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Banna, now known as Birdoswald Roman Fort, was a fort, towards the western end of Hadrian's Wall, in the Roman province of Britannia. Today the site is occupied by a former farm called Birdoswald. , it is the only site on Hadrian's Wall at which significant occupation in the post-Roman period has been proven, and it is subject to a long-term archaeological programme under the directorship of Tony Wilmott. It is one of the best preserved of the 16 forts along Hadrian's Wall. The fort is situated in a commanding position on a triangular spur of land bounded by cliffs to the south and east overlooking a broad meander of the River Irthing in Cumbria. In Roman times, the fort was known as ''Banna'' (Latin for "spur" or "tongue"), reflecting the geography of the site. Cumbria County Council were responsible for the management of Birdoswald fort from 1984 until the end of 2004, when English Heritage assumed responsibility. ==The fort== The fort was occupied by Roman auxiliaries from approximately AD 112 to AD 400. In this western part of Hadrian's Wall, the wall itself was originally built from turf, later replaced with stone (Hogan, 2007). The stone fort was built some time after the wall, in the usual playing card shape, with gates to the east, west and south. Inside were built the usual stone buildings, a central headquarters building (''principia''), granaries (''horrea''), and barracks. Unusually for an auxiliary fort, it also included an exercise building (''basilica exercitatoria''), perhaps reflecting the difficulties of training soldiers in the exposed site in the north of England. Excavations between 1987 and 1992 showed an unbroken sequence of occupation on the site of the fort granaries, running from the late Roman period until possibly 500AD. The granaries were replaced by two successive large timber halls, reminiscent of others found in many parts of Britain dating to the 5th and 6th centuries. Tony Wilmott (director of the excavations) has suggested that, after the end of Roman rule in Britain, the fort served as the power-base for a local warband descended from the late Roman garrison and possibly deriving legitimacy from their ancestors for several generations. Extensive geophysical surveys, both magnetometry and earth resistance survey, were conducted by TimeScape Surveys (Alan Biggins & David Taylor, 1999 & 2004) between 1997 -2001. These surveys established that the sub-surface remains in the fort were well preserved. The later surveys detected two vici (civilian settlements) of different characters on the eastern and western sides of the fort. The surveys by TimeScape also determined the location of a bathhouse in the valley of the River Irthing. An area between the fort and the escarpment was excavated by Channel 4's archaeological television programme ''Time Team'' in January 2000. The excavation detected signs of an extramural settlement (''vicus''), but the area is liable to erosion and the majority of the vicus could have fallen over the cliffs. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Banna (Birdoswald)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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