Brough-on-Humber, identified as the Roman *Petuaria*, was a small walled town on the north bank of the Humber estuary, occupying a strategic crossing point opposite the Lincolnshire shore. It originated as a Flavian auxiliary fort (c. AD 70) established during the conquest of the Brigantes/Parisi, and after the military phase ended in the early 2nd century it developed into a civilian settlement, likely the *civitas* capital of the Parisi, continuing into the 4th century with reinforced defences added in the later Roman period.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
Petuaria's importance lay in its role as a port and ferry terminus controlling movement across the Humber, linking the road network of eastern Yorkshire to Lincolnshire and the south. It is one of the few named sites in Roman Britain attested by an inscription naming its civic status — the famous Marcus Ulpius Januarius aedile stone (RIB 707), which records the gift of a stage (*proscaenium*) and refers to the *vicus Petuariensis*.
Excavations by Philip Corder in the 1930s and by John Wacher in the 1950s–60s revealed successive fort defences, internal buildings, and later town walls with bastions, along with the inscription noted above. Evidence for the supposed theatre implied by the inscription has not been securely located, and recent work by the Petuaria ReVisited project (from 2020) has continued to investigate the public
Brough-on-Humber, identified as the Roman *Petuaria*, was a small walled town on the north bank of the Humber estuary, occupying a strategic crossing point opposite the Lincolnshire shore. It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a settlement site from the Roman period in Britain.
Brough Petuaria Roman settlement is classified as a Roman settlement — a civilian 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 Romano-British villa at Cockle Pits, near Brantingham (2.2 km), Brantingham (2.6 km), *Petuaria (4.6 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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