Turret 71B was a stone-built watch tower on Hadrian's Wall, located west of Milecastle 71 (Burgh-by-Sands area) in the western, Cumbrian sector of the frontier. It would have been constructed in the 120s AD as part of the original Hadrianic scheme, manned by detachments from auxiliary units based at nearby forts such as Burgh-by-Sands (Aballava), and likely abandoned by the later 2nd or earlier 3rd century in line with the general pattern of turret decommissioning along the Wall.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
In this low-lying stretch approaching the Solway, turrets like 71B provided observation across the coastal plain and the Solway Firth fords, a known crossing route exploited by raiders from the north — a surveillance rather than combat function. It forms part of the westernmost run of the Wall where, unusually, the curtain was built in turf before being rebuilt in stone, making the construction sequence of its turrets archaeologically informative.
Very little is published specifically on Turret 71B; its position is known from the regular Wall-mile spacing rather than from substantial excavation, and no upstanding remains are visible. Comparable turrets in this western sector (e.g. 72B Burgh Marsh) show small square stone towers c. 4–5 m internally, sometimes set into a turf wall and later rebuilt, but no distinctive finds assemblage is recorded for 71B itself.
Turret 71B was a stone-built watch tower on Hadrian's Wall, located west of Milecastle 71 (Burgh-by-Sands area) in the western, Cumbrian sector of the frontier. It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a watch tower site from the Roman period in Britain.
Turret 71B is classified as a Roman watch tower — 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 Aballava (0.1 km), Turret 71A (0.5 km), Milecastle 72 (Fauld Farm) (0.5 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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