careful reconnaissance, then to layout a network of roads dividing up the country. At each road junction, and between if distances were great, permanent forts were built. These might be for infantry or cavalry and each housed from 500 to 1000 men. A fort was commanded by a prefect or tribune, responsible to the legionary commander at York or Chester. [5]

The main roads north passed to the east of the Lake District, but the road from Ravenglass through the centre was important. Ravenglass, a port which flourished until medieval times, was with Chester a centre for importing wines and other supplies to the west. The remains of amphorae, great wine jars too big to be brought by road from Dover, have been found in the area. [6]

There were also eventually routes from Ravenglass up the west coast, probably to the end of Hadrian’s Wall on the Solway, certainly to Carlisle via Papcastle, which was an important point in the developing road system.

In AD 117 the 9th Legion was defeated and shortly afterwards (in 122) the Emperor Hadrian came north. After his visit the wall which bears his name was built. There was already Stanegate from Carlisle to Corbridge and this continued to be used as a highway throughout the occupation, but Hadrian’s Wall, running from Wallsend to Burgh Marsh and later extended to Bowness-on-Solway, closed the Tyne-Solway gap and became the permanent frontier of Roman Britain.

The Wall is a study in itself and we can only mention its effect on Cumbria, whose fortunes were often bound up with it. An attempt about AD 140 to provide a shock absorber in the Antonine Wall across the Clyde-Forth neck was not successful and forces on and behind the earlier wall were strengthened in the latter half of the century. There were wars between the troops and the native people in AD 155-8, 162 and 181. The first of these was a large-scale revolt of the Brigantes south of the Wall, put down with great severity.

Then in AD 193 Emperor Commodus was assassinated and Albinus, governor of Britain, withdrew most of the troops, taking them to Gaul to fight unsuccessfully in support of his claim to the vacant emperorship. While the defences were weakened the Wall was overrun from the north (in 197) and Roman fortifications destroyed as far south as York and Chester.

No doubt Lake District dwellers joined in, possibly in their own defence against the northern invaders, possibly joining with them against the Romans. The Wall was retaken by Rome, but repairs took 10 years and in AD 208-211 Emperor Severus (who had defeated Albinus in Gaul) came in person and conducted savage punitive campaigns.

A hundred years of peace followed, during which army recruiting became increasingly local and the Brigantes grew more co-operative under the valued protection of Rome. Then once again soldiers were withdrawn because of Roman discord and in AD 296 the Wall was overpowered and badly damaged. Repairs followed and peace reigned until 367 when Picts from the north, Saxons from Germany and Scots from Ireland all attacked, possibly attracted by the wealth of the region. [7] Although restored again, the Wall gradually ceased to be an effective frontier, defence being based on forts further south until in AD 410 Honorius proclaimed the independence of Britain. This meant he could no longer hold it and troops were withdrawn from the country.

It is necessary to keep the risings against Rome in perspective. For most of the 350 years of occupation there was peace along the Wall and in the area to the south of it, a peace which brought prosperity to the Papcastle district. Then with the end of Roman rule the Scots increased their raids on the coast and the Picts poured south of the Wall Britain moved into the Dark Ages.