Gillingwater's History of Lowestoft: a reprint: with a chapter of more recent eventsGillingwater, Edmund
History
Gillingwater's History of Lowestoft: a reprint: with a chapter of more recent events
Gillingwater, Edmund
Lothingland (England); Lowestoft (England)
No part of the policy of this General claims our attention so much as the
erecting this fortress: it was the most effectual method of curbing the
high spirit of liberty inherent in the native Britons, of dissolving
their alliances, breaking their power, and dividing their resources; and
without these mural encampments, neither conquest nor security could have
attended the Roman banner in Britain. From this period, therefore, we
date the rise of Garianonum, built by the command and by the soldiers of
Ostorius, and garrisoned by a cohort of veteran troops lately returned
victorious from a battle with the Iceni.
Round our now well-cultivated fields, then cold, bleak, and woody, the
Romans diverted themselves with the pleasures of the chase; and cross our
now green and fertile meadows, they navigated their vessels and caught
their fish.
Upon a rising hill, near the confluence of the rivers Yare and Waveney,
and overlooking a large extent of Marshes which once formed the estuary
it commanded, stands Burgh Castle, the ancient Garianonum of the Romans.
In the construction of this camp the Romans pursued their usual method of
security in building, and practised their favourite military
architecture. It formed an irregular parallelogram, the parallel sides
of which were equally right lines, and equally long, but the corners were
rounded. Those camps, which were one-third longer than they were broad,
were esteemed the most beautiful, but here the proportion is as two to
one.
The principal wall of this station, in which is placed the Porta
Prætoria, is that to the east, 14 feet high, 214 yards long, and 9 feet
broad; the north and southern walls are just the same height and breadth,
and just half the length; the western side has no remains of any wall,
nor can we determine, with certainty, whether it ever had any; the sea
might possibly be considered as a sufficient barrier on that side, and
the steepness of the hill, as a collateral security.
Four massive round towers defend the eastern wall; the northern has one;
and another, now thrown down, stood opposite on the southern. These
towers were added after building the walls, and served not only to
ornament and strengthen them, but as _turres exploratorii_, each having
on the top a round hole two feet deep, and as many in diameter, evidently
designed both for the erection of standards and signals, and for the
admission of light temporary watch-towers, under the care and for the use
of the spectators. The south-west corner of the station forms the
pretorium, raised by the earth taken out of a vallum which surrounds and
secures it, and which is sunk eight feet lower than the common surface of
the area.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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