Roman Britain

The Pelican History of England #1

by Ian Archibald Richmond

This book provides a general picture of the Roman province of Britain during the period form A.D. 43 until the fifth century.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, British Literature, Ancient History, Roman Britain, European History

240 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1955

About the author

Sir Ian Archibald Richmond, CBE, FSA, FBA (1902 - 1965) was an English archaeologist and academic. He was Professor of the Archaeology of the Roman Empire at the University of Oxford. In addition, he was Director of the British School at Rome from 1930 to 1932, President of the Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies from 1958 to 1961, and Director of the Society of Antiquaries of London from 1959 to 1964.

Reviews

[Rosemary Atwell · Rating 3 out of 5]

A likeable but fairly dense guide that offers a good starting point for the general reader in that it seeks to inform through the more personality-driven approach favoured by modern historians.

I would have liked a chronological timeframe to complement the text but overall this is a graceful and reliable text from leading mid-century historian Ian Richmond (1902-1965).

[Bryan--The Bee’s Knees · Rating 2 out of 5]

I consider myself a bit of a connoisseur when it comes to dry history books. I don't exactly revel in them, but I believe that if I want to have anything more than a superficial understanding of history, then I can't limit myself to books that are concerned more with entertaining the reader than an analysis. Thus a book like Theodore Hamerow's Restoration, Revolution, Reaction: Economics and Politics in Germany 1815-1871, or Oscar Jászi's Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy took a great deal of effort to get through, but in the end, I felt as though I had a very good understanding of all the unsexy elements that led to critical developments in these respective time periods, such as agriculture, economics, labor conditions and so on. The problem I found with Richmond's book on Roman Britain was that I don't have much of a different picture in my mind about the time period than I did when I started.

That isn't because the facts aren't here (or at least the facts as known in 1963, when the second edition was published.) Richmond takes the reader through five chapters that cover the major aspects of the years from Julius Caesar's invasion to the last years of the 4th Century: Military History, Towns and Urban Centres, The Countryside, Economics, and Religious Cults; and I think he has included everything that would apprise the reader of this period in Britain in a concise and straightforward manner. Unfortunately, the effect for me was similar to following behind a monotone museum curator for a four-hour walking tour of sterile display cases filled with pottery shards.

Not that there isn't a tremendous amount of information that can be gleaned from pottery shards; but the fact is, that for me, either the curator has to be entertaining as all get out, or has to be able to make me visualize exactly what the context is for these shards, or else I'm going to mentally check out. In comparison with a book, for instance, such as Baroque Times in Old Mexico: Seventeenth-Century Persons, Places, and Practices by Irving A. Leonard, which was actually quite lively and witty and left me with a distinct 'feel' for the time period, I was simply glad to be done with Richmond's walking tour, and finish with a regret that the time spent wasn't more fruitful. On the other hand, this could be the exact kind of presentation that appeals to other readers, I don't know. But I do want to emphasis that my two-star rating is not a result of the information given, but in its presentation, or, at least, my reception of it.

Review ends here.

The Joys of Book Series Collecting dept.

Roman Britain is the first volume in the Pelican History of England and is followed by eight more volumes:

The Beginnings of English Society by Dorothy Whitelock
English Society in the Early Middle Ages, 1066-1307 by Doris Mary Stenton
England in the Late Middle Ages by A.R. Myers
Tudor England by S.T. Bindoff
Stuart England by J.P. Kenyon
England in the Eighteenth Century by J.H. Plumb
England in the Nineteenth Century, 1815-1914 by David Thomson

and, unsurprisingly, England in the 20th Century, 1914-1979: Volume 9 by David Thomson

As strange as it may sound, I've spent a couple years tracking this series down, and when I say 'tracking down', I mean keeping an eye out at all the thrift stores and discard sales I go to for 50 cent copies of these books. Anyone can just get online and order these if they so desire, but I find the thrill of the hunt to be part of the draw. For some reason, I also find myself drawn to anything that says 'Volume [ ] of the history of...'. So I was recently just thrilled to death to find the last installment of this series (Stuart England) and looked on with a ridiculous amount of misplaced pride at all nine blue Pelican spines staring back at me from my bookcase--and which makes my tepid response to the opening salvo, if you will, that much more disheartening. I am glad to see that each succeeding volume has a different author; my hope is that among them, I'll find some that can deliver a narrative that resonates better with me.

But, unfortunately, this is the second Pelican 'History of...' that I've read that I've found disappointing, the first being A History of India: Volume 1 by Romila Thapar. At some point I plan on getting to volume 2, but I have to admit to feeling somewhat 'once burnt, twice shy.' Pelican also has a three volume History of France, which I've scrounged together, and an eleven (!) volume history of Soviet Russia, that I've only managed to find one of...so far.

None of which has anything to do with Roman Britain, unless one happens to be a collector of Pelican books or of multi-volume histories (and of which the population must be infinitesimal), but I have to say that I'm still waiting for that Pelican history that gives me a solid feel for the period I'm reading about. It may be an editorial approach that eschews the larger narrative and focuses on contributing factors, which is fine, but I've found that it takes a particular kind of historian to make that appealing.

[Beorn · Rating 2 out of 5]

It feels somewhat harsh to mark this book down as only two out of five stars as the information contained within is deeply informative, analytical and a very good source for anyone interested in the history of Roman Britain.
The area which has let the book down and prompted me to ratchet down the rating is just how that information is presented, i.e. in one big monolithic slab of information with which to beat the reader around the head. There are no paragraph breaks whatsoever and the chapters are all at least sixty pages long when they could have been made much shorter and more succinct. This all leads to that monolithic feeling which history books can all too often incur, dissuading all but the most determined, ardent history enthusiasts.

With a better, more user friendly approach to how the text is presented in this book, it could arguably be an incredibly valuable asset to anyone seeking to study the subject. As it stands, it's a weighty, almost stuffy tome that cares more about droning away at the reader that captivating them with the subject.

[Johnny · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Pelican History of England: 1 Roman Britain, written by archaeologist and Oxford Professor I. A. Richmond, is a collation of archaeological summaries. It is cross-sectional in that Richmond observes this historical period from the perspectives of: military, urban centers, rural areas, economy, and religion. Each cross-section has its own chapter to consider the subject, but there is no compelling narrative upon which to tether the descriptions (some that seem right out of dig reports and archaeological surveys). Perhaps, this is result of Richmond’s interest in material artifacts as opposed to literary artifacts. He does cite Tacitus (for example, on the hostility of the Romans to the Druids, p. 28) and offers a few references to military campaigns, but a sense of perspective and continuity seems missing.

My experience with the book was that it was a worthwhile reference, offering some fascinating summaries of significant finds that bear further research (and, perhaps, visits), but it is not a book I would read in a reasonable amount of time. It took over a month to read even though it is a relatively thin volume. Why? Because its approach was (admittedly by design) such an aerial view of a vast period that it liked the human touch! [Although, there was a tiny modicum of empathy in his suggestion that “modern civilization” would find the killing of the offspring of slaves via infant exposure to be “repellant,” p. 117.] Richmond did touch on general themes like the Roman conquerors “pressing” the vanquished into forced labor (p. 130) and how the tribal hostility of the tribes was repaid with Roman retribution via primitive taxation (pp. 130-131).

For the most part, though, Richmond focused on artifacts. To be sure, he drew cautious conclusions from said artifacts, but they were his emphasis. I liked his description of Roman mosaics and their predilection for classical scenes compared to the Romano-British preference for abstract patterns (pp. 122-123). I was unaware of the production of barbotine pottery decoration and why it wasn’t as well-as the reason for the lack of precision in the images (p. 164). I was surprised at his evidence for the lack of a British mint to cast, stamp, and distribute currency (listing only a few exceptions (p. 180). Yet I was more pleased when he followed this up with a description of how the materials used in the coinage and the authority who minted the currency was a government-induced inflationary scheme perpetrated on the occupied population (p. 185). It also had not registered with me that British manufacture of metal bowls were more dependent upon being beaten in the molds rather than cast (p. 175).

Regarding religion, the chapter on the countryside shared about a shrine at Gosbecks, near Colchester, where the temple/shrine seems to have been both a temple of trade (reflected in the statue of Mercury discovered there as well as the colonnaded enclosure for visitors and the later addition of a nearby amphitheater—pp. 136-137) and, as a shrine placed conveniently by a sacred grove (reasonable speculation on p. 194). I hadn’t realized that Mars Ocelus Vellaunus (“Mars the Lofty” or “Mars the Holy”for Ocelus and “Superior” for Vellaunus) and Mars Lenus (Mars the Tenacious? Mars the Deliberate? Since lentus in Latin seems close to Lenus) were “healing” gods as opposed to the traditional god of war (for whom, Richmond observes, that healing power would also have been most invaluable, p. 192). Apparently, though, during the renewing of regimental vows, a distinction was made between the Roman god of war and this fusion of roles (p. 203). Another example of fusion is the depiction of armored Mars Thinscus combined with his goose and his divine attendants, the Alaisiagae, naked versions of the Victories (p. 206). Such fusion Richmond attributes to the Romanization of the culture despite the tolerance granted under the interpretation Romana (p. 206).

Ignorant as I am of Celtic (including Irish) mythology, I was unaware of the association of the Nodens recounted in “Britain” with Nuada of the Silver Hand and his legends told in Ireland (p. 194). Richmond cites crowns and ceremonial headdresses from various shrines with scenes from the Noden legends depicted on them (p. 195). And since human nature never really changes, I was bemused by Richmond’s account of a spring near modern Carrawburgh and its shrine dedicated to the Romano-British goddess of wells and springs, Conventina. It seems that a basin through which the spring bubbled was used as a centerpiece of the ancient shrine and worshippers threw in money and memorial tokens as gifts to the goddess. Ironically, during a time of depaganization, the basin also became the receptacle for portions of the altars and possible votive tablets from the temple (p. 196). Many of the shrines, however, cannot be identified because memorial/inscriptional features were stripped in the cannibalization of said buildings for the rare building stone, particularly in the southern end of England (pp. 168, 198).

It is surprising that the book doesn’t end with any summary notes. Fortunately, the text is followed by a rather nice bibliography. I learned much from The Pelican History of England: 1 Roman Britain, but it was not the most stimulating exercise in reading.

[Grindy Stone · Rating 2 out of 5]

Over the years I have picked up copies of this series from used book stores, reading them out of order. While the volumes can be uneven and dry, by and large they are entertaining and informative. This one is a mess, though - it jumps off with allusions to invasions of Britain by the Romans, but from the outset one never knows who is who.

[Ashley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Full on info, straight at you with no gaps but it's 60 years old. Its still very interesting - especially the religious icons section.

[Mahmoud Keshk · Rating 1 out of 5]

A very dull book and I couldn't finish it.

[Neil Bye · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short précis of Roman Britain.
The presentation of its time - first edition in c1955 - a little dry but nonetheless informative.
A good introduction to a complex history.

[Erik Graff · Rating 3 out of 5]

A light read, this is a short, profusely illustrated general history of Roman Britain.

[Steve Clark]

Edition: 2nd