Bridgeness
| Bridgeness | |
| West Lothian | |
|---|---|
 Bridgeness Pier on the Forth | |
| Location | |
| Grid reference: | NT015815 |
| Location: | 56°-0’59"N, 3°34’54"W |
| Data | |
| Post town: | Bo'ness |
| Postcode: | EH51 |
| Local Government | |
| Council: | Falkirk |
Bridgeness is a West Lothian village, by the south shore of the Firth of Forth, which has become absorbed into Bo'ness, sitting just east of the town centre. To the east of Bridgeness is Carriden.
The Gazetteer of Scotland records of Bridgeness that it is:[1]
A former village which now forms an eastern industrial district of Bo'ness, Bridgeness lies a mile east of that town. It is here that the Antonine Wall ends and a fine Roman sculpted tablet was discovered on 16th April 1868. While the original is held by the Museum of Scotland, a replica of the Bridgeness Slab was erected in Kinningars Park in 2012. Roman camps have been found immediately to the south and to the east at Carriden.
This was once an industrial village, in the Parish of Carriden, with iron-smelting amongst other works.
The Bridgeness Slab
In April 1868, a Roman 'distance slab' was found in front of the rocky promontory on which Bridgeness Tower stands. It was discovered broken in three places, lying face down, under a few inches of soil, at a point 19 feet above the level of the ordinary spring tides. The finder Mr Cadell, donated the slab to the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland on condition that a plaque recording the discovery be erected near the spot.[2] Today a commemorative plaque does indeed stand, a Victorian replica of the Roman slab, in the roadside wall.
The slab is 9 feet 2 inches long by 2 feet 11 inches high and commemorates the completion of some four miles of the Antonine Wall by the 2nd Legion.
In addition to the Latin inscription the original has sculpted panels. On the left is a victorious Roman cavalryman with four naked Britons, one being trampled, one running with a spear in his back, one sitting in apparent despair and one of whom is bound and beheaded. It has been suggested that the last act was a show of contempt for Gallo-Briton head veneration.[3] On the right panel is a depiction of the ritual cleansing of the legion, with a soldier at the rear carrying the vexillium, or cavalry flag, of Legio II Augusta. The inscription records the building of 4,655 paces of the Antonine Wall.[4]
The inscription in the centre panel reads:
| “ | "Imp CaesTito Aelio Hadriano Antonino Aug Pio p p legII Aug per m p III DCLXVI s" | ” |
- which when expanded reads as"Imp(eratori) Caes(ari) Tito Aelio/ Hadriano Antonino/ Aug(usto) Pio p(atri) p(atriae) leg(io) II Aug(usta)/ per m(ilia) p(assuum) III(milia)DCLXVI s(emis)"
In English this translates as:
| “ | "For the Emperor Caesar Titus Aelius Hadrianus Antoninus Augustus Pius, Father of his Country, the Second Augustan Legion completed [the Wall] over a distance of 4655 paces".[5] | ” |
Close to the find-spot, an old dry-stone dyke of squared freestone such as the Romans used in constructing their permanent camps was found, extending for a few feet like a rough retaining wall round the face of the promontory.[2]
Outside links
- Bridgeness on Vision of Britain
- Antonine Wall:
References
- ↑ Gazetteer of Scotland
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 CANMORE (RCAHMS) record of Bridgeness
- ↑ Aldhouse-Green, Miranda (August 2004). "Chaining and Shaming: Images of Defeat, from Llyn Cerrig Bach to Sarmitzegetusa". Oxford Journal of Archaeology 23 (3): 319–340.
- ↑ Breeze, David J (November 1989). "The flag of legion II Augusta on the Bridgeness distance slab". Society of Antiquaries of Scotland (119): 133–142. http://archaeologydataservice.ac.uk/catalogue/adsdata/arch-352-1/dissemination/pdf/vol_119/119_133_142.pdf.
- ↑ "The Antonine Wall". http://www.scran.ac.uk/packs/exhibitions/learning_materials/webs/56/Antonine.htm. Retrieved 28 August 2013.
- H M Cadwell 1871; 1913; G Macdonald 1925; RCAHMS 1929; R W Feachem 1967
