03-13-2006, 08:28 PM
I don't want to burst the bubble, as I see no reason why it should not necessarily be a military structure but I have a couple of observations to make.
1) The plate (was it a metallic object or was it a stone inscription?) carrying a vespasianic inscription may come from an earlier phase of occupation. If it was and if it was not stratigraphically dated it may have been deposited when the new structure was built or it might have been recycled and built into a later structure. The best way of dating the gateway would be by the strata the foundations are built into.
2) Town and fort gateways were not the only structures to employ double arches. The 'Old Work' at Wroxeter was originally a double arch (late knocked into a single portal) which led from the exercise hall of the town bathhouse to the calidarium (?). See pictures here: http://www23.thdo.bbc.co.uk/shropshire/ ... 270_02.jpg
here: http://www.virtual-shropshire.co.uk/pho ... ct0072.jpg
and here: http://www5.synapse.ne.jp/osuo_uk/wroxeter.jpg
It was the only part of the bathhouse to survive, due to being used as a wall in a number of later buildings, and is the most obvious surviving pice of Roman building at the site.
Crispvs
1) The plate (was it a metallic object or was it a stone inscription?) carrying a vespasianic inscription may come from an earlier phase of occupation. If it was and if it was not stratigraphically dated it may have been deposited when the new structure was built or it might have been recycled and built into a later structure. The best way of dating the gateway would be by the strata the foundations are built into.
2) Town and fort gateways were not the only structures to employ double arches. The 'Old Work' at Wroxeter was originally a double arch (late knocked into a single portal) which led from the exercise hall of the town bathhouse to the calidarium (?). See pictures here: http://www23.thdo.bbc.co.uk/shropshire/ ... 270_02.jpg
here: http://www.virtual-shropshire.co.uk/pho ... ct0072.jpg
and here: http://www5.synapse.ne.jp/osuo_uk/wroxeter.jpg
It was the only part of the bathhouse to survive, due to being used as a wall in a number of later buildings, and is the most obvious surviving pice of Roman building at the site.
Crispvs
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<a class="postlink" href="http://www.romanarmy.net">www.romanarmy.net
