Fanum Cocidi, identified with the fort at Bewcastle in Cumbria, lay roughly six Roman miles north of Hadrian's Wall and was linked to the Wall fort at Birdoswald by a metalled road. Unusually for a Roman fort, it was hexagonal in plan, occupying about 6 acres and adapted to a low knoll above the Kirk Beck. It was occupied from the Hadrianic period through to the later 4th century, serving as one of the outpost forts (along with Netherby and Risingham) that projected Roman military control beyond the Wall line.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
The site takes its Roman name from a shrine to Cocidius, a native warrior god worshipped widely on the western Wall but whose principal cult centre — the *fanum* — was here. It functioned both as a forward military post monitoring the Liddesdale–Bewcastle approaches and as a religious focus, making it one of the few British forts whose Roman name reflects a sanctuary rather than a topographic or tribal element.
Excavations by Richmond, Birley and Gillam in 1937–38, with further work in the 1950s and 1970s, revealed the principia, commandant's house, bath-house, and evidence for substantial rebuilding under Severus and again in the 4th century; a unit of the *cohors I Dacorum* is attested by inscriptions and stamped ti
Fanum Cocidi, identified with the fort at Bewcastle in Cumbria, lay roughly six Roman miles north of Hadrian's Wall and was linked to the Wall fort at Birdoswald by a metalled road. It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a fort site from the Roman period in Britain.
Fanum Cocidi is classified as a Roman fort — 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 Maiden Way Roman road from B6318 to 450m SW of High House, Gillalees Beacon signal station and Beacon Pasture early post-medieval dispersed settlement (4 km), Romano-British farmstead and post-medieval farmstead at Watch Hill (7.7 km), Turret 50B (Appletree) (9.4 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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