THE ORIENTATION OF ROMAN CAMPS AND FORTS

Summary.   The angles of orientation of 67 Roman camps were determined from their published plans. There was a marked tendency for them to be aligned close to the cardinal points but they were offset from those points by only 28 of a possible 45 angles and of these six occurred in 29 camps, probably because they were set out by making right-angled triangles whose non-hypotenuse sides were in whole number ratios. Twenty-seven forts on the British frontier walls were similarly orientated by only 12 angles, one of which occurred six times. The apparent accuracy of the layouts suggested that the directions of the meridian and latitude were first carefully determined. The use of a limited number of offset angles was probably due to a religious regard for celestial geometry.     

REIMAGINING ROMAN PORTS AND HARBOURS: THE PORT OF ROMAN LONDON AND WATERFRONT ARCHAEOLOGY

This paper explores some theoretically informed ways in which to use the rich evidence relating to ports, harbours and other waterfront installations in archaeology. It argues that studies of waterfront structures within the specialisms of nautical/maritime and wetland archaeology are extremely important in their own right, but they could also be used to explore broader issues connected with their use and context. These include the cultural and religious significance of water and its dangers, the symbolic significance of landscape change, the relationship between people and their environment and the negotiation of the land/water interface. Examining the evidence of the port of Roman London as a case study, this paper explores the archaeology in its local setting and addresses a number of subjects relating to both its temporal and spatial position. It focuses on the religious significance of water and the implications of altering waterscapes through artificial construction.     

THE BIRDS OF ROMAN BRITAIN

Summary. Wild birds were probably of little importance for food in Roman Britain, but there is some advantage, for ecology, conservation, archaeological reconstruction and education, in establishing a tolerably correct list of species present in Roman times. There are special problems for the recovery and identification of bird bones; on the other hand, historical and other sources are wanting for Roman Britain. There is no evidence for falconry in the Roman period; birds would be caught, for sport by lime-rods, and for food by a variety of methods. There is little definite evidence for religious use of wild birds in Roman Britain. The environment of Britain in the Roman period was, in many respects, quite similar to that of recent times, but the bird species recorded from Roman sites suggest that the landscape was rather varied, and favourable to wildlife. An up-to-date list of 94 wild species can be roughly quantified by the number of sites on which each has been found; both the more numerous species and the absentees offer some surprises, and the effect is to emphasize the Romanization of eating habits in the province.     

THE USE OF ROMAN COINAGE

Summary. There is little doubt that Roman coins found today in excavations were lost during the Roman period because they were in use. If these coin-finds are examined in the appropriate way it should be possible to detect something of the patterns of coin-use and coin-loss in the ancient world and hence to learn something of the monetary side of trade and the economy. Finds from different sites are compared in an effort to establish basic rules of interpretation, or, failing that, of presentation of the evidence.     

NATIONALIZING HISTORY AND THE CHALLENGE OF DISCORDANT TEMPORALITIES1

Christopher Hill's National History and the World of Nations reminds us of the conjunctural moment of an emerging world market in the latter half of the nineteenth century and the promise it offered for vitalizing a “world history” yet to be written. More importantly, it supplies the silhouette of a radically different interpretive approach, formed by the force of a centrifugal perspective that—through its concentration on how France, the United States, and Japan were simultaneously motivated to construct representations of self‐identity in national narratives—converged to disclose the possibility of a wider world no longer held hostage to the geopolitical category of the “West.” Hill's account shows that the impulse behind the formation of national history employed different strategies to imagine a singular linear historical narrative of national identity that aimed both to remove the spectacle of coexisting, different, multiple temporalities and to weld large and regionally disparate populations into a single people who, in a new time, would be instructed to recognize themselves in the nation's story. In Hill's reckoning, national history in France, the United States, and Japan appears simply as another name for historical necessity that sought, through processes of naturalization and nationalization, to overcome the unstable and uneven relationship between state and capital but that failed to conceal the deeper reality of determinations demanded by the relations of capital at the local and international levels.     

天主教在广西沿北部湾地区传播、扩散过程中的海岛效应和点轴模式

本文以天主教在广西沿北部湾地区的传播、扩散为例,试图揭示其传播、扩散的地理学规律。研究表明,天主教在环北部湾地区的传播分布基本上符合清末年间传教士先从沿海港口登陆,渐次沿交通干道向内陆地区扩散的点轴扩散模式。需要强调的是,涠洲岛以其地理上的闭合性特征在天主教进入广西初期扮演了弹跳板和插转台的角色,进而直接影响到广西沿北部湾地区天主教分布格局的形成。     

OPPIDA AND THE ROMAN ARMY. A REVIEW OF RECENT EVIDENCE

Until recently it has been commonly assumed that the Roman army made relatively little use of pre-exising fortifications such as hillforts and oppida. The accumulation of evidence over the past twent years suggests that this view is to be modified. The informastion now available from Gaul, Germany and especially from southern Britain indicates that military use of prehistoric strongholds was widespread and probably far from rare, notably in he early phases of occupation. Such use might reflect political control in the case of large oppida like the Titelberg, Camulodunum and perhaps Maiden Castle, or the securing of supplies, or possibly on occasion the use of native levies.     

FORM AND FUNCTION: THE EXPERIMENTAL USE OF ROMAN SAMIAN WARE CUPS

Summary.   Wear-patterns inside Roman samian ware vessels provide a clue as to how the pots were used. The wear repeatedly seen in the cups, Dragendorff 27 and Dragendorff 33, is particularly distinctive. This paper reports the results of using reproduction cups to replicate the patterns in order to discover how these may have been formed. The results suggest that Dragendorff 27 was used in the kitchen as a mortar, while Dragendorff 33 was a wine-drinking vessel. Evidence from historical sources and graffiti supports this view, and suggests that the inhabitants of Roman Britain were conversant with Roman ways of cooking and dining.