Ian Haynes
Professor of Archaeology, Newcastle University; Project Director Roman Temples Project, Maryport; Project Director Lateran Project.
Location School of History, Classics and Archaeology, Newcastle University
Activity
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Some of the units on this diploma did indeed serve on Hadrian's Wall. Most of our information as to which units served on the Wall comes either from building inscriptions or the Notitia Dignitatum, a document discussed later in this week's programme. While some units did move, cohors I Aelia Dacorum in the document was at the outpost fort of Bewcastle...
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Our colleague Jane Webster has just returned from Brazil where she was discussing the Romans with university colleagues there. I hope you enjoy the course.
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Ian Haynes replied to Gail Best
Welcome. It is really good to see people continuing to join the programme, and great to have colleagues from the National Trust with us. We owe a great debt to the NT. I hope you find the course useful.
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Ian Haynes replied to Peter Davies
Modern writers on ancient history certainly frequently make the claim that auxiliaries were light infantry, yet by the time Hadrian's Wall was built auxiliaries were functioning in a range of roles which included close order formations - a classic heavy infantry role. They were not restricted to the looser skirmishing formations assigned to light troops. You...
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Ian Haynes replied to Harry Cather
In general the better we can model the modern landscape, the more precisely we can read the way in which it formed. We can also use the digital models generated here alongside other forms of data, including geophysical survey results, by laying the latter over the former, giving much greater precision than we would get from superimposing it on simple 2D maps....
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I am delighted to see so many colleagues joining us from the Portus course. Our friends at Southampton did a wonderful job and the Portus Project is endlessly fascinating. For those who haven't yet followed the Portus course I would strongly recommend it.
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Good to see the comments coming through and to see some friends from the last run returning. Welcome everyone. I do hope that as many of you as possible can get to Newcastle tomorrow (Saturday 20 June) for Dr Nick Hodgson's talk on Hadrian's Wall. Apologies for those who are further afield... Nick will be talking about research on the eastern end of...
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A very interesting topic. Our graduate students are just back from Xanten, where they participated in the preparation of a fine Roman banquet. I joined them - it was delicious.
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Good to have you on the course Fabiana. I think it is great that you are taking the course. I hope that you find the programme gives you what you are seeking in terms of both content and English practice. For my part, I am trying to do something to improve my Italian.
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Thank you Rodrigo. It is a pleasure to offer the course. I hope you will enjoy it .. even though I am afraid we have very few gladiators in this one. Perhaps another time.....
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I hope you will find the course helpful and engaging. I am pleased to see that AS exams haven't discouraged you from taking another course straight away!
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Welcome Pilar. I think it is great that you are trying out an online course in another language. I hope that you enjoy the course.
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Welcome Graham. I will be very interested to hear what you make of the course and how your students find its structure and content.
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Good luck with your plans for university. I hope that the course you choose will allow you scope to explore archaeology further.
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It is great to see so many people participating from all over the world. A quick advertisement though for those of you able to the Wall this weekend. Our excellent colleague Dr Nick Hodgson will be giving a lecture at Newcastle University, chaired by Dr Rob Collins on 'The Rediscovery of Hadrian's Wall on Tyneside'. The lecture will take place on Saturday...
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Welcome back Sue, please let us know what you think about the changes we have made to this version
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Good to see you back Derek
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This is good to see!
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I hope you find the course helpful and that your plans for the Rome visit come to fruition. I have so many favourite places in Rome, but I must admit to a special fondness for the extensive excavations underneath St John Lateran basilica in Rome where I am lucky enough to work. There you can find traces of lavish housing, baths, a fort, and the first...
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Have just returned from a day of site preparation work at Maryport, Cumbria. Our aim this season is to open up an area immediately to the north of the Roman cult buildings we excavated last year. We believe this will give us a deeper understanding of the ritual landscape at this important frontier settlement. We have a great team out in the field, and our...
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Ian Haynes replied to Ian Haynes
Dear Olga,
thank youDear Lynda,
I am glad you will be visiting the Wall. If you are able to extend your Wall walking into Cumbria I can assure you that will also prove rewarding.All best wishes
Ian
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Ian Haynes replied to Jenel Hazlett
Our aim with this piece was really to focus on iconography rather than text Edward, but if you review the video you will find that we scroll down one of the altars from 3.03 and 3.07. I note that it is not the easiest text to read though. With your comment in mind though, when we run this course again I will include a link to our new NU Digital Heritage site...
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Ian Haynes replied to Ian Haynes
Dear Olga, Dear Margaret, And to all our other friends out there
My turn to apologise for a late response. Thank you for the kind Christmas wishes. I hope that you had a good break over Christmas and wish you all the best for 2015.
And Olga, to be a philologist is of course a very fine thing, and you would be most welcome to volunteer for Maryport -...
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Ian Haynes replied to Ian Haynes
Dear Olga
Sorry for the delay responding and thanks for your comments. The evidence comes from a study of the Northumberland Coastal Plain published in an important recent study by Hodgson, N. et al. 2012 The Iron Age on the Nothumberland Coastal Plan: Excavations in advance of development 2002-2010. This details the excavation of a series of sites in the...
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Patricia, Ellen, I think you will find that there are many others working alongside you both. I hope you enjoy(ed) the last week
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Thank you Anne, Thank you Christopher
In answer to Christopher's question (and you can see here how I am learning my way through Futurelearn too) the discussion boards actually never close (contrary to what I heard before) so you have as long as you like. The only difference is that anyone wanting to register for the course for the first time must do so on...
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Ian Haynes replied to Ian Haynes
Thank you. I have just received confirmation from my colleagues here that the discussion boards will remain open too, so that hopefully reduces any sense of pressure on people. It really is satisfying to see people working through to the end of the course.
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Ian Haynes replied to Ian Haynes
Thank you all. How are you doing Lynda? I do hope you find the time to get through to the end. Also always good to hear that more people are planning to visit the Wall
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Ian Haynes replied to Felicity Keetley
Many thanks to you too Philip.
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Just to encourage those of you still working your way through week 6, the discussion facility will be stopping soon, but I hope you will be able to continue the course to the end. I hope too that you might come back and join us in June when we re-run this course - we will be making some changes, but it will remain substantially the same, though I suspect new...
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Ian Haynes replied to Kirsten Abbott
Thank you. I am glad that this has inspired you to take up Latin again - it can bring so much pleasure.
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Ian Haynes replied to Mick Symes
Do make sure that you look at the Vallum Crossing and the Temple to Antenociticus when you visit Benwell. They may appear to be a little tucked away, but they are well worth a look.
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Ian Haynes replied to Cheryl Churchill
There is so much to enjoy in the North West, and I hope that on one of your visits you will be able to head up beyond the Lakes to Maryport - but I am also pleased that you are encouraged to head to the NE too.
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Ian Haynes replied to Alan Greenwood
You are of course quite right that it is very important to look at the relationship of the Wall to Roman Britain more widely - and also to note that even in the region there is much more that we haven't even touched on in terms of the wider settlement structure. These are themes we do develop much more in our longer undergraduate courses, but the challenge...
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Ian Haynes replied to Rosemary Zakrzewski
Thank you Rosemary, it is indeed a fascinating topic. I think that the Tony you are thinking of must be my good friend and colleague Tony Wilmott, the archaeologist whose major discoveries at Birdoswald (featured earlier in Week 6) helped transform our thinking. Max has done a fine job opening the topic to a wider audience and of course Colm O'Brien has been...
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Ian Haynes replied to Felicity Keetley
You are both very kind, but I hope that wherever and whatever you study in future, you do not feel that age is a barrier. I have worked with several students who began their undergraduate archaeology careers well into their 70s.
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Ian Haynes replied to Jacquie Thompson
Delighted that you are now planning to visit the area - please make sure to make time for the Great North Museum
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Ian Haynes replied to martin waldron
Dear Martin, Thanks for your comment and observation about the level of feedback. The challenge has been two fold. First we have been trying to work out what the right level is in order to encourage, rather than deaden, discussion and second, the numbers of comments have been greater than I think many of us expected. We will be reviewing this aspect of the...
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Ian Haynes replied to Stephen Hardy
A pleasure working with you Stephen. There are quite a few wonderful projects operating with volunteer opportunities in the frontier zone, including Wallquest (based out of Arbeia), Binchester (based also out of Durham), Vindolanda (through the Vindolanda Trust) Maryport (Senhouse Museum and Newcastle), Papcastle and Ravenglass.
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Ian Haynes replied to Lesley Barry
Thank you Lesley. I am glad you have enjoyed it. I love the Geordie accent too, it always speaks to me of warmth and kindness, but alas I wasn't born here! Sadly the discussion period is indeed closing down very soon - so far as I understand people cannot contribute to discussion on this course after Sunday night BUT we will be running this one again, with...
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Ian Haynes made a comment
I just wanted to offer a quick note to thank you for your comments and to encourage those who feel they are 'behind'. Remember that you can keep going with the course, so although some people are indeed finishing the programme, we don't really think of people who are just completing week 3 / starting week 4 as 'behind' at all. The course remains there for...
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Ian Haynes replied to Margaret A
I hope that you will come and visit the UK, once you have completed moving house of course!
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Ian Haynes replied to Sue U
We will be running this course again next year and will draw on some of the feedback we have received to adapt it in places.
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Ian Haynes replied to Alexandra Cassley
Good luck with your university plans. The Wall is certainly a huge topic, but as you realise one cannot do a degree in it. What you can do, of course, is develop appreciation of the methods we have discussed and the broader cultural context in your first degree.
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Ian Haynes replied to Greg Sykes
I'll discuss the field trip idea with Rob Collins this week
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Ian Haynes replied to Lorraine Shepheard
I agree with Catherine
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I am pleased that the course was there when you wanted it. Thank you
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Ian Haynes replied to Olwen Poulter
An important thing to plug, well done
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Ian Haynes replied to Valerie King
The annual forum is a good place to meet people and catch round ups of research on the Wall. Also excellent is the annual Arbeia Society Conference, which takes place this year on the 15 November, 2015. Be warned though, this year's Arbeia Conference is already sold-out. Book early for next year.
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Why not?
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Ian Haynes replied to Helen Minchin
Thank you Helen. This is all helpful. Just a couple of quick points. I too found it very hard to get through the number of comments. I was aware that sometimes, the absolute number of comments concealed the fact that there were in fact certain recurrent participant observations/concerns that came back at intervals, so people sometimes missed less than they...
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Ian Haynes replied to Paul Spray
I hope you do take the Portus course. The Southampton team work very hard on it and have been very diligent in drawing on the experience of their first course to develop this one.
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Ian Haynes replied to Val Burr
Thank you. We would all like to know more about the story of the people on the other side of the Wall. I have tried to emphasise their importance to the story by coming back to them in different ways in multiple different steps, but any study of the Wall can seem lop-sided. Part of this is because actually the evidence is lop-sided itself. We know much...
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Ian Haynes replied to Rina Taramutu
We are indeed reading your comments, so thank you for your feedback.
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Ian Haynes replied to Timothy Ambrose
Thank you Timothy for this and your other feedback. I am pleased that Southampton are going to run Portus again soon
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Ian Haynes replied to Jo North
Come back for the re-run next year.
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Ian Haynes replied to Rachel Jones
Thank you Rachel. Please do get in touch. I am sure that there is more we can do to help with your Year 6 pupils and we would of course be delighted to talk to you about the Frontier Studies programme too
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Ian Haynes replied to Neil Manning
Goodbye Neil and thank you. You are warmly welcome to rejoin the course when it runs again (in an updated form) next Summer.
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Ian Haynes replied to Pamela Hardy
Thank you Pamela. At present we are focussing on the end of the course and the lessons we can learn from everyone's feedback. We will then run an adapted version of the same course next year. There is certainly interest here in running new courses.
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Ian Haynes replied to Nick Foreman
I think we will be learning from you all for a long time.
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Thank you and good luck with the MSc.
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Ian Haynes replied to M. CLEMENT HALL
Thank you both. We will note this for this re-run
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Ian Haynes replied to Jayme Perlingeiro
Excellent plans both
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Ian Haynes replied to Chris Stenman
Dear Chris, Dear Lynda, I am very pleased that the course has helped.
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Ian Haynes replied to Simon Read
We do not offer a distant learning course I am afraid, but there are discussions about relaunching our summer school events.
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Ian Haynes replied to Andrew Fisher
Do please do so. The Portus course is great.
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Ian Haynes replied to Josephine Cox
I hope that you do make it over one day. Thanks for joining us on the course.
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Ian Haynes replied to Jean Barnett
Thank Jean. Enjoy Leicester, it has lot of very talented academics and great courses as you know. We would be happy to see you if you wanted to come and visit.
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Ian Haynes replied to Lia A.
I hope you will get to come over and see the Wall, in the meantime good luck with all those MOOCs!
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The Wall is certainly a great resource for teaching and inspiring. I hope that you get to fulfil your ambition
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Ian Haynes replied to Kathleen Dunlop
Aiming to run again in June 2015
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Ian Haynes replied to Jan Prior
My understanding is that the material should remain accessible for several months to come.
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Ian Haynes replied to Edward Sterling
Thank you Edward and I hope that you enjoy the graduation ceremony.
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You will all realise, I hope, that this is another reason we incorporate this exercise - we want people to think about what we think we know, what we think is probable, what we have no evidence for and all the gradations between. Our on campus students are very clear on this - and I am pleased to see that our on-line course participants are actively debating...
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Anne Hoskins' response warrants a direct reply. My hope was that this exercise would give course partiicpants a sense of how many diverse sources of research are required to get to a plausible visualisation, but we can only give a glimpse here. The problem is that you have to know enough to realise what the student are themselves achieving here. Take the...
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We are indeed aiming to be back in Maryport next year. When in the field we aim to have at least two site tours a day during the week, together with an open day on one of the weekends. Current plans are to excavate between mid June and mid August
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We should explain to those not familiar with OFSTED that it conducts inspections of schools. Those outside the UK should be assured, however, that those failing to meet OFSTED targets do not then find themselves in fear for their lives, Whereas the threat of exile or death would have hung over Wall unit commanders whose effectiveness (and sometimes perhaps...
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Ian Haynes replied to L K
The odds against a relevant gravestone with such an explicit explanation of cause of death surviving are very very slim indeed, but it is interesting to note that there is one case in Britain (from Ambleside) where we do have a tombstone that refers to a soldier being killed by enemies in the fort in which he was (presumably) stationed. As for surviving human...
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Ian Haynes replied to Wendy WIlson
The Scoti came from Ireland
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Ian Haynes replied to Ian Haynes
Many thanks for all your points. I would certainly like to provide you with updates on some of our ongoing research in the next iteration.
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Ian Haynes replied to Stuart Archer
There are other areas where Mithras attracts notable communities of military devotees, so it is not only particularly military in Britain, but across the Empire Mithras has more non-military devotees attested than military ones. It is highly likely that more sites linked to the god await discovery in Britain. A point to consider is the degree to which the...
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There is a great deal of work that has taken place but of which the general public are largely unaware. It would indeed make for an interesting documentary series.
As for high-grossing historical drama, the profits from film and TV drama virtually never end up being spent on research. That said such programmes can stimulate greater interest which in turn...
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Thank you Howard, both for the suggestion and the feed back. I will make sure that a reminder goes out by Twitter
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I assume that they did it because they felt it was worth doing. Whether or not they wished to be on good terms with the indigenous population - a population that may well have been seriously disrupted by the arrival of Rome - they would still have felt it appropriate to show due respect to the deities they encountered.
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Ian Haynes made a comment
Thank you for taking the time to offer your thoughts on this one, we will be drawing our discussion points from your feedback here.
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Ian Haynes made a comment
Now it is a question of us catching up with you all! You have moved through the programme rapidly. Thank you so much for the time you have taken to post your thoughts and for your feedback here. If you have time, do go back to some of the earlier steps as you will see a steady accumulation of participant / mentor / 'educator' comments there too. Note also...
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Ian Haynes made a comment
Thank you all for your feedback which is much appreciated. Some of the many colleagues who have worked behind the scenes on making this course have confided in me that if ever they feel down, they come to visit this course and this step. Seeing how people engage with the programme and give up their own time to offer feedback encourages everybody. As of last...
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Francoise, there may have been some difficulties arising regarding pay and supply from time to time, but in general the Roman administration was well aware that soldiers needed to be paid and paid punctually. It is alleged that the emperor Septimius Severus advised his sons 'to enrich the soldiers and scorn the rest'. Emperors regarded the payment of soldiers...
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We do indeed reference the Antonine Wall in 1.3. I thought long and hard about how much we should dedicate to the Antonine Wall. On the one hand it is an especially important frontier system, arguably the most advanced of them all, but on the other it was occupied for less than two decades, a fraction of the time the Roman authorities maintained Hadrian's...
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Ian Haynes replied to Pat Poppy
Yes, it is striking isn't it? The marvellous thing about this example is that the colours still survived on some of the altars when they were excavated.
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Ian Haynes replied to Joanna Godfrey
There are several very good studies of Mithraism. Key studies are the three major works produced by Beck, Cumont and Clauss respectively. It is true that Mithras did not allow to be initiates, but it is also to note that its communities in the provinces were generally relatively small and that the archaeological investigation even of our handful of known...
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Ian Haynes replied to Roger Taylor
Thank you. but not in assessing the evidence, rather in generating questions / hypotheses that can be assessed.
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Ian Haynes replied to Stuart Archer
Patricia notes a wonderful book and a prevalent idea. I have some sympathy for this view, but it is important to note that Mithras' association with the army is strongest in Britain. Across the Empire he has more non-military devotees attested than military ones
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Ian Haynes replied to Ferial Etherington
Absolutely. Looking at the imagery is crucial. The knife does indeed indicate blood sacrifice. The ewer indicates that something is poured during the ritual, wine or water? The garland is interesting too, it does indeed have a connotation with victory, but garlands are also worn be devotees in some rituals.
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Ian Haynes replied to Paul Gell
All very interesting questions and we have no simple answers. I suggest that there would be a range of practices. There are certainly cases where we can see altars at a given site having similar decoration to other altars from the same site. Was this because of a particular sculptor, workshop or because of the person who commissioned it? The problem is...
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Ian Haynes replied to Daniel Muir
Thank you, we might include more detail next time we run the course, but for the meantime this is intended to be an introduction to the section on altars and people need to know what the elements of these are. We have discussed some offering forms under Maryport, but note that there are in fact clues with the answers to your questions on these altars (note...
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Ian Haynes replied to Pierre Brunet
I note a typo above, it should read 'explicitly addressed to the god Antenociticus' not 'explicitly dated'
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The origins of many of the gods particular to certain areas of the Empire is ill-understood, was probably debated at the time, and is unlikely ever to be fully resolved. Jews and Christians may well have been present in Britain as early as the first century AD, but as a very small minority. We must remember that many different groups came to Roman Britain...
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In Britain as a whole there is quite a lot of evidence for incomers (the 'Romans' to which you refer not necessarily coming from the city of Rome, but from another part of the Empire) making dedications at local shrines. This evidence is better from the south than from the frontier zone itself, but the very fact that we see some of the Wall community making...
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In the early period with so many gods to choose from the impression is that there was quite a lot of choice, with different individuals and families perhaps often emphasising one deity more than another. Certain practices were frowned upon and devotees of some beliefs subject to sporadic persecution, but where we have a lot of evidence for a unit, we can see...
