Horncastle Roman Burg

Horncastle was the site of a Roman lesser walled town. The town defences date to the late 3rd/early 4th century AD. Roman Horncastle may refer to Banovallum (i. e. Wall on the River Bain). Banovallum was merely suggested in the 19th century through an interpretation of the Ravenna Cosmography, a 7th-century list of Roman towns and road-stations, and may equally have meant Caistor.

Although fortified, Horncastle was not on any important Roman roads, which suggests that the River Bain was the principal route of access to it.

Horncastle, in Lincolnshire, may have been a Saxon Shore fort. Stukeley in the early eighteenth century describes its walls as “three or four yards high, and four yards thick. … It is a perfect parallelogram … at the corners have been square towers, as they report ; the gates were in the middle of three sides, and I suppose a postern” in the fourth. His Plan shows the area as about 31 acres (Stukeley, It. curiosum, p.30). In point of fact the towers were probably round, and the plan is not quite a parallelogram.” (Collingwood, p.49)

The classification of the site as a Saxon Shore Fort would be better described as a Fortified Civil Settlement or Burg, which were also prevalent at the time.

Roman Walls of Horncastle

If you zoom into the map you will see an outline of the “visible remains of wall”. Most of the remains are either part of private buildings or on private land, and therefore not accessible. The public can view sections in the library, and at the end of Manor House Street or the north east corner near Somerfields.

A Second Settlement

Roman Horncastle is now understood to have consisted of two main settlement areas: the first being a walled enclosure of around 5 acres at the confluence of the Bain and Waring rivers, and the second an unwalled settlement that spanned up to 135 acres, located on a higher gravel terrace with its center around the town hall.

Coin finds from the unwalled area suggest it was the earliest settlement, dating back to the 1st century. However, evidence of earlier Iron Age occupation has also been discovered, possibly indicating a seamless transition between the two periods. The walled enclosure is believed to be a military structure from the 3rd or 4th century, with no signs of earlier settlement activity.

References for Bannovalvm

• The Archaeology of Roman Britain by R.G. Collingwood (Methuen, London, 1930). 
•  “Roman Horncastle” by Naomi Field and Henry Hurst published by the Society of Lincolnshire History and Archaeology (SLHA) in 1984

Map References for Bannovalvm

NGRef: TF2569 OSMap: LR122

Roman Roads near Bannovalvm

Ridge trackway: NNW (23) to Caistor (Lincolnshire) W (22) to Lindvm E (20) to Skegness

Sites near Horncastle Roman Burg

• Heckington (26 km)
  Pottery
• Greetwell Villa (26 km)
  Quarry and Villa
• Lincoln (Colonia Lindum) Roman Settlement (28 km)
  Aqueduct, Colonia, Legionary Fort, Pottery and Roman-Building
• Sleaford Roman Settlement (30 km)
  Minor Settlement
• Scampton Villa (32 km)
  Villa
• Skegness (32 km)
  Probable Port and Settlement
• Owmby Settlement (33 km)
  Minor Settlement
• Caistor Settlement Roman Burg (35 km)
  Roman Burg
• Ancaster Camp (37 km)
  Marching or Temporary Camp
• Ancaster Roman Fort (38 km)
  Claudian Auxiliary Fort (AD 43–54)