I can think of no better place to start than my own name. Beswick is Anglo-Saxon, but -wick is a loan word from Latin, very common in England. Roman forts often had a vicus [pronounced wicus] near them. This was an economic area. When the Romans left the word wicus remained and came to denote an area used for economic purposes, often for sheep or dairy. That wick is a very common place name ending is a sign of the impact of the Roman presence. However, people with wick in their surname are not more likely to be of Roman descent than anyone else in the population.
Furthermore, I live in the district of Stretford, in Greater Manchester, near to Chester Road, and there is Roman influence in these place names. Roman roads were sometimes known as streets. Stretford means Street Ford, where a street, in Latin strada, fords the river Mersey. The street in question is the old Roman road, which runs underneath the long, straight road to Chester. Watling Street is the name of long Roman road which extended from Dover for 276 miles to Wroxeter in the West Midlands
Chester is an English place name ending derived from the Latin castra, military camp. It always denotes a site once occupied by a Roman military unit. Chester, thirty miles from where I live was known as the city of the legions, as it was a legionary base for several hundred years, home of the twentieth legion. Manchester was a mere fort, but its remains have been excavated and can be visited. Variants of the word chester are cester or caster. Examples are Cirencester in Sussex and Lancaster in Lancashire. Furthermore, in South Wales we have the city of Caerleon [ pronounced Carleon. ] This name is composed of the Welsh caer, meaning castle and leon, a word that is a shortened form of legion. City of the Legion, it was the base of the Second Legion. There are Roman remains there, as you will see in the next section. Eboracum is York, home of the sixth legion, and the city is rich in Roman archaeology.
Other place names signify Roman influence. London is a Celtic word, but the Roman name Londinium survived the departure of the Romans, and this is indicative of cultural and ethnic continuity between the Roman period and the subsequent Saxon age. Faversham, in Kent, has a name that includes the Saxon ham [home] with the Latin faber, meaning maker, and is indicative of the survival of a group of smiths from the Roman period into the Saxon age. Nearby, the town of Dover has a name little changed from the Latin Dubris [v and b are phonetically closely related.]
Comments
Roman tactics were based on their being a disciplined force fighting an Ill-controlled war band in pitched battle.But from the time of the Gaul Vercingetorix it was known that the Romans were susceptible to guerilla tactics, a deficiency that produced the rout of
Rome at the Teutobergian Forest.The Silures used this weakness to some effect in Wales,but the Picts drove home this advantage in the Caledonian woodland.
The Romans being disciplined and efficient, they were ill-suited for the wild ways of the Picts and Scoti which lacked organised tactics.
Southern England is not very hilly and is ideal fighting territory for legions, which were designed for relatively flat lands. But as the Romans went northwards they encountered rockier, boggier and more mountainous terrain, in which the fighting capacity of legions was challenged. Moreover, the forested terrain of Scotland [Caledonia, the woodland] suited the use of guerilla warfare with hit and run attacks rather than the use of legions designed for pitched battle. Furthermore, the economic value of land in Scotland is not high and would not repay conquest.
It is likely that the Romans intended to conquer Ireland, but with all their problems in Britain they were already overstretched.
The Romans spread themselves too thinly. They did not have the resorces, human or physical, to cover all that land.
Scotland was difficult to capture because of the utter savagery of the Picts and Scoti . The terrain and weather also played their part.
The Scoti were unruly, undisciplined, fierce fighters.
It particularly intrigues me where you mention, in the second paragraph under the subheading Archaeology and the last paragraph under the subheading A Broad View, that the Roman presence was precarious in southern Scotland and non-existent in Ireland.
Why was that so?
The territory which became Wessex had a ruling family whose first rulers had Celtic names, but there seems to have been a Saxon warrior class. Something of Roman culture probably survived, but baths don't seem to have survived. The original name for Wessex people was Gewissae, the Steadfast ones, which suggests a determination to hold their ground against oncoming difficulties.
Wessex English was one form of Old English, but there were several other English dialects. Modern English descends from the English of London.
Is Wessex particularly known for its Roman accounts, artwork and baths and for King Ecbert appreciating, preserving and promoting them?
The series Vikings has the monk Athelstan hostaged from Ragnar Lothbrok to King Ecbert, the latter of whom he helps realize accurate translations from Latin to Wessexese (Old English?). It indicates that King Ecbert liked indoor-bathing in temperate waters and Roman wall paintings and writings.
The Fandom wiki links Athelstan to the historical Alcuin of York (born 735 A.D.?)
YES..... no charge there in North west England !
Yes indeed. However, you and I live in an area where there were very few villas. Villas are found in areas where there were peaceful conditions suitable for investing in expensive projects, but our area was almost certainly tribal territories held down by a military presence.
Frank,
I was so thrilled to see that this week. The farmer and his family uncovered possibly the best Roman mosaics in Britain. They have been covered over again for protection but it makes me wonder what is beneath our feet as we walk around.