BREMENIUM
(High Rochester) Northumberland,
England.
Roman fort of ca. 2 ha 65 km NW of
Newcastle (NY 834986), on Dere Street 38 km N of
Corstopitum. An occupation with turf ramparts dates to
the Flavian period, with modifications under Trajan.
After an interval of abandonment when Hadrian's Wall
was built, the site was reoccupied under Lollius Urbicus
and garrisoned by Cohors I Lingonum (
RIB 1276). The
defenses were now of stone, but little else is known of
the 2d c. occupation.
The fort was reoccupied and probably largely rebuilt
in the early 3d c. as an outpost of Hadrian's Wall. A
fragmentary building inscription (
RIB 1277) may date
to the reign of Severus, but more extensive rebuilding is
attested under Caracalla (
RIB 1279, A.D. 216), Elagabalus (
RIB 1280, A.D. 220) and Severus Alexander (
RIB
1281, ca. A.D. 225-235). The two latter record the construction of catapult platforms (ballistaria), which have
been found in the NW corner of the fort. Excavations in
the 1850s (the first to reveal the basic anatomy of a
Roman fort in Britain) showed that the fort faced N.
Under the shrine in the headquarters building was a
strongroom, at the entrance to which was a stone door
which ran back, on small iron wheels, into a recess. The
fort had a double allocation of granaries, two on either
side of the headquarters building. To the S lay structures
very like the rows of chalet-like houses which took the
place of unitary barracks in the late Roman period at
Housesteads and Great Chesters. An internal bath house
occupied the SE corner of the fort. Little is now visible
except for the fine single-portal W gate, a monumental
construction probably of the 4th c.
The fort was garrisoned in the 3d c. not only by a milliary cohors equitata, Cohors I fida Vardullorum, but also by a unit of scouts, numerus exploratorum Bremeniensium (
RIB 1262, 1270). Built after destruction about
the end of the 3d c., the fort was destroyed again about the middle of the 4th (perhaps in A.D. 343 or 360) and not reoccupied.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
I. A. Richmond, “Excavations at High
Rochester . . . ,”
Arch. Ael. 13 (1936) 171-84
PI; id;,
“The Romans in Redesdale,”
Northumberland County
History XV (1940) passim; E. Birley,
Research on Hadrian's Wall (1961) 242-44.
J. C. MANN
