NOVIOMAGUS REGNENSIUM
(Chichester) Sussex,
England.
The New Market of the Regnenses
grew up in a territory defined by pre-Roman defensive
dikes several miles N of the site of the earlier oppidum.
The origins of the town are still somewhat obscure, but
recent excavations have demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that the site was first occupied as a military
fort during the invasion period following the Roman
landing of A.D. 43. Traces of timber buildings and a
possible defensive ditch can be ascribed to this initial
phase, together with a large number of military bronze
fittings.
From ca. 45 to 75, after abandonment by the army,
the site began to take on an urban appearance with
more timber dwellings and the development of a pottery industry producing fine beakers imitating imported
Gallo-Belgic types. Other buildings of a more monumental kind must have existed as well as benefactions,
including an equestrian statue of Nero the inscribed
base of which was found in the 18th c. During the 70s
and 80s the somewhat haphazard arrangement of the
town was apparently tidied up. Probably at this time the
street grid was laid out and the forum and basilica built
with a large (public?) bath close by. There was also a
Temple to Neptune and Minerva, erected in honor of the
Divine House by a guild of craftsmen with the permission of the local client king, Tiberius Claudius Cogidubnus. An inscription recording these facts was found in North Street in 1723 (where it is now exhibited), but
the actual building has not been located. Other amenities
of the late 1st or early 2d c. included an amphitheater
and probably a public water supply canalized from
the nearby Lavant river. A cremation cemetery grew
up beside the main road leading NE towards London.
Apart from the principal public buildings most of the
structures of Noviomagus throughout the 2d and 3d c.
were of timber construction, sometimes based on dry-stone footings.
Late in the 2d c. the nucleus of the town (ca. 40 ha)
was enclosed within an earthen rampart with two V-shaped ditches outside. At this stage gates were probably
of masonry, but little is known of them apart from a
fragment of the N gate found recently. Early in the 3d c.
the front of the earthen rampart was cut back and a
masonry wall inserted. This wall, many times refaced,
still stands for most of its original length. Later, probably
immediately after the troubles of A.D. 367, forward-projecting bastions were added to the walls, necessitating
refilling the inner ditch and recutting the outer one in a
wide flat-bottomed shape. The new defensive measures
were consistent with those taken elsewhere, and reflect
the growing need felt by towns to defend themselves with
permanently mounted artillery.
Within the walls the town continued to develop, with
masonry houses and shops gradually replacing the old
timber structures. Traces of buildings have been found
in most parts of the town and a number of fragmentary
mosaic floors have come to light, but building does not
appear to have been as dense in Chichester as in other
comparable British towns. It may be that Noviomagus
experienced an economic setback during the 3d and 4th c.
The fate of the town during the 5th c. is unknown, but it
emerged as a center of some significance in the later
Saxon period and has continued to be occupied since
then.
Apart from its well-preserved walls and bastions, and
the amphitheater, there is little to be seen of Roman
Chichester. The City Museum now houses the archaeological collections.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
G. M. White, “The Chichester Amphitheatre: Preliminary Excavations,”
AntJ 16 (1936) 149-59; id., “A New Roman Inscription from Chichester,”
ibid. 461-64; A. E. Wilson, “Chichester Excavations
1947-50,”
Sussex Arch. Collections 90 (1952) 164-200;
id., “The Beginnings of Roman Chichester,” ibid. 94
(1956) 100-43; id., “Roman Chichester,” ibid. 95 (1957)
100-43, id.,
The Archaeology of the Chichester City
Walls (1957); J. Holmes,
Chichester: The Roman Town
(1965); A. Down & M. Rule,
Chichester Excavations 1
(1971).
B. W. CUNLIFFE