Isca Dumnoniorum was a legionary fortress established c. AD 55–60 on a spur above the River Exe, serving as the base of Legio II Augusta during the Claudian-Neronian conquest of the south-west. Covering approximately 38 acres (15 ha), it housed a full legion until the unit's withdrawal to Gloucester c. AD 75, after which the site was reduced to a smaller auxiliary or vexillation function before transitioning into the civitas capital of the Dumnonii (recorded in the Antonine Itinerary) by the late first or early second century.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
As the westernmost legionary base in Britain during the conquest period, Isca anchored Roman military control over the Dumnonian peninsula and supervised tin and lead exploitation in the south-west. Its evolution from fortress to civitas capital — the administrative centre for the Dumnonii — makes it a key example of the standard Roman trajectory from military base to urban centre, paralleling Wroxeter and Gloucester.
Excavations from the 1970s onwards, principally by Paul Bidwell and the Exeter Archaeological Field Unit, revealed the legionary bath-house (one of the most complete known from Britain, found beneath the Cathedral Close), barracks, the fabrica, fortress defences, and the granaries; the bath-house was later monumentalised into the civil
Isca Dumnoniorum was a legionary fortress established c. It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a fort site from the Roman period in Britain.
Isca Dumnoniorum 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 Unnamed Roman fort, Cheeke Street, Exeter (0.2 km), Exeter Roman Bathhouse (0.5 km), Stoke Hill (2.4 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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