Saint Patrick & Names along the Antonine wall

[MonsGraupius]

Ignore the evidence that St.Patrick born in Strathclyde

I have probably missed something along the way but what is this evidence? Obviously, the name would not have been in use in Patrick's day, so what is being interpreted as referring to Strathclyde and what name (if any) is being translated as 'Strathclyde'?

Yes, it's been a bit rambling. The best thing (rather than me reposting) is to read the summary I produced at the start of the article at:

http://roman-britain.co.uk/nemthur.htm

Let's start at the beginning. Around a decade ago I did an archaeology course run by a Romanist at Glasgow University. For obvious reasons, living only a mile from the wall (east of Glasgow), and being interested in the Roman archaeology I had a special interest in the Antonine wall. And like most people, I will have read about the Ravenna Cosmography and the difficulties with fitting the names (I was also generally interested in Roman names). I had also read the note to Nennius about there being 7 forts on the wall (which seemed to be ignored).

And ... it just happened that as part of the course we had to write an essay on early Christianity in Scotland. As part of the research for that essay I happened to read up on St.Patrick where I read that "3 out of 5 lives" said he was born in Strathclyde. And then I read that in the Gaelic Hymn of Fiacc it says that he was born in Nemthur.

So, being curious, and knowing that the Ptolemy & Ravenna Cosmography lists were online  I had a look to see whether Nemthur could be matched to any of the names located in central Scotland. And that is how I stumbled on "MedioNemeton", a single word in the Ravenna Cosmography, which was easily seen (by me) to match if split to give Nemeton. So, imagine how I felt, when I realised that if you split MedioNemeton to Medio & Nemeton that Nemeton is now the 7th entry on the Ravenna Cosmography ON THE ANTONINE WALL, and therefore the last fort on the Antonine wall and therefore Old Kilpatrick.

Imagine then, when I checked the next entry and found it was Subdobiadon - which is easily equated to Dumbarton (and others have noted the likeness)

Fortunately, having been taught by one of the best Romanists - I wasn't under any allusion about the extensive amount of Roman archaeology in the central belt of Scotland (every lecture seemed to be on it and most field trips had a Roman content). I was also aware that most Roman forts had been shown to have civilian settlements. So, I couldn't see any problem at all with a Roman coming to Scotland and for their family to have stayed here.

Yes I can see how that might have seemed odd to antiquarians who didn't have our survey techniques and all they could see were the military remains. But now we do have ground survey techniques and have accounts like the Vindolanda tablets which shows the old views were very wrong.

However, despite the fact we are told he was born in Strathclyde, because people read antiquarians who could not believe civilians were in Roman settlements in Scotland, it seems that a bit of an industry has grown up relocating St. Patrick's birth to numerous other places.

So, my problem is one of trying to convince people - not of the facts (which are pretty conclusive) but to ignore the outdated views that led to St.Patrick's birthplace being translated anywhere other than where we are told it was. And after something like a decade of listening to people advance every conceivable reason why it can't be Old Kilpatrick, I've not come across anything like a convincing argument to reject the overwhelming case that Old Kilpatrick is Nemeton.

So, as I took over running the Roman Britain website - I thought I'd given the subject enough time to find any flaws - none were forthcoming so it was time to make the change.