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Has there ever been Roman artifacts found in Ireland ?

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    #32
    sensibleken
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,650 ✭✭✭sensibleken


    There was a leather strap from roman armour found at rath gael in carlow


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    #33
    brianthebard
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,165 ✭✭✭✭brianthebard


    Mr. Presentable wrote: »
    With respect of "a few coins" there have been coins, pottery, Samian, amphora shards found in places such as Cashel, Kilkenny and even Tara and Newgrange.
    This isn't surprising, its well known at this stage that there were sophisticated trade links between Ireland and the continent during this period, coins, pottery, etc would be the expected left overs of this.
    Ireland is pretty much virgin territory archaeology-wise. Much of what we know of ancient history is myth and unsubstantiable, and sadly for us, much of what we have recovered has been illegally dug up and decontextualised, rendering it worth less historically.

    lol.


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    #34
    PatsytheNazi
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,260 ✭✭✭PatsytheNazi


    MarchDub wrote: »
    Irish archeologists have been excavating many of the ancient sites over the past 30 or 40 years - and also using geophysical surveying equipment. Scholarship on ancient Ireland does not rely on mythology. That itself is a myth. The Celtic 'invasion' myth, for example, has long been discredited by the archeological evidence.
    A bit off topic, but I've also heard the same about the Anglo Saxon 'invasion' of Engalnd. Seen a programme where an English historian suggested that it was more of an assimilation because of trade etc with what we now know as Holland, Fresian Islands and Germany than some sort of military conquest. Is it true ?


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    #35
    Mr. Presentable
    Closed Accounts Posts: 9,496 ✭✭✭Mr. Presentable


    brianthebard wrote: »

    lol.

    Care to expand on this pithy reply?


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    #36
    Johnmb
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,150 ✭✭✭Johnmb


    Mr. Presentable wrote: »
    Care to expand on this pithy reply?
    What you said was quite funny, and not based on reality. That would be my guess as to what he meant.


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    #37
    brianthebard
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,165 ✭✭✭✭brianthebard


    Mr. Presentable wrote: »
    Care to expand on this pithy reply?

    As John says, the second half of your statement was just too unrealistic to be able to pass any other comment upon. I take it however you have no problem with the first half of my reply?


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    #38
    Riamfada
    Registered Users Posts: 10,246 ✭✭✭✭Riamfada


    Thaedydal wrote: »
    The fort at duncannon in wexford was a roman fort, but the chances were that is was mostly used as a tradepost.

    You have a link to that? Id be very interested


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    #39
    testicle
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,430 ✭✭✭testicle


    Thaedydal wrote: »
    The fort at duncannon in wexford was a roman fort, but the chances were that is was mostly used as a tradepost.

    Unless the Romans were here in 1588, more than 1000 years after the Empire fell, I doubt it.


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    #40
    Mr. Presentable
    Closed Accounts Posts: 9,496 ✭✭✭Mr. Presentable


    brianthebard wrote: »
    As John says, the second half of your statement was just too unrealistic to be able to pass any other comment upon. I take it however you have no problem with the first half of my reply?

    Not at all! That's the accepted view.


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    #41
    topper75
    Registered Users Posts: 5,942 ✭✭✭topper75


    I find the argument for an invasion based on no more than the discovery of a few Roman artifacts to be amusing. Ireland had traded goods with Europe long before the Romans came on the scene. Why would they cease that just because the Romans ruled Europe?

    Admittedly, it is a little odd that they ignored us, especially given our relative proximity to Britain. However, they weren't the first to ignore us. Human habitation of Britain stretches back considerably further than habitation of Ireland, does it not?


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    #42
    Johnmb
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,150 ✭✭✭Johnmb


    topper75 wrote: »
    Admittedly, it is a little odd that they ignored us, especially given our relative proximity to Britain. However, they weren't the first to ignore us.
    I doubt they actually ignored us, if they did their homework (as I'm sure the Romans would do) they probably just figured the political set up here was too difficult to conquer. England could be taken by defeating a handful of powerful kings. Even the Vikings managed to conquer half the country fairly quickly. Ireland, on the other hand, would have required hundreds of kings to be defeated, and by the time you got to the last one, half of the earlier conquests would have been fancying there chances for a rematch! That's why the Vikings never managed to rule much outside their initial settlements later on, and why it took hundreds of years before the Anglo-Normans finally completed their invasion. Romans probably just figured that the potential pay-off of an invasion wasn't worth the almost constant state of war that they would be in. They were happy to fight along their borders, but not constantly within territory they had already conquered.


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    #43
    Corsendonk
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,871 ✭✭✭Corsendonk


    Johnmb wrote: »
    It's incorrect though. There is no evidence of any kind of Roman fort at Drumanagh. In fact what evidence there is would go against there being any fort there (i.e. of all the finds in the collection that includes what was found at Drumanagh, none were from the Roman military).

    Drumanagh ever been fully excavated??? I know there was a court case over the site, and stories that certain people late at night with metal detectors were removing finds from the site. The Sunday Times had a piece a few years back about the site and that was the last I heard about it.


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    #44
    fontanalis
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,619 ✭✭✭fontanalis


    PatsytheNazi wrote: »
    A bit off topic, but I've also heard the same about the Anglo Saxon 'invasion' of Engalnd. Seen a programme where an English historian suggested that it was more of an assimilation because of trade etc with what we now know as Holland, Fresian Islands and Germany than some sort of military conquest. Is it true ?

    The genetic evidence doesn't seem to point to genocide/wipeout but more of an elite take over, made easier by pre-existing links. Stephen Oppenheimers Origins of the British gives a good overview. One interesting bit was when he mentioned Beauwolf which is considered an English classic but describes events in Southern Sweden.


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    #45
    Riamfada
    Registered Users Posts: 10,246 ✭✭✭✭Riamfada


    fontanalis wrote: »
    The genetic evidence doesn't seem to point to genocide/wipeout but more of an elite take over, made easier by pre-existing links. Stephen Oppenheimers Origins of the British gives a good overview. One interesting bit was when he mentioned Beauwolf which is considered an English classic but describes events in Southern Sweden.

    New DNA analysis indicates a possible widespread population replacement in post roman south east england.I'll find the paper and link to it tomorrow. I did my thesis on Anglo Saxons in Ireland.

    As far as Romans in Ireland goes, the best evidence such as Stoneyford and Bray is sketchy at best bordering on fraudlent. With the exception of Drumanagh there really isnt that much. There is a fair quantity of roman material from Newgrange wether these were exotic items left by native Irish or deposited by Romans is unclear but its fair to say there was a bit of trading an cultural exhance going on at least.


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    #46
    sensibleken
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,650 ✭✭✭sensibleken


    well i think its been pointed out by a couple of historians that the massive roman fort at chester could have been building up to an invasion of ireland. but it was completed during Hadrians early reign who was calling a halt to the expansions of the empire.


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    #47
    Johnmb
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,150 ✭✭✭Johnmb


    Corsendonk wrote: »
    Drumanagh ever been fully excavated??? I know there was a court case over the site, and stories that certain people late at night with metal detectors were removing finds from the site. The Sunday Times had a piece a few years back about the site and that was the last I heard about it.
    No official digs have taken place at Drumanagh. All the evidence that currently exists are the collections the the National Museum have (which is one big collection that includes stuff found at Drumanagh as well as elsewhere, and last time I checked, they had legal advice not to get involved by determining what came from where) and aerial photographs, which don't show anything remotely like the foundations to a Roman fort. As far as I know, everything is still in limbo, awaiting a Minister in charge who wants to force things along.


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    #48
    fontanalis
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,619 ✭✭✭fontanalis


    Grimes wrote: »
    New DNA analysis indicates a possible widespread population replacement in post roman south east england.I'll find the paper and link to it tomorrow. I did my thesis on Anglo Saxons in Ireland.

    Very good, could be worth a thread of its own?


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    #49
    Ponster
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 10,911 Mod ✭✭✭✭Ponster


    Was this the paper ?

    Interesting program on BBC a few months back about just how English people believed themselves to be mentioned it.


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    #50
    dlovering
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1 ✭dlovering


    While the issue is far from decided, I thought I'd throw in my two-cents' worth on the subject of Roman goods/burials in Ireland.

    Firstly, I think most reputable archaeologists and historians are in agreement that there has never been a formally sanctioned Roman invasion of Britain. That said, there are instances in other sites where Roman legions intervened in local political and military events on the quiet - witness the number of Roman artifacts freely distributed around the Vindolanda site in Britain. Not everything was 'plunder' or piracy; many of the soldiers who manned Hadrian's wall eventually intermarried into local populations.

    The fact that there is evidence (admittedly scant) that forces that were nominally under Agricola's control might have interceded in the Tuathal Teachtmhar debacle has contributed to much of the furor, and it is (in my opinion) largely unnecessary.The presence of significant quantities of small Roman goods near sites closely aligned with Teachtmhar gives some credence to this idea. Note that I did not say 'proved' - that would require a lot more than has been produced to date. Even a handful of legitimate, undisturbed Roman legionary graves with clear identifiers tying them to their units would be grounds for believing in the intervention theory. Until then, 'proof' is a long ways out.

    Experienced Roman generals often let their men 'off the leash' to work out some of the frustration caused by the tedium and unavoidable boredom of standing watch on a border fort day in and day out; some of the incursions into Scotland are traceable to incidents not too different from what is being proposed here. Can we not at least consider the possibility that Agricola told a select few of his men 'Ok, so you can take a few boats and go and whack the Irish; but if you get caught I'm disavowing all knowledge of your actions and whereabouts'. For him it was a win-win situation; if his men succeeded in establishing a toe-hold and something like a diplomatic alliance with Teachtmhar, it would be a credit to him (Agricola) and provide possible justification for later incursions in a more formal capacity. If it ended in tears, he'd be rid of a few handfuls of hot-heads and their hangers-on. He couldn't know of course that only a few decades down the road the Legions would be irrevocably recalled from Britain to defend the last vestiges of the remaining Roman strongholds in Italy and Gaul against the Ostrogoths.

    Even if a small number of Roman legionaries and their families settled in Ireland, I daresay the most likely outcome would be that they'd be assimilated and become 'Irish' in their own right. This certainly proved true for a lot of the British who were compelled to settle in Ireland (often against their will). Today their descendants are as Irish as you'd fancy.

    Whatever the truth of the matter, I doubt we'll ever see a wholesale 'invasion site' in Ireland with unquestioned Roman origins. Without a sanction to initiate such an invasion from the Emperor himself, actions of this sort would have been career-ending. A quiet invasion on the other hand, has somewhat greater appeal.

    If someone wants my ideas as to where to look for such a base of operations, let me know. I'll lay a few bucks (quid?) down on a case of Guinness. It won't be anywhere you've heard of, and certainly nowhere that has been excavated professionally.

    -- Dave Lovering


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