Vercovicium, modern Housesteads, is one of the best-preserved auxiliary forts on Hadrian's Wall, occupying a dramatic ridge on the Whin Sill in Northumberland. Built c. AD 124 as an integral part of the Wall, it covered roughly 2 ha (5 acres) and housed a nominal 800-strong infantry cohort; it remained in use into the late 4th century, with the Notitia Dignitatum recording the cohors I Tungrorum stationed here.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
As a primary garrison fort on the Wall's central sector, Vercovicium controlled movement across the frontier at Knag Burn gate and anchored Roman military presence in one of the most strategically exposed stretches of the limes. The associated extramural civilian settlement (vicus), unusually well-preserved, illustrates the social and economic complexity that developed around frontier garrisons.
Excavations from the 19th century onwards (notably by Bosanquet, Birley and later campaigns) have exposed the full circuit of walls, four gates, headquarters (principia), commanding officer's house, granaries, barracks, hospital, and the famous latrine block; finds include the Mithraic relief sculptures from a mithraeum south of the fort and the so-called "Murder House" with two skeletons beneath its floor. The vicus has yielded altars, civilian houses (including the "Chalet" barracks of late date), and evid
Vercovicium, modern Housesteads, is one of the best-preserved auxiliary forts on Hadrian's Wall, occupying a dramatic ridge on the Whin Sill in Northumberland. It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a fort site from the Roman period in Britain.
*Vercovicium 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 Turret 36B (Housesteads) (0.1 km), Housesteads Mithraeum (0.3 km), Milecastle 37 (Housesteads) (0.5 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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