All language subtitles for Lost.Treasures.of.Rome.S01E05.DSNP.WEB-DL.DDP5.1.H.264-SiGLA.en[cc]

(dramatic music)

NARRATOR: In the shadow of
Hadrian's Wall in the north of Britain,

archaeologists are digging through the
ruined rubble of a massive Roman mystery.

FRANK: This building, was it
built for something special?

Totally unexpected. Really excited.

NARRATOR: They're uncovering
buried ancient treasures

that haven't seen the light of
day for nearly 2,000 years.

FRANK: Is that an edge?
Because if it's not wall, what is it?

This is just bizarre, isn't it?

NARRATOR: Unlocking the
secrets of a forgotten world

on Rome's wildest and
most northern frontier.

MAN: Dog's came along
and placed its paw on there.

MAN 2: It is absolutely amazing.

MAN: That's phenomenal.
That's just a moment in time.

(theme music playing)

(sweeping music)

NARRATOR: Hadrian's Wall, the biggest
structure the Romans ever built.

Constructed in 122 AD,

it defined the most northern edge of the
greatest empire the world had ever seen.

This was the final frontier,

where Rome's empire ended
and barbarian territory began.

ROB: Hadrian's Wall is fascinating.
When you look at a Roman frontier,

it's not just about big walls
creating a border.

It's actually about a dynamic
culture, dynamic landscape.

NARRATOR:
Over 1,000 miles away in Rome,

spectacular monuments
are lasting testament

to the glory of this ancient civilization.

But now, teams of archaeologists
are investigating the margins

of Rome's mighty empire to unlock the
secrets of their most distant outposts.

ANDREW: The majority of
information is yet to come

and that's extremely exciting.

NARRATOR:
They're on a mission to find out

how the Romans maintained
their far flung borders

and discover what life was like for those
at the very wildest edges of the empire.

ANDREAS:
Just by getting their remains,

you really can
get in touch with the people

which were living
thousands of years ago.

It's like diving into
history and it's really great.

NARRATOR:
On a search for answers,

archaeologist Andrew Birley has
enlisted an army of volunteers

to excavate a massive frontier fort.

Known as Vindolanda, it lies just
one mile south of Hadrian's Wall.

Oh, hang on a second.

- PAUL: There we go.
- ANDREW: Very crumbly.

What you've got there is probably
a little silver denarius, a Roman coin.

That's going to be really helpful to date
the fill that you working in right now.

NARRATOR:
Andrew is leading the excavation,

and has lived and breathed
this incredible site for his entire life.

ANDREW: I'm the third generation
of archaeologists on this site

and my family's been
involved with Vindolanda,

one way or another, since 1929.

NARRATOR: Through nearly
100 years of digging this fort,

Andrew and his ancestors have
made it their mission

to pick this site apart stone by stone.

ANDREW: When you look at stones
like this around about me,

they look like dusty old Roman ruins.

But you got to remember they're populated
and built and inhabited by real people.

NARRATOR: Vindolanda Fort
is the perfect place to unlock

the secrets of life in this wild frontier.

It was built by Roman soldiers
sent to conquer this region

50 years before Hadrian's Wall.

As the Romans drove north across
Britain following their invasion,

they'd face battles
every step of the way.

(dramatic music)

In 60 AD a southern
tribal leader, Boudica,

rebelled against the Roman invasion.

She burnt down their cities but,
finally, the Roman army prevailed.

Further north, another fierce
female leader, Cartimandua,

also resisted, but eventually surrendered,

handing over rebels in exchange
for wealth and protection.

But the tribes furthest north
would not yield to the invaders.

They constantly raided Roman camps
and posed a terrifying threat.

The Romans needed a
solution to the problem.

Vindolanda, a huge power base,

was the Roman's attempt to
quell the barbarian north.

It was garrison for over 300 years until
the end of the Roman empire.

ANDREW: Vindolanda is an incredible time
capsule preserved in this landscape.

It was the home of thousands
and thousands of people.

An excavation like this can
give us a lot more detail

about how those people lived their lives

and it’s an opportunity
that we just can't miss.

NARRATOR: Every stone they
lift may reveal another clue

to the story of those people
who lived on this frontier.

Andrew and his team of volunteers

are now focused on the
southwest corner of the site.

ANDREW:
Right, let's just lift that out,

see if there's anything surviving in
that mud. It may or may not.

I think what you've got there
is the copper alloy disease,

the bronze disease, and the artifact has
basically rotted its way into the soil.

That's so frustrating.

So, you've got a tiny little bit of a
broach and the rest of it's gone.

But it's a good start.
I'll go and get a bag for that.

NARRATOR:
Under Andrew's watchful eye,

the volunteers are beginning to reveal
floors and walls across the site.

ANDREW: Can I just have
a little peek over here.

(sharp scraping sound)

I don't know, that just sort of...

- WOMAN: Tinny.
- ANDREW: Tinny sound, yeah.

(scraping sound)

I think you're very close to it there.
That's really tight.

That's as good as a surface
you were working on over there.

NARRATOR: The emerging walls are
evidence of substantial buildings.

- ANDREW: That's a beast, isn't it?
- WOMAN: Yeah.

NARRATOR: More and
more walls begin to appear.

Because that wall definitely goes
underneath where your hand shovel is.

And you've got no sign of the wall where
you're kneeling, have you? No.

Pop those out and see if
we've got an edge of a corner.

NARRATOR: This looks like a
complete maze of overlapping walls,

but to Andrew's expert eye it reveals
different layers of occupation.

ANDREW: We're dealing with hundreds
of years of people living on this site.

Building after building
popped on top of one another.

New demolition,
new construction.

NARRATOR: The evidence
of Vindolanda suggests

that throughout their
occupation of this frontier,

even before Hadrian's Wall was built,

the Roman's constantly had to react and
adapt to new challenges.

The massive scale of one
building is especially intriguing.

ANDREW: Where I'm standing,
I'm in quite an exciting space.

I'm inside a cavalry barrack
in one of the rooms,

and all of this rubble is the collapsed
walls fallen inside the rooms.

NARRATOR: The presence of cavalry shows
the strength of the forces stationed here.

(dramatic music)

The Roman army was made up
of legions of foot soldiers.

But its cavalry regiments were its
most powerful fighting force.

The most elite horsemen were highly
trained soldiers called the alae.

Posted to Britain’s frontier,
it's clear that Rome had deployed

its toughest troops
against the northern tribes.

Some of the best riders from
across the whole empire

were selected to join this elite unit.

With a daily range of up to 50 miles,
they could offer rapid response

wherever and whenever
a threat arose in Rome's wild frontiers.

(dramatic music)

Andrew's excavations at Vindolanda

reveal the true level of military force
that the Roman's needed

to gain and then maintain its
most northern frontier.

ROB: Roman frontiers are some of
the most exciting spaces in history.

It's a contact zone
where anything can happen.

NARRATOR: Originally
from New York state,

archaeologist Rob Collins has
made Rome's northern frontier

his home and his passion
for the last 20 years.

Rob is now investigating the terrain
around Vindolanda for more evidence

of how the Romans protected
themselves at the edge of empire.

ROB: Looking at this groove through
the ground, this is not natural.

This is man-made.

There's a real stark V shape cut to it,
and it runs east and west.

NARRATOR:
This ditch stretches into the distance

and runs in exactly the same
direction as Hadrian’s Wall.

Its V shape suggests its military

and there are other signs it
could be defensive.

ROB: This is incredible.
You can see all these lumps and bumps,

turves of cut grass that have been taken
from the surrounding landscape,

that have been stacked up and actually
build a nice big mound behind that ditch.

NARRATOR: The mound is evidence
that this was once a massive turf wall.

ROB: The fact that they chose to
build here in turf might suggest

that there was a need
for speed for the Romans.

Everything they need to build the turf
wall is right here in the local landscape.

NARRATOR: This was a quick-fix solution
to create a border defense.

The mighty forces at Vindolanda Fort

were clearly not enough to
hold back the enemy.

ROB: This is a danger zone.
There is warfare, there is raiding.

The Romans are in an active
landscape that they are securing.

NARRATOR: This turf wall and
ditch were a crucial step

in the Romans’ struggle
to gain this frontier.

It was the start of the greatest
construction project in Roman history.

(dramatic music)

The Romans built Hadrian's Wall after
40 years of intense hostility.

It was 73 miles long, up to 15
feet high and ten feet thick.

It was heavily guarded with
small forts at regular intervals,

and watch towers in between
manned by soldiers day and night.

Running parallel to the
wall along its north side,

they dug a defensive ditch.

And on the south side strategically placed
garrisons held hundreds of soldiers.

It's clear that this wild
territory was so dangerous

it could only be won with a massive
wall and a huge military presence.

It would take some
15,000 men six years to build.

Nearly 2,000 years later,

its survival is testament to the
quality of their workmanship.

Rob heads along the wall,
scrutinizing every inch of its surface.

ROB: This is a fairly normal
facing stone for Hadrian's Wall.

But what the soldier that carved the stone
also did was carve this phallus in relief.

It's fascinating.

In the Roman period,

the phallus is a symbol which is
used for good luck, for protection.

It's the sort of thing
that can ward off the evil eye.

And so, the inclusion of a
phallic symbol is a way to

activate that sense of protection.

NARRATOR: It's a rare glimpse
into the Roman mind set,

and a very human reminder of the
fear felt by the soldiers

as they built the wall and tried
to conquer this wild frontier.

460 miles away in
Kalkriese in Germany

on another of
Rome's remote frontiers.

STEFAN: Get the small hand saw.

You have to remove the sand bags.

NARRATOR:
A team of archaeologists

is also hunting for clues to
life on the front line.

The Romans marched through this
wilderness intent on conquest.

Archaeologist Stefan Burmeister is on a
quest to find out exactly what happened.

STEFAN: We want to find out what
we actually have on this site.

Could it have been a Roman camp site?
And we hope to find out this summer.

NARRATOR:
This site covers around 60 acres

and finding a camp is like
finding a needle in a haystack.

MAN:
Nothing. (laughs)

STEFAN: Problems of
identifying a Roman campsite is

that it just is a
very short event in time.

Just installation for one night perhaps.
It's not a very strong installation.

Just very quickly built
and not really big, firm walls.

And this is difficult to
detect after about 2,000 years.

NARRATOR:
Centuries of forest growth

makes uncovering a lost
marching camp a huge challenge.

But scanning the ground, it's clear that
clues are still buried within the soil,

and the team is determined
to uncover them.

(electromagnetic whines)

NARRATOR: In the
forests of northern Germany.

It's a metal object.

NARRATOR: The team of archaeologists is
beginning to find what they hope

might be the first tantalizing
clues of a lost Roman camp.

STEFAN: We have here this brownish soil
going down here in this V shaped bottom.

Fits very well into the
idea of a Roman campsite.

NARRATOR: The V shaped ditch is
a fast and effective defense.

Marking it out with poles,

Stefan and his team have
followed the line of the ditch

and it seems to surround the
area where they are digging.

They believe it's strong
evidence of a marching camp.

In their on-site lab,

they analyze hundreds more small
metal fragments discovered in the soil.

REBEKKA: There are a
lot of bronze fittings,

little attachments
like copper alloy buckles.

It's a little bit like a big puzzle.

We have at least 300 fragments
that we need to put together.

NARRATOR:
Conservator Rebekka Kuiter

painstakingly cleans every
single fragment by hand.

REBEKKA: I'm just selectively,
under the microscope, cleaning bit by bit.

That's quite time consuming
but it's necessary,

to not damage
the objects any further.

NARRATOR: As Rebekka removes
2,000 years of dirt and corrosion,

the fragments
begin to reveal their secrets.

We have a breast plate here and
it has some small decorations

like a decorative washer, which is
worked, into a decorative shape.

This is the oldest plate armor that is
found in such a complete fashion.

NARRATOR: The breast plate
is an incredibly rare find.

Once Rebekka has cleaned the armor up,
it promises an equally rare glimpse

into the life and death of a
soldier on Rome's wild frontiers.

Just one mile south of Hadrian's Wall,
at Vindolanda Fort.

ANDREW:
That's similar if not the same.

Yeah, I think it's the same vessel,
I think you're right.

Boy, you've got a good sort
of mix of stuff coming through.

WOMAN: Yeah.

NARRATOR: Andrew and his team
continue to strip away the rubble,

searching for valuable
clues about the life of Romans

who established themselves
on Britain's wild frontier.

ANDREW: Can I just give you that,
there we go. It's good stuff.

- MARTA: How sweet.
- ANDREW: It's a good start.

Right, we'll get that logged in, Amy.
Thank you very much.

NARRATOR: Marta Alberti is
second in command of the dig.

MARTA: One of our volunteers has just
found this really nice kitchen knife.

And it's quite exciting.
It's in really lovely condition.

It's really nice to go back in time and
think about every day life

of these people and how they sat
down to have their dinner or,

you know, lie down as Romans do.

NARRATOR:
Soon another surprising find

reveals more of every day
Roman life on this frontier.

MARTA:
Gorgeous example.

This is a lovely neck of a bottle.
You can see the rim right there.

The body would have perhaps been
globular or kind of a slight pear shape

and this could have been used
for either pouring very fancy drinks,

or more likely, as a kind of container of
perfumes and other beauty products.

Happy times.

NARRATOR: It's an intriguing find.
Perfume was worn by men and women,

but probably not by soldiers while
battling to defend the border.

The team hunts for further
evidence that could reveal

why such a luxury item was left
here in the frontline fort.

Back at the Kalkriese dig site,
the team is carefully excavating

a new find in their Roman marching camp.

MARC:
We found here parts of an animal.

We can see these tooth
and they looked like horse.

Out of this context and the rest
of the photographic profiles

I can say it's 90% Roman.

NARRATOR: This jaw bone is evidence of an
animal that could have carried supplies,

or even a cavalry officer.

With a dead horse buried here and
Roman armor lying not far away,

the story of this marching camp
is becoming increasingly intriguing.

Stefan joins Rebekka in the lab to
analyze the armor in more detail.

REBEKKA:
And this one is very bent.

STEFAN:
Any idea why it's so sharply bent?

REBEKKA: This one is the
one which is bent like down.

So, it must have been
a blow or something like that?

REBEKKA: Yeah.

NARRATOR: The wearer of this
armor had clearly been in battle

and recent chemical analysis reveals
another more sinister clue to his fate.

STEFAN:
We had some phosphate analysis

and they clearly give us the evidence
that there must have been a body inside.

NARRATOR:
The forest soil is acidic.

So, over 2,000 years the
flesh and skeleton rotted away,

leaving only chemical traces.

It's proof that the soldier who
wore this armor died in it,

and was still wearing it when
he was buried in the ground.

The team believes there is
even more to this macabre story.

REBEKKA: Right next to the armor
we also found a pair of handcuffs,

the one that shackles
your hands and your neck.

And that's very interesting that we find
it in direct neighborhood to the armor.

And we think that a soldier
might have been shackled there.

STEFAN: This gives us the
impression that we have here

a shackled legionary in his body
armor and a display by the victors.

NARRATOR: The shocking find suggests
that a Roman soldier in full battle armor

was shackled, killed, and
left to rot in the ground.

It's not the image of the invincible
Roman soldier that we are used to.

But it does align with
ancient written accounts of

a catastrophic event that
happened here 2,000 years ago.

(dramatic music)

In nine AD a German chief and
former Roman soldier, Arminius,

rose up against the Romans.

He spread a rumor of a revolt
in the forested north

and tricked the Romans into sending
three legions to suppress it.

Arminius knew the Roman
legions needed open spaces

to organize into
battle formation.

So, he lured them
into the Teutoburg forest

where they had to
march single file.

Arminius's men attacked
and massacred 20,000 Romans.

One of the biggest military
disasters in Roman history.

STEFAN: If the Romans wouldn't have
lost this battle here in Kalkriese

we could suggest that history would have
taken a complete different course.

NARRATOR:
Success or failure on Rome's frontiers

was clearly key to the empire's fortunes.

STEFAN: The Romans aimed to
conquer the whole world.

After the battle, in the end they stopped
their expansion over the next generations.

NARRATOR: The Romans
were forced to retreat

and draw up their German
borders further south.

(sweeping music)

NARRATOR:
In Mogglingen in southern Germany,

a team of archaeologists is investigating
another Roman frontier site,

over 200 miles south of the
catastrophic defeat at Teutoburg,

this became the Romans
new Germanic frontier.

ANDREAS: You don’t have to clean
that anymore. You can start.

NARRATOR:
The dig is led by Andreas Schaflitzl.

ANDREAS:
I'm most interested in

the way the people are living here
far away from Rome.

The living, which is not mentioned in
the text everybody learnt at school.

That's something which is really,
really interesting to see and to get it.

Show me your rubbish and
I can tell you who you are.

NARRATOR: The team is finding lots of
Roman stone work beneath the fields.

It looks like a mass of buried
rubble, but for expert Andreas,

one section has the very distinctive
form of a defensive ditch.

Just like the one in Kalkriese.

ANDREAS: We have this typical V shape.
Let’s look how deep it is.

So, we have one meter 40 and we are
seeing erosion takes around half a meter.

So, we think we will have a ditch deep up
to two meters in Roman times.

That's pretty impressive. Two meters
ditch is for fortification and defense.

So, it's very likely that it would be in
some kind of military use.

NARRATOR:
A six and a half foot ditch

could be evidence of a
previously unknown Roman fort.

And a sign that the Romans
had to put up heavy defenses

in the years following
their catastrophic defeat.

Andreas heads into the
surrounding forest to find out

how far the Roman
frontier defenses stretched.

ANDREAS: Here these are
stones between the roots.

Here is what we are searching for.
These are the stones lying in one line.

It is the outside of the wall which
directs here next to this tree

and comes under this pathway.

NARRATOR:
To Andreas's expert eye,

a leafy covered bank is evidence
of a buried ruined structure.

ANDREAS: Here on the slope
we have overgrown section of

a very good preserved
remains of the wall.

If we count the slopes
here and the debris and

count them together how high
we would get, it was a wall,

it was approximately three meters high.

NARRATOR: To investigate
the true scale of the wall,

Andreas examines high tech
digital surveys of the region.

ANDREAS: If you go up in the air
and using the LIDAR technique,

then you can scan the terrain,
removing all the trees,

and then you will see how this wall
is straight going through the forest.

NARRATOR: It's clear that this once formed
part of a massive frontier defense,

just like Hadrian's Wall in Britain.

Known as the Limes Germanicus, the
Romans built this massive border defense

in the century following their defeat
in the Teutoburg forest in nine AD.

It would eventually stretch 350 miles,

include 60 forts and over
900 watch towers.

The Limes Germanicus suggests the
beginnings of a new imperial policy.

The Romans realized that before
they could expand their empire,

they first needed to consolidate
and defend their borders.

100 years later, Hadrian's Wall became
the ultimate symbol of this strategy.

Andreas and his team continue
their dig to hunt for evidence

of what life was like after the
Romans heavily defended this border.

South of the Roman’s wall
across Britain, at Vindolanda Fort...

PAUL: I think I've
found a coin Marta.

- NARRATOR: The finds keep on coming.
- MARTA: Oh, there you go.

PAUL: Ah, you can actually see
the silver on it, can't you?

MARTA: That's lovely.
- PAUL: Nice

MARTA:
He's got a beard. Almost resembles Paul.

- (laughs) Thank you.
- Turn around, give me a profile.

- No, no, no, it's the Roman nose.
- Perfect.

NARRATOR: The treasures the team
is unearthing at Vindolanda

are not just military artifacts.

They suggest that this
fort has a more complex story.

MARTA: We have the largest
collection of leather objects

anywhere in the Roman empire.

And that equates to 7,000 leather
artifacts, of which 5,000 are shoes.

NARRATOR: Organic material like
clothing normally decays

and is lost to the
archaeological record.

But these items are
incredibly well preserved.

Things have been buried so
far down and covered

with so much debris and so much clay

that oxygen from the outside world does
not penetrate those deeper layers.

This means that objects made
of leather survive really well.

NARRATOR: These objects
offer fascinating insights

into the lives of the
fort's inhabitants.

MARTA: This is a very
elaborate gentleman's shoe and

it's got lovely cut-out leather uppers.

If we turn this shoe around we
can see a pattern of hob nails.

Hob nails are very useful in
muddy places like Vindolanda

because they allow for a better grip.

NARRATOR: This is an
amazing glimpse of a shoe

actually worn by one of
Rome's frontline soldiers.

But it's not the only
type of footwear here.

MARTA: So, if we look at
this shoe, it's much smaller.

And we think it's a lady's shoe.
If this is indeed a lady's shoe,

then we've got contemporary occupation
of the fort by both soldiers and women.

NARRATOR: And the collection reveals
something even more extraordinary.

MARTA: We've got interesting evidence
right here of children's shoes.

Very, very, nicely decorated upper,
some nice lattice work.

The reason why shoes are
so exciting to me is that

they bring you
really close to the wearer.

You can imagine a child running around in
this rather sophisticated footwear.

Or maybe it's raining and you want to put
on a more closed boot like this one.

NARRATOR: Finds like these help
archaeologists piece together

what life was like for those living at the
furthest reaches of the Roman empire.

(dramatic music)

When Roman soldiers
arrived here in about 85 AD,

they rapidly built a fort
of earth and grassed turf.

Along the top they added a
wooden parapet and watch towers.

Under constant threat from the locals,
they had to strengthen its defenses,

finally opting for a stone rampart.

This formed a defensive wall completely
surrounding Vindolanda.

And the finds prove it wasn't just
a massive fighting force stationed here.

The soldiers’ families lived here too,
in a settlement alongside the fort.

As Andrew and his team dig deeper,

they discover more surprising evidence
about these communities.

ANDREW: This here is a
semi-circular curve coming through.

Probably for a wattle and daub building.

NARRATOR: The curved shape means that
this is no ordinary Roman house.

ANDREW: So, we've got local architecture
coming in here, which is fantastic to see.

But what on earth is it
doing inside a Roman fort?

(dramatic music)

NARRATOR:
In Mogglingen, southern Germany,

Andreas and his team are
uncovering more evidence

of the Romans who lived by the Limes
Germanicus, the massive border wall.

ANDREAS:
You see here mortar on the stones.

NARRATOR: As more of the
buried evidence is unearthed,

Andreas discovers some unusual stone work.

ANDREAS:
Here we have a structure.

And you can see here some stones,
which were standing upside.

It could be a foundation for a statue.

NARRATOR: Statue bases like this are
not usually found in military forts.

So, Andreas now suspects this is evidence
of a very different building here.

With the other evidences
we have found now,

it could be part of a sanctuary or
of sacrifice space taking place here.

NARRATOR: Sanctuaries were
built throughout the empire

for citizens to worship emperors and gods.

Finds like this add to our understanding
of life at the fringes of empire.

They show these weren't
just militarized zones.

Roman civilization and
culture also took root

behind the protection of
these border walls.

In Carlisle, on the western
wing of Hadrian's Wall.

FRANK: Is that an edge? Because
if it's not wall, what is it?

And this is just bizarre, isn't it?

NARRATOR: Archaeologist
Frank Giecco is leading

an excavation to discover the
extent of the Roman presence here.

FRANK:
Oh, it's an incredible opportunity.

Carlisle has always had a strategic
location. It controls the crossing point

between basically present day England and
Scotland. It has always been a key place.

NARRATOR: Carlisle was once the site of
the biggest fort on Hadrian's Wall.

But its Roman heritage is almost
completely buried beneath the modern city.

FRANK:
If we've seen 2% I'd be amazed.

Probably we've still got, you know,
98% of Roman Carlisle to find.

So, plenty more secrets I'm sure
to be revealed on this site.

NARRATOR: After painstakingly
removing the top soil,

the team is rewarded with some tantalizing
glimpses of life 2,000 years ago.

MAN:
That's got to be a dog, hasn't it?

That must be not quite set and a dog has
come along and placed its paw on there.

It is absolutely amazing.

NARRATOR:
These clay tiles were made locally,

and clearly left out in the
open air to dry.

FRANK: I've just noticed this.
The prints of a deer that walked on it

when it was laid out to dry
before it was fired.

So, that's a little moment in time
captured forever.

NARRATOR: As the team excavates,
it’s finding lots of these clay tiles.

Many are neatly stacked in columns
exactly as the Romans left them.

Frank thinks it's a sure fire indication
of the structure they've discovered.

FRANK: These clay pillars
would have supported

the underfloor heating
for the bath house complex.

So, we've got fragments
of floor, the walls,

the ceiling, this just massive
jumble of material.

But it's incredible for us archaeologists,

because it's just a snapshot in
time that is preserved there.

NARRATOR: Communal bath houses
were a staple of Roman life.

Grand examples survive
in Rome and Pompeii.

Soldiers also enjoyed this luxury in
smaller versions inside their forts.

But a bath house of this
scale in a garrison town

on Britain's frontier is surprising.

FRANK: This building is
probably four times the size

of a standard military bath house.

Was it built for something special?
Totally unexpected. Really excited.

NARRATOR:
As the team digs,

a group of strangely shaped objects are
another unexpected discovery.

These formed a curved roof.

The way they worked is it has a small
nozzle and that slots into there

and so you can adjust the
angle of your curve on the roof.

So, these ceramic tubes are thought to
have come over from North Africa,

in the early third century.

And they were an African method of
making a lightweight roof.

FRANK: Just an amazing
bit of the site, isn't it?

NARRATOR: The more the team digs,
the more enticing this bath house becomes.

It is far bigger than
expected in military territory

and there are African influences.

The team continues to hunt for more clues

to find out what it can reveal
about Rome's wild frontier.

(sweeping music)

NARRATOR: At Vindolanda, Andrew
and his team dig deeper around

the mysterious round shaped buildings that
they've uncovered in the Roman fort.

ANDREW: Ah, okay. We've got a black
stain curving around in the soil here,

and it's circular, so it's
got to be a roundhouse.

You can just about make out
the curve just beyond it there

of a stone wall coming through
and that's the stone version

of the timber version we're looking at
here where we've just got the stains.

NARRATOR: The two round houses are not
expected in a Roman fort.

ANDREW: The Romans
don't built round houses.

The native Britains do,
but the Romans don't.

NARRATOR: As the team continues
to dig across the site,

more evidence of these
mysterious round houses emerges.

ANDREW: There's a
curve there, isn't there?

Ooh. It's possible we have another
circular hut coming through.

NARRATOR: The site is covered with
a whole village of British round houses.

They seem to be
contemporary with the fort.

Andrew and the team dig inside
them to find out what is going on.

ANDREW: Well that is absolutely
gorgeous. Beautifully made.

NARRATOR:
And finally uncover a clue.

ANDREW: It just shows you the sort of
preservation as part of the site. Wow.

What a lovely thing. That's definitely
Roman rather than British.

It's a sort of a traditional military
style quern stone. A really nice one.

NARRATOR: Quern stones are tools that the
Romans used to grind cereals into flour.

It's startling evidence that Romans

and conquered Britains
were living side by side.

In Carlisle, 25 miles west
along Hadrian's Wall,

archaeologists investigating the
massive lost bath house

analyze their finds in the dig's lab.

WOMAN: Yeah, I know that's nice, isn't it.
It's even got his head on.

- ANDREW: Yeah.
- WOMAN: This could be an antler.

It's like a little pick and mix.

FRANK:
That's beautiful isn't it?

NARRATOR:
They hope to find clues to why

such an enormous
bath house was built here.

They meticulously sieve and scrutinize
every bucket of earth from the excavation,

to make sure they don't miss
any tiny treasures.

REBEKKA: It looks like two...
yeah, two halves of plenty.

WOMAN: Is it a figure though?
REBEKKA: Yeah, it is a figure.

It's a person with a hat on.

NARRATOR: Objects like this small jewel
probably fell out of a ring or broach

while its owner was bathing.

Its good evidence that this
was not a military bath house,

and its bathers were
a little more genteel.

Frank and the team think that
clues on the tiles hold the key

to why such a grand
bath house was built here.

WOMAN: So, we've got the stamp, I-M-P.

So, we've got the I, we've got the M and
we've got the P for imperato.

NARRATOR: In ancient Latin
imperator means emperor.

These tiles have the
Emperor's personal stamp.

FRANK: Just the word imperator.

It's not a legionary
tile or an auxiliary tile.

This is the imperial court and that's the
thing that makes this building, you know,

other than the size and where they've
come from, this little stamp here, it's --

WOMAN 2:
It's what makes it so special.

- FRANK: Yeah.
- WOMAN: It makes it special.

NARRATOR: The inscription
suggests this bath house

may have been an imperial building,

built as a personal gift
to the city from an Emperor.

It's an incredibly discovery and suggests
that the Emperor himself

was taking a keen
interest in this frontier.

Frank believes further clues
reveal the identity of this Emperor.

FRANK: We've got the inscription
that's likely to be his wife,

you know, Septimus Julia Domna.

NARRATOR: Julia Domna was the wife of
the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus.

Suddenly, the presence of a
massive bath house with African tiles

is beginning to make sense.

(dramatic music)

In the early third century, African-born
Emperor Septimius Severus

came to Britain to
rule the Roman empire from York.

He strengthened
Hadrian's Wall and its forts

and built granaries to supply campaigns
even further to the north.

The garrisons alongside the
wall were transforming from

military bases to
communities and villages.

And so the Emperor constructed
Carlisle's spectacular bath house

as a bold statement that
this far flung frontier garrison

was now an established fully Roman town.

FRANK: By the third century,

Carlisle isn't just a
frontier garrison town.

It's not the wild west.

It was part of the Roman empire.

(investigative music)

NARRATOR: On Hadrian's Wall, Rob is
heading to one of the 80 small forts

which the Romans built at
regular intervals along its length.

He's on the hunt to understand
more about the relationship

between the
Romans and the locals.

Sitting directly on the wall,
these installations would have

provided one of the first points of
contact between soldiers and barbarians.

ROB: Yeah, these are very nicely
prepared in cut stone blocks.

You can see how they join together, how
they sit on top of each other very neatly.

You can see that here and,
and also here on the other side,

which has been
laid to create a gate.

NARRATOR: This gate was
clearly the main entrance for

the small platoon of
soldiers stationed here.

Venturing further towards the
far side of the mile castle,

Rob spots something intriguing.

ROB: Now, these blocks
are really interesting.

They're very large, very heavy blocks.
These blocks are evidence of another gate.

NARRATOR: The position of
this second gate is a surprise

because it forms a
break in the wall.

ROB: What this tells us is
not only that mile castles

could allow soldiers in from the south,

but also there's a gate which allowed
access north into barbarian lands.

If there are 80-mile castles, if there are
80 gates through Hadrian's Wall

that can be found every mile along its
length, that raises questions

about just how closed a barrier
the wall is intended to be.

NARRATOR: This evidence suggests that the
Romans didn't close off

the frontier completely and Hadrian's
Wall wasn't an impervious barrier.

With fortified breaks in the wall,

they could control who was
coming into their territory,

and also had easy access points to
expand their frontiers further.

At the dig site in Carlisle,

Frank and the team have expanded their
excavation alongside the bath house,

and are unearthing a curious structure.

They've uncovered a beautifully
preserved cobble surface

which they believe is a Roman road.

We're quite excited about
this stretch of road.

It's heading towards Hadrian's Wall
and the mile castle.

NARRATOR: Soldiers stationed in the mile
castles would have needed supplies

but this road side is producing
a surprising wealth of finds.

So, this is just some of the stuff
we've found today from this area,

which is a really nice little assembly.

So, we've got animal bone, coarse pottery,

fine pottery that's been
imported from France,

nails from the timber buildings, and
bits of amphora from southern Spain.

So, this has just given us an idea of
what was going on in this area.

So, basically people are preparing food,
eating food. So we've got cooking.

These are basically
just fast food restaurants.

NARRATOR: The cosmopolitan finds
reveal that diners here

could enjoy the trappings of fine
Roman living from around the empire.

This is more like a bustling
high street than a military highway.

And with gateways
in the mile castles,

it's possible that this road didn't just
head to the wall, it went through it.

FRANK: This could have
been quite a busy road,

with people coming north
and south beyond the wall.

They could have been coming here
just to have something to eat.

It would have been probably first
place south of Hadrian's Wall

where you could
have got a glass of wine.

NARRATOR: This latest discovery
shines new light on life

on both sides of Hadrian’s Wall.

It is startling evidence
that it changed dramatically in

the 300 years
the wall was in use.

These new investigations are transforming
our understanding of Hadrian's Wall

and life in Rome’s wildest frontiers.

These territories were once so dangerous

that they not only required
a huge military presence

but monumental border
walls to control them.

In the shadow of these mighty defenses,
Rome began to tame the wilderness.

Families grew up alongside the
soldiers garrisoned in their forts.

Their civilization began to flourish with
sumptuous bath houses and sanctuaries,

and people from
both sides of the wall

may have enjoyed the
luxuries of Roman life.

ROB: It'd be very easy to dismiss
frontiers as the edge of empire,

not something that's really important to
an Emperor sitting in Rome.

But actually, it's
exactly the opposite.

Frontiers are about securing
the peace of the Roman empire.

Without the Roman frontiers, we
would not have the Roman empire.

(dramatic music)