In the unlikely event you went to the Tripadvisor website and typed in Bearsden, then clicked on Things to Do, you would find five listings with the Roman Bathhouse at Number 3. (I’m not going to get diverted; if you want to see the full list, click here.)
So, everyone knows OF the Romans in Bearsden but what do you know ABOUT the Romans in Bearsden?
Good news, you can click here and be taken to a download link courtesy of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. The link is to a pdf copy of the book “Bearsden: a Roman fort on the Antonine Wall” by David Breeze. He’s the man who led the excavations and is just a hero for his dedication in completing the task to such a high standard, then writing a book in reasonably accessible language, THEN making it available for free.
Breeze’s work is a treasure trove but, at 441 pages, it is quite long for a casual reader so I have dipped in to come up with some answers to questions that interested me, as follows:
- How big was the fort, and where was it in the modern landscape?
- What objects were found, are there pictures of them, and where are they now?
- As the hamlet of New Kilpatrick transformed into the suburb of Bearsden, could the Victorian builders see any of the remains visible and what did they build on top?
My first question(s), how big and where, can be addressed in the following diagram drawn by Breeze and his team:
As you can see, Roman Road does indeed run through the centre of the fort from east to west. I’ve ringed the bath-house remains you can see today in red to orientate you. Apart from Roman Road, two other modern roads are shown – on the top right is Grange Road and in the bottom left is Horseshoe Road – this is difficult to see initially as it follows the line of the ditch (in light grey).
Therefore as you walk away from Bearsden Cross, passing the Post Office (Kulbir’s) on your left, then the car park, you are approaching the western gate. As you come level with Horseshoe Road on your right you are crossing the ditch, with the rampart immediately after, approximately where the turning to Roman Court is on your left and this is where the gate would have been.
As you proceed, there would have been barracks and storehouses to your left and the commanding officer’s residence to your right, then the admin HQ. There was then an internal wall and gate, possibly the original east gate before you get to the bath house. The bath house itself stands in what has been called the annexe – one theory is that it was a fore risk so had to be separated from the wooden buildings.
The eastern gate of the fort is immediately after the visible bath-house remains, before Grange Road.
Here’s the same information on a ‘satellite view’ covering a similar area to the diagram of the fort, but a slightly wider angle to let you see some of the shops at the Cross on the left and Grange Road on the right. The blue line is my understanding of the line of the wall itself and the red rectangle is my understanding of the approximate position of the fort:
I am sure my alignments are off to some extent but I think I have the west gate and east gate about right. The northern dimensions are dictated by where the wall was, and the dimensions south of the road assume it is symmetrical around the axis of the road.
And here is a sketch by one of David Breeze’s team, Michael Moore, of what it might have looked like viewed from the south e-east and looking to the north-west:
To orientate you, the road running from top left through the fort gates and exiting bottom-right is (approximately) modern Roman Road. The buildings outside the fort wall in the top left are where the modern car park is.
Describing his sketch, Moore says the two buildings south of the road are the headquarters building (with courtyard) and the commanding officer’s residence (with a vegetable garden). North of the road are barracks and stores, with haystacks by the wall itself. The bath-house is in an annexe to the east, possibly because the risk of fire, with a paddock and exercise area south of that.
My second question was: Are there any photos of the finds? I had to rethink a bit because in Breeze’s terms there are LOTS of finds such as fragments of pottery and seeds from the toilet drain. That wasn’t what I had in mind – I’d seen there was a carved stone tablet, a carved stone goddess’s head and brooch, for example.
Here is the inscribed stone:
The scale at the top shows 10cm, so in Imperial it’s about a foot long (the size of a house-building brick?) The inscription is translated by Lawrence Kepple, from Breeze’s team, as “Of the Legion XX, Valiant and Victorius, the Century of Quint … built (this)”.
This was found in the rubble of one of buildings north of the road, thought to be the granary.
Here’s the carved head of a woman, possibly the goddess Fortuna:
The head was found amid rubble in the cold bath of the Bath-house.
I have seen a photo of a brooch but cannot now retrieve it (can any reader help?). But instead here are two of my favourite finds, the intaglio. First is the one of the Goddess Minerva:
Second, is an intaglio of a shrimp, set within an iron ring:
Wow, different finds appeal to different people but I love this one.
My third question: what would have been visible to the Victorians? Breeze includes an extract from Roy’s military map of 1755 as follows:
The red patch of buildings just above the centre is what we would call Bearsden Crss with the outline of the fort to the right. Note Thorn and Liddcamrough to the left and St Germains Loch at the bottom of the photo.
Roy was not a fanciful, romantic mapmaker – this was a military map to guide the army of George II around Scotland in the event of another rebellion.
Here is a very similar view in 1861:
Again, we can see there were visible remains of the fort earthworks south of Roman Road, as well as earthworks marking the line of the wall to the west of Dryman Road and on the north side of Boclair Road. the following photo is a section through the Antonine Wall, but not in Bearsden:
Maybe we can imagine this is what the Victorian builders flattened out.
What was built on top of the site? South of Roman Road, we can now say it is the northernmost house of Horseshoe Road, the Bearsden Baptist Church (Maxholme) and the Antonine Care Home. The north side of Roman Road is a topic I have partly covered before (click link) but I can now extend that to the south side of the road to show the buildings:
North of the road, Old Auchendrane was on the site of the north-west part of the fort area, with Torran Mor, the villa next to it, on the north-east. (with the bath-house hidden in its garden). Breeze includes a photo of Torran Mor:
Note the chimneys of Old Auchendrane in the background.
This is very approximately the same view today:
And here is the front garden of Torran Mor, prior to excavation (so roughly the revse view of the previous photo):
Note the roof of the next villa along, also for demolition, called Wellwood.