https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-tyne-56468718
another nice find
That's interesting. Somewhere nearby we have Caer Uedra, Koch thinks Chester le Street or Durham, that gets a mention in Marwanad Cunedda. If the port remained in use it presumably serviced it.
thanks for the info Stephen, interesting stuff
Quote from: Holly on Mar 21, 2021, 06:44 PM
thanks for the info Stephen, interesting stuff
Yes it's interesting, there must have been an awful lot of river wharves and similar around the country that are long lost and forgotten
Interesting. I have always been very sympathetic to Selkirk's "Piercebridge Formula" theory about the possible canalisation of even quite small rivers to enable logistics for Roman garrisons, even though I got a rather cold and dismissive reaction when I mentioned it to one of my Roman Britain professors... Selkirk's sin was that he was a pilot who dared to go beyond just flying the archaeologists around to take aerial photographs and started to think up things himself. :o
Yes that thinking for one's self stuff can be frowned upon.
When you think about how hilly the North East was and is river transport would have been a very attractive option where feasible.
Currently some think there was a civitas centred on Corbridge. I wonder if there was another centred on Caer Uedra? The line in the poem opines that "the civates will shake" upon hearing of Cunedda's death.
interesting thoughts on that point of the potential civitates in the North
This thread inspired me to have another poke around in Marwnad Cunedda. Amongst the goodies available to the elite was olive oil and wine. Those things would not have been arriving in Bryneich by road so perhaps our port was still in business.
Interesting question...and a further one
could it be more likely east coast or west coast?
That is an interesting question.
I'd be inclined to think both, as there was both an eastern polity centred on Durham (ish) and a western polity centred on Carlisle involved. Maryport (Alauna?) might be a good guess for the western port.
Not sure how much of the 'Western Seaboard' trend that became apparent in the 5th and especially 6th Centuries would have found its effects felt that far north but it is a consideration. Mediterranean traders were often more inclined to use the Western approaches to Britain
I've a memory that it is to do with the currents.
Of course there could be British middlemen buying from the traders and shipping further up country.
and also potentially less susceptible to Channel raiding presumably?
There is that consider too. Speaking of raiders.
Niall of the Nine Hostages father had the sobriquet slave lord, his mother was a daughter (Cairenn) of the King of Britain -so we are told. It always struck me as a very commercial and nautical sounding relationship. I'd imagine Cairenn's father whoever he was would be based on the western seaboard. A dynastic alliance on both sides of the sea would be good for business for both parties.
Off topic I know but I thought it might be of interest.
absolutely of interest!
One of the old OS three miles to the inch maps included Cumbria and Galloway and Man, and it certainly gave a genuine feel for the importance the sea as the road linking these together
Quote from: Holly on Mar 24, 2021, 11:18 AM
Not sure how much of the 'Western Seaboard' trend that became apparent in the 5th and especially 6th Centuries would have found its effects felt that far north but it is a consideration. Mediterranean traders were often more inclined to use the Western approaches to Britain
Barry Cunliffe's
Facing the Ocean is excellent on the topic of the Lisbon to Hebrides cultural links from the Neolithic to the Medieval period.
The other thought that occurs is the "Palmyrene" tombstones from the north-east. Regardless of whether one links Regina's in South Shields with Barathes' in Corbridge (and the latter was a reused stone, so exact provenance in the area unknown), I personally wonder whether a Palmyrene merchant, even if a logistics contractor for the legions, would have been slumming it in a humble vicus outside a fort. After all, Regina's tombstone shows her as a lady of some wealth and class. I therefore wonder whether or not there was somewhere more upmarket for them to reside than alongside auxiliaries' concubines.
Cunliffe is always worth a read.
Regina had been, and maybe still was, I forget, a slave. That she had a British tribal identity on her tomb stone suggests she had once been free. So at best a Freed Woman when she died.
Quote from: DBS on Mar 24, 2021, 03:33 PM
Quote from: Holly on Mar 24, 2021, 11:18 AM
Not sure how much of the 'Western Seaboard' trend that became apparent in the 5th and especially 6th Centuries would have found its effects felt that far north but it is a consideration. Mediterranean traders were often more inclined to use the Western approaches to Britain
Barry Cunliffe's Facing the Ocean is excellent on the topic of the Lisbon to Hebrides cultural links from the Neolithic to the Medieval period.
The other thought that occurs is the "Palmyrene" tombstones from the north-east. Regardless of whether one links Regina's in South Shields with Barathes' in Corbridge (and the latter was a reused stone, so exact provenance in the area unknown), I personally wonder whether a Palmyrene merchant, even if a logistics contractor for the legions, would have been slumming it in a humble vicus outside a fort. After all, Regina's tombstone shows her as a lady of some wealth and class. I therefore wonder whether or not there was somewhere more upmarket for them to reside than alongside auxiliaries' concubines.
thanks for the nod
Yes, she had been a slave, but was freed and recognised by Barathes as his wife, and, as I say, portrayed in death - accurately or otherwise - as a dignified Roman matron.
Purely speculation on my part, but I just have a feeling that the tombstone, and the very presence of a Palmyrene of some apparent standing in the north-east, possibly point to something beyond the bare "military plus" societal environment.