Alchester, in Oxfordshire, was one of the earliest Roman military bases in Britain, established within a year or two of the Claudian invasion of AD 43 and occupied into the early 60s. The complex includes a vexillation fortress and smaller fort, an associated marching camp, an access road, and a parade ground — the latter a rare identified example in Britain, used for drill and formal military assembly.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
Alchester appears to have been a key forward base for the Legio II Augusta during the conquest period, likely under Vespasian's command, and sits at a strategic road junction (Akeman Street and the road north from Silchester). The site is notable for producing one of the earliest precisely datable Roman timber structures in Britain and for the unusual survival of an identifiable parade ground.
Excavations directed by Eberhard Sauer from the late 1990s onwards recovered dendrochronologically dated oak gateposts felled in autumn AD 44 to spring AD 45, along with the tombstone of a Legio II Augusta veteran, defensive ditches, and timber buildings. Geophysical survey and aerial photography have defined the marching camp and the access road linking the military complex to its outworks, though the parade ground itself is known mainly from cropmark and survey evidence rather than extensive excavation.
Alchester, in Oxfordshire, was one of the earliest Roman military bases in Britain, established within a year or two of the Claudian invasion of AD 43 and occupied into the early 60s. It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a military camp site from the Roman period in Britain.
Alchester Roman parade ground, access road and marching camp is classified as a Roman military camp — a military site in the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer. Roman Britain's archaeology encompasses thousands of sites ranging from legionary fortresses and marching camps to villas, temples and towns.
Several Roman sites lie within a short distance, including Merton Roman Camp (0.4 km), Alchester (0.8 km), Two sections of a Roman road on Ot Moor (5.8 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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