Roman Fort Project Needs Your Support

[Vindex]

Paul Harston of Roman Chester Weekend fame strikes again.

Sounds like experimental archaeology on a grand scale.

There's a text number and an online support vote for the project to receive up to up to £50K

http://www.pasthorizons.com/index.php/ar...ur-support

[Tiberio]

Sounds like a interesting Project, and I am certain many UK reenactors will be keeping an eye on that. But most of these projects are regional, meaning those that live near by will be most interested. Since the UK is a fair bit away for me I personally am looking more at this project: Kastell-Pohl
As here the chances are very good that I will be visiting more than once.
Maybe it would be of interest to sort these kind of projects? So that people can find with in a short time what reconstruction projects are going on in their vicinity?

[mcbishop]

Probably churlish of me to observe that a) The Lunt already exists (although understandably not very convenient for RTL's purposes) and b) there seems to be some confusion over terminology: The Roman Fort Project actually appears to be aiming at a temporary camp (although the photo from last time looks more like a flimsy fort than a camp). Confusion seems inevitable! hock:

Mike Bishop

[Nurglitch]

Probably churlish of me to observe that a) The Lunt already exists

Lunt consists of a single gate and one building, a granary. Hardly a fort.

[mcbishop]

Lunt consists of a single gate and one building, a granary. Hardly a fort.

More than the proposed camp/fort/camp has, though (still unclear which it is supposed to be – if a fort it will have buildings, if a 'marching' camp it won't, so the granary point is irrelevant). Surely it would make more sense to plough limited resources into what already exists (and The Lunt is, after all, for all its faults, a reconstruction of an excavated fort)? The Lunt was (re)constructed as a serious(-ish) piece of experimental archaeology, designed by archaeologists to answer specific questions (albeit executed in a fairly modern manner, as these things invariably are with health & safety/building regs). The problems with it lie in the fact that it has largely been unloved in subsequent years – last time I went there huge amounts of heras fencing around the crumbling ramparts sort of spoiled the photo opportunities. One remembers the tragic end of the Metchley reconstruction, torn to pieces by vandals (Brits, eh, what can you do with 'em?!). Pouring serious money into a project needs one eye on the long game and decent project management; sadly, in my experience, those two are seldom found squatting under the same hedge ;-)

Mike Bishop

[Vindex]

EDIT: The link is dead as the voting is over!!

Perhaps the Lunt has been written off as too unsafe to be redeemed and therefore a new project is required?

[Nurglitch]

More than the proposed camp/fort/camp has,

The proposed camp is supposed to be less than a gate and a single building? How? Are they going to erect a tent?

Surely it would make more sense to plough limited resources into what already exists (and The Lunt is, after all, for all its faults, a reconstruction of an excavated fort)?

Lunt is state-owned and it doesn't seem the local council gives a flying frig about the site. Nothing has been done there for decades, the last serious work was done in 70s. Pouring money into Lunt is effectively handing them over to the state which may just decide the money would be better spent on a progressive campaign of inclusive leveraging of convergencies in the local frog population. Even if the council was interested you still get into all kinds of trouble when you try to build anything on a historical site - trouble you don't get when you build from scratch.

[mcbishop]

The proposed camp is supposed to be less than a gate and a single building? How? Are they going to erect a tent?

I just meant it in the sense that The Lunt exists already and the proposed camp is just vapourware.

Lunt is state-owned and it doesn't seem the local council gives a flying frig about the site.

Strictly not state-owned but rather council owned (the state is rather successful at owning and caring for historical properties, just a bit pants at promoting them). Arbeia and Segedunum are both council-owned and do rather well, so there is no automatic state/council=bad private=good equation to be drawn there.

Nothing has been done there for decades, the last serious work was done in 70s.

There have been recent campaigns of excavations and improvements to the site were being actively considered only a few years ago (although I'm not sure if they ever got as far as an HLF application).

Pouring money into Lunt is effectively handing them over to the state which may just decide the money would be better spent on a progressive campaign of inclusive leveraging of convergencies in the local frog population.

Absolutely no reason why such funds should not be ring-fenced. And let's not forget that we own 'the state' ;-)

Even if the council was interested you still get into all kinds of trouble when you try to build anything on a historical site - trouble you don't get when you build from scratch.

And other problems don't arise on a fresh-build site? Now that is tempting the gods of planning, archaeology, building regs, and who knows what else. Even if they are just building a temporary camp, they will have to break ground for a ditch, whilst a fort would require postholes, post-trenches, and the whole kit-and-caboodle that we know and love from Roman military archaeology (never mind any modern services that have to be installed) so – depending upon where it is built – there could still end up being a need for an archaeological provision as part of the planning permission process. Of course, if they have a brownfield site in mind...

Mike Bishop

[Crispvs]

As a fairly regular visitor to the Lunt, I would both endorse and counter some of the comments above.

In the early 1970s one of the gateways was reconstructed in the original post holes with the overall look being based on images on Trajan's Column. A section of the rampart was also reconstructed either side of the gateway (I believe this was at the same time as the gateway). Some years later (1976-7 off the top of my head) one of the three granaries was reconstructed on the original trenches and turned into a site museum. A some stage around this time or slightly later the gyrus was reconstructed. At some stage the plans of several of the buildings were also marked out with concrete.

There has also been an annual excavation season for the last couple of decades which has concentrated on the area of the south side of the fort. I recall great excitement about ten years ago when they enthusiastically announced that they had found the ditch of the first fort (the original Lunt was rebuilt twice during its roughly twenty year existence, as well as being briefly reoccupied far a little while during the third century AD).

I first visited the Lunt in 1998 and was struck at the time by the state of the ramparts. When I asked about this I was told that the ramparts were an experiment in how long a turf and timber rampart will last. I replied (and still maintain) that turf ramparts will last as long as they are properly maintained and I cannot accept the idea of soldiers living in a fort whose walls were falling down, rather than maintaining a fairly constant level of maintenance.
The ramparts continued to decline and collapse and after a while were declared unsafe and fences were put up to prevent access. At the same time, expansive plans were advanced for reconstructing the principia and one of the barrack blocks. Unsurprisingly, these plans came to nothing. Coventry City Council, which has never exactly valued its own heritage, has never really put any effort into maintaining or promoting the Lunt. We used to put on two shows per year there for free in exchange for being permitted to train there. Although they thus had a regular opportunity to promote an event which would showcase the Lunt and increase gate takings they never promoted the events and usually we found ourselves performing for just a handful of people. If I understand it correctly, what publicity there was was arranged on a very ad hoc basis by the staff who worked there, rather than by the department responsible. There seemed to be a continual complaint that the Lunt was a continual drain on funds and did not pay for itself. However, the council themselves were at fault here as they did nothing to promote it (it was not even featured in most of their tourist information pamphlets) and the entry fee was laughably small, not having been increased since the early 1980s. Mind you, the really rather good Midland Air Museum, just around the corner from the Lunt, is similarly neglected.

Anyway, in 2005 the council finally did some restoration work on the gateway (which had also been fenced off for some time) and announced plans to rebuild the ramparts. However, this was following a concerted letter writing campaign and an anonymous (well, just about anyway) donation of several thousand pounds which should have amounted to about half the cost of the restoration, but which I suspect paid for the whole restoration of the gate with very little real financial input from the council.
Various plans were bounced about for doing this work, but due to an insistence by the usual voices that there must be disabled access to the rampart a number of these plans foundered. The one which seemed to be preferred by the council was one which involved turning one of the ramparts into a long ramp which would have allowed wheelchair access to the first level of the gatehouse. This would have destroyed the look of the rampart though and there was a good deal of opposition to this. I and a number of other people proposed an alternative and very workable way to arrange wheelchair access which did not involve destroying the look of the rampart, but they did not seem interested in ideas which did not originate in their own staffroom. As they were also talking about rebuilding the rampart in some way which would not require them to have to do any maintenance in the future (something which surprised no-one) I suggested to them that they employ triangular section concrete sections as a solid but invisible core for a reconstructed rampart, such as has been used very successfully for the reconstructed ramparts at Montfichet Castle. The response I got was distinctly cool.

Then, quite suddenly in late 2006 or early 2007, CCC transferred management of the Lunt, along with the Herbert Art Gallery and something else which I do not recall, to a trust and gave the trust an annual grant to work with. The trust immediately set about trying to renovate the Lunt and promptly announced they were to begin work on the ramparts. On hearing about this I got in touch with them and ended up having a long and in depth conversation with the head of the trust, who seemed very interested in what I had to say. However, within two months he had been replaced by someone else, who I did not get to talk to. The reconstruction went ahead though. They did decide to use a concrete core but apparently decided to use 'H' shaped concrete supports rather than triangular sections. The chosen supports will probably do the job fairly well though. However, the outer look of the reconstruction gave greater concern. Although they abandoned the obsession with wheelchair access, rather than go to the trouble of building the entire rampart from turf, the trust decided on a compromise and made the upper section of wood, thus unwittingly creating an uncomfortable mixture of box rampart construction sitting on top of a half height turf rampart. Obviously unaware of the anachronism they had produced the trust spent a week or two congratulating themselves over the good job they had done. I did get in touch with them (as did a number of other people) about their further plans (and to tell them a little about Roman fort building) but was told that they had spent around half of their grant for the year and that all remaining money would need to be poured into the Herbert Art Gallery. I have never visited the Herbert (although I am sure it is very nice) but I somehow doubt that it could generate the visitor numbers the Lunt could if it was properly funded.
Over the next few years, the Herbert seemed to be the trust's main concern, although they did arrange for one or two rotting panels in the gyrus wall to be replaced.
Early last year however, it was announced that the granary (which had also been in need of some work for a while) was to be re-roofed and that a firm which specialised in historical restoration had been selected for the work. They were good to their word and the granary has indeed been re-roofed. The museum has been re-arranged in places as well, although the promise of a few more of the finds being displayed seems to have been forgotten. There are currently rumours of a reconstructed barrack block, but I am not really holding my breath considering that the trust are probably still feeling the effect of paying for the new roof on the granary.

I don't know whether it was our vocal attitude to the proposals for the Lunt or something else, but for the last three years we have not been booked for shows there (although we do still do our training there) and it seems our place has been taken by a third rate group who promote themselves on the basis of their combat displays (which bear very little resemblance to the way the Romans are likely to have fought).
Ho hum - so much for being the resident group who have actively campaigned in favour of the Lunt's survival. :?


(Edit) Sorry Mike. I had this post open for some time and did not see your post until I had finally posted it.

Crispvs