Tower 13b at Wolsty South was a Roman watchtower forming part of the Cumberland Coast frontier system, an extension of Hadrian's Wall's defensive arrangements down the Solway coast south-west of Bowness-on-Solway. Like its counterparts, it would have been a small stone-built turret manned by a small detachment, active from the early 2nd century AD (Hadrianic, c. AD 122–130s) through at least the mid-2nd century, with possible intermittent occupation into the later Roman period.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
The tower formed one link in the regularly spaced chain of milefortlets and towers (paired between each milefortlet) that continued the surveillance system of the Wall around the vulnerable open coastline of the Solway Firth, guarding against seaborne incursion or unmonitored crossings from the Galloway shore. Its significance lies in this systemic role rather than any individual prominence.
Tower 13b at Wolsty South was a Roman watchtower forming part of the Cumberland Coast frontier system, an extension of Hadrian's Wall's defensive arrangements down the Solway coast south-west of Bowness-on-Solway. It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a site site from the Roman period in Britain.
Wolsty South tower 13b, 200m WNW of New House, part of the Roman frontier defences along the Cumbrian coast is classified as a Roman site — 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 Wolsty North tower 13a, 500m south west of Wolsty Farm, part of the Roman frontier defences along the Cumbrian coast (0.5 km), Prehistoric enclosure and hut circle, a Romano-British enclosure, and a Romano-British farmstead and associated field system north of Wolsty Hall (1.4 km), B(r)ibra? (1.5 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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Research the area around Wolsty South tower 13b, 200m WNW of New House, part of the Roman frontier defences along the Cumbrian coast