The Wrekin
The Wrekin is a hill in east Shropshire, England. It is located some five miles west of Telford, on the border between the unitary authorities of Shropshire and Telford and Wrekin. Rising to a height of 407 metres above the Shropshire Plain, it is a prominent and well-known landmark, signalling the entrance to Shropshire for travellers westbound on the M54 motorway; the Wrekin is contained within the northern panhandle of the Shropshire Hills AONB. The hill offers good views of Shropshire, it can be seen well into Staffordshire and the Black Country, as far as the Beetham Tower in Manchester, Winter Hill in Lancashire and Cleeve Hill in Gloucestershire. The earliest mention of the Wrekin occurs in a charter of 855, as entered in a late 11th century Worcester cartulary, spelled Wreocensetun, its modern form is believed to have come into modern English by way of Mercian, and, to have been taken from the early Celtic Wrikon-. The minor Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the Wreocensæte existed in the area prior to Mercian reign.
For several centuries the hill was known as Mount Gilbert, a name given to it by the Normans after a hermit who lived there. There is an Iron Age hill fort on the summit 8 ha in size, to which the name Uriconio referred, it is thought the fort was was once their capital. A more recent addition is the Wrekin transmitting station, used for broadcasting and telecommunications. At the top of the main mast is a beacon which emits a red pulse of light every few seconds at night. A beacon was erected on the Wrekin during the Second World War to warn aircraft, was kept in operation until 1960. A new beacon was installed in 2000, as part of a project to celebrate the new millennium, it is known locally as the "Wrekin Beacon", is visible for many miles around. From the summit, travelling due East, the next highest point is in the Ural Mountains; the geology of the Wrekin and its immediate area is complex, consisting of a variety of rocks of a range of ages affected by numerous faults. The crest of the Wrekin's ridge and its northwestern slopes are formed from various rocks of volcanic origin assigned to the Uriconian series, of Precambrian age.
The'Uriconian Volcanics' include rhyolites and agglomerates. These rocks – layers of ancient lava flows laid down in a volcanic island arc, similar to modern Japan – are 680 million years old. Dolerite dykes intruded the extrusive volcanic rocks around 563 million years ago. A variety of the intrusive igneous rock granophyre, known as Ercallite forms the northeastern shoulder of the Ercall, it was put in place around 560 million years ago and is overlain by Cambrian rocks of sedimentary origin. The southeastern side of the ridge is formed from sandstones and shales of Cambrian age, they include the early Cambrian Lower Comley Sandstone and Lower Comley Limestones together with the Wrekin Quartzite, outcrops of which occur to the northwest of the ridge. The lower ground to the northwest comprises sandstones and mudstones of late Carboniferous and Permian age whilst to the southeast are a succession of rocks of early Carboniferous age including limestone, the Little Wenlock Basalt and the Lydebrook Sandstone.
Structurally, the Wrekin together with the Ercall forms part of the Church Stretton Complex where different geological terranes meet. The Cymru Terrane is to the west with the Wrekin Terrane to the east of the fault system; the fault system trends north-northeast:south-southwest and the line carries on through other geologically important exposures such as those in the area of Caer Caradoc. Contrary to a common misconception, the Wrekin has never been a volcano in its own right, but is composed of volcanic rocks and is a product of volcanism, its modern shape, which from certain viewpoints appears to resemble a volcano, has been formed by other natural processes. The name the Wrekin is used to refer more to the part of East Shropshire around the towns of Telford and Wellington, within sight of the hill; the surrounding area is one of the birthplaces of industry: Ironbridge Gorge is just to the south of the Wrekin hill. Woodland covers much of the area around the hill and into the Ironbridge Gorge area too.
The eponymous Wrekin parliamentary constituency incorporates the hill. The Wrekin can be accessed from the final junction on the M54 motorway before it turns into the A5 which continues to Shrewsbury; the hill is signposted. There is a well-used footpath up the side of the hill which has an entrance at the end of the road off the M54. There is a small car park and parking bays up the road. Between the Ercall and the Wrekin is a well positioned car park, at Forest Glen, allowing easy access to both areas; the ascent is steep in parts. The Wrekin is the subject of a well-known legend in Shropshire folklore. One version of the story runs as follows: A giant called Gwendol Wrekin ap Shenkin ap Mynyddmawr with a grudge against the town of Shrewsbury decided to flood the town and kill all its inhabitants. So he set off towards the town; when in the vicinity of Wellington he met a cobbler returning from Shrewsbury market with a large sackful of shoes for repair. The giant asked him for directions, adding that he was going to dump his spadeful of earth in the River Severn and flood the town.
"It's a long way to Shrewsbury," replied the quick-thinking shoemaker. "Look at all these shoes I've worn out walking back from there!" The giant decided to abandon his enterprise and dumped the earth on the ground beside him, where it became the Wrekin. The giant scraped the mud off his boots, which became the smaller hil
Hillforts in Britain
Hillforts in Britain refers to the various hillforts within the island of Great Britain. Although the earliest such constructs fitting this description come from the Neolithic British Isles, with a few dating to Bronze Age Britain, British hillforts were constructed during the British Iron Age; some of these were abandoned in the southern areas that were a part of Roman Britain, although at the same time, those areas of northern Britain that remained free from Roman occupation saw an increase in their construction. Some hillforts were reused in the Early Middle Ages, in some rarer cases, into the Later Medieval period as well. By the early modern period, these had all been abandoned, with many being excavated by archaeologists in the nineteenth century onward. There are around 3,300 structures that can be classed as hillforts or similar "defended enclosures" within Britain. Most of these are clustered in certain regions: south and south-west England, the west coast of Wales and Scotland, the Welsh Marches and the Scottish border hills.
British hillforts varied in size, with the majority covering an area of less than 1 ha, but with most others ranging from this up to around 12 ha in size. In certain rare cases, they were bigger, with a few examples being over 80 ha in size. Various archaeologists operating in Britain have criticised the use of the term "hillfort" both because of its perceived connection to fortifications and warfare and because not all such sites were located on hills. Leslie Alcock believed that the term "enclosed places" was more accurate, whilst J. Forde-Johnston commented on his preference for "defensive enclosures". British hillforts, as now recognised, first appeared in the Late Bronze Age. Archaeologists Sue Hamilton and John Manley believed they were a part of "...substantial landscape and social reconfigurations at the start of the first millennium ", that coincided with the change of three characteristics of British Bronze Age society: "...disappearance of an archaeologically visible burial rite... increased deposition of prestige metalwork in rivers... and the demise of a middle Bronze Age settlement format of groups of round houses set within enclosures."
They went on to note that "Accrued place-value may have been important in the establishment of the earliest hillforts. These are in locations with conspicuous traces of previous ritual monuments; this may have been a means of validating new social practices through making links with the past". This idea was examined in more depth by ethnologist J. Forde-Johnston, who made note of how a number of Iron Age hillforts had been built close to earlier Bronze Age barrows. Commenting on the fact that both types of monument were constructed in high locations, he said, "It is not surprising that the two features should coincide in several dozen cases." He added that it was possible that hillforts had been intentionally sited near barrows for defensive protection from the "...sacred associations of the burial place." The Iron Age hillforts have remained dominating features in the British landscape: as ethnologist J. Forde-Johnston noted, "Of all the earthworks that are such a notable feature of the landscape in England and Wales few are more prominent or more striking than the hillforts built during the centuries before the Roman conquest."
He continued, describing them as an "eloquent testimony of the technical ability and social organization of the Iron Age peoples." On a similar note, the English archaeologist J. C. D. Clark remarked that " Hillforts are at once among the most impressive and informative of our prehistoric antiquities, they impress by their mere size, by the height of their ramparts, by the depth of their ditches, by the extent of the areas they enclose, by their commanding position."There was "immense variation subsumed within the class of monuments called hillforts", those of the British Iron Age have been characterised as belonging to four different types. The main two are contour and promontory forts, the lesser two are hill-slope and plateau forts. Contour forts are those "...in which the defences cut off the upper portion of a hill from the ground below by following, more or less, the line of the contours encircling it." Promontory forts are defined by "...an area to which the approach is limited, to a greater or lesser extent, by natural features such as cliffs steep slopes, rivers etc.
Where such features exist little or nothing in the way of man-made fortification is required." Hill-slope hillforts, rather than "enclosing the hilltop in the manner of contour forts, are situated on the sloping ground on one side of it, overlooked by the crest", whilst plateau forts "face level ground on all sides, regardless of their elevation above sea-level". Iron Age hillforts made use of both natural and man-made defences, with the former including such geographical features as cliffs, steep slopes, rivers and the sea, the latter consisting of banks and ditches. There were two forms of banks built at such sites: revetted and glacis. Revetted banks present "a near-vertical outer face to the enemy; this outer face or revetment is of timber or dry stone walling, or a combination of the two, retains the core of earth, clay etc. derived in most cases from the outer ditch." Glacis banks on the other hand "are triangular in cross-section and at their simplest consist of a single dump of the material excavated from the ditch."
The number of these such ramparts differs in Iron Age British hillforts.
Viroconium Cornoviorum
For the fictional city in the works of M. John Harrison, see Viriconium. Viroconium or Uriconium, formally Viroconium Cornoviorum, was a Roman town, one corner of, now occupied by Wroxeter, a small village in Shropshire, about 5 miles east-south-east of Shrewsbury. At its peak, Viroconium is estimated to have been the 4th-largest Roman settlement in Britain, a civitas with a population of more than 15,000; the settlement lasted until the end of the 7th century or the beginning of the 8th. Extensive remains can still be seen. Viroconium is a Latinised form of a toponym, reconstructed as Common Brittonic *Uiroconion " of *Uirokū". *Uirokū is believed to have been a masculine given name meaning "werewolf". The term "Cornoviorum" distinguishes the site as the Viroconium "of the Cornovii", the Celtic tribe whose civitas the settlement became; the original site of the Cornovian capital was a hillfort on the Wrekin. The site at Wroxeter was strategically located near the end of the primary Watling Street Roman trunk road that ran across England from Dubris.
During the early years the site was a key frontier position lying on the bank of the Severn river whose valley penetrated deep into Wales and lying on a route to the south leading to the Wye valley. The site was first established in about AD 55 as a frontier post for a Thracian legionary cohort located at a fort near the Severn river crossing. A few years a legionary fortress was built within the site of the city for the Legio XIV Gemina during their invasion of Wales, they were replaced in about 69 AD by the Legio XX Valeria Victrix which left to fight with Agricola in Scotland in 78 AD although the fortress may not have been abandoned until around 88 AD when it was taken over by the civilian settlement that had grown up around the fort. The local British tribe of the Cornovii had their original capital at the impressive hillfort on the Wrekin; when the Cornovii were subdued their capital was moved to Wroxeter and given its Roman name. When the legion left, an unfinished bath house remained in the centre of the town where the forum was to be built.
In the 90s AD the main street grid was being laid out based around the plan of the fort. The colonnaded forum was started in the 120s AD covering the unfinished bath house, with the impressive dedicatory inscription to Hadrian found in excavations dating the completion to 130 AD. By 130, the town had expanded under Hadrian to cover an area of more than 173 acres, it had many public buildings, including thermae. Simpler temples and shops have been excavated. At its peak, Viroconium is estimated to have been the one of the richest and the fourth largest Roman settlement in Britain with a population of more than 15,000, its wealth is surprising for what remained a frontier town and is explained by its access to Wales and to other trade routes. Between 165-185 AD the forum was burnt down, including neighbouring shops and houses, many shop contents were subsequently found in excavations; the forum was rebuilt with several modifications. Following the end of Roman rule in Britain around 410, the Cornovii seem to have divided into Pengwern and Powys.
The minor Magonsæte sub-kingdom of the Angles emerged in the area when Oswiu conquered Pengwern in 656. Viroconium may have served as the early sub-Roman capital of Powys; the city has been variously identified with the Cair Urnarc and Cair Guricon which appeared in the Historia Brittonum's list the 28 civitates of Britain. N. J. Higham proposes that Viroconium became the site of the court of a sub-Roman kingdom known as the Wrocensaete, the successor territorial unit to Cornovia. Wrocensaete means the ‘inhabitants of Wroxeter’; the Wroxeter Stone or Cunorix Stone, was found in 1967, with an inscription in an Insular Celtic language, identified by the Celtic Inscribed Stones Project at UCL as "partly-Latinized Primitive Irish". The inscription on a re-used gravestone, is dated to 460-475 AD, when Irish raiders had begun to make permanent settlements in South Wales and south-western Britain. Town life in Viroconium continued in the fifth century, but many of the buildings fell into disrepair. Between 530 and 570, when most Roman urban sites and villas in Britain were being abandoned, there was a substantial rebuilding programme.
The old basilica was demolished and replaced with new timber-framed buildings on rubble platforms. These included a large two-storey building and a number of storage buildings and houses. In all, 33 new buildings were "carefully planned and executed" and "skillfully constructed to Roman measurements using a trained labour force". Who instigated this rebuilding programme is not known; some of the buildings were renewed three times, the community lasted about 75 years until, for some reason, many of the buildings were dismantled. The site was abandoned peacefully in the second half of the seventh century or the beginning of the eighth; the court of Powys is believed to have moved to Mathrafal sometime before 717 following famine and plague in its original location. According to archaeologist Philip A. Barker, the parish churches of Atcham and Upton Magna are built of stone taken from the buildings of Viroconium Cornoviorum; some remains are still standing, further buildings have been excavated. These include the remains of a baths complex.
These are on display to the public and, along with a small museum, are loo
St Andrew's Church, Wroxeter
St Andrew's Church is a redundant Church of England parish church in the village of Wroxeter, England. It is recorded in the National Heritage List for England as a designated Grade I listed building, is under the care of the Churches Conservation Trust. Both the village of Wroxeter and the church are in the southwest corner of the former Roman town of Viroconium; the earliest parts of the church are Anglo-Saxon but the precise date of its foundation in uncertain. There is strong circumstantial evidence that a church was built in the area of the Roman bath in the 5th or 6th century. A preaching cross was erected in the churchyard in the 8th century, it is thought that the oldest existing fabric in the present church dates from the 8th or 9th century. This consists of large stones. By the time of the Domesday Book in 1086 the church had a college of four priests. In 1155 William FitzAlan, Lord of Oswestry, who held the advowson, gave the church to Haughmond Abbey. At that time it was a portionary church, i.e. a church served by a group of priests who took shares in the income but did not form a corporate entity, as would be the case in a collegiate church.
FitzAlan declared his intention of increasing the number of canons to a "full convent" meaning 12 in order to create a chantry for the FitzAlan family. Haughmond Abbey was to be the FitzAlan burial place for several centuries but the chapter of St Andrew's church was never expanded on the scale he envisaged. However, the building itself was enhanced. In about 1190 a large chancel was built and in about 1210 a south aisle was added. A chantry chapel dedicated to Saint Mary was built and the nave was lengthened westwards. In about 1470 the lower part of the tower was built. After the English Reformation the interior of the church was damaged, the wall paintings were covered with whitewash and wooden statues and fittings were burnt; the upper part of the tower was added in 1555. By the middle of the 18th century the population of the village was declining, the church was becoming unstable because of the inadequate medieval foundations. In 1763 the south aisle and chapel were demolished, part of the chapel was converted into a vestry.
The church was restored in about 1863, in 1890 a porch was added and the tower was restored. By the end of the 19th century most of the local people had moved away; the church was declared redundant on 1 December 1980, was vested in the Churches Conservation Trust on 18 May 1987. St Andrew's is built of sandstone with tiled roofs, it has a nave, south porch, south vestry, west tower. The tower is divided by string courses into three stages, it has a plinth, diagonal buttresses, a battlemented parapet with gargoyles, a pyramidal cap with a weathervane. On its northeast is an octagonal stair turret with a pyramidal cap. In the upper stages on the north and east fronts are carved fragments which are said to have come from Haughmond Abbey. In the bottom stage is a three-light west window, there are rectangular openings in the middle stage, the top stage contains two-light louvred bell openings; the north wall of the nave contains blocks from former Roman buildings. These blocks have Lewis holes; this wall has a three-light arched window.
In the south wall are two-three light windows and a porch containing a doorway. The porch has a parapeted gabled double lancet window, a carved frieze. Set into the top of the south wall is a fragment of a 7th-century Anglo-Saxon cross-shaft. On each side of this is a carved block of similar date, one depicting the other a bird; the chancel incorporates some re-used Roman masonry in its north wall, which contains two narrow round-headed windows and a triple lancet window. In the south wall is a blocked Norman priest's doorway; the east window has five lights, around it are portions of blocked former windows. The vestry has one on each side of a round-arched doorway. In the east wall of the chancel is an aumbry and an Easter Sepulchre with ballflower ornamentation; the sepulchre contains traces of a wall-painting depicting Christ in Glory. The church has a west gallery. On the walls of the church are painted benefactors' boards and Royal coats of arms; the nave contains box pews. The font is large and round, was constructed from the base of a former Roman column.
Behind the font is a 13th-century iron-bound oak chest. The carved wooden pulpit has five sides. A wooden pedimented reredos hangs on north wall of the nave and is painted with the Lord's prayer, the Ten Commandments and the Creed; the stained glass in the chancel was designed in 1860 by E. Baillie and depicts the twelve apostles and biblical scenes. In the north side of the nave are windows depicting saints, made in 1920 by Morris & Co.. The latter workshop made the two-light window at the west end, depicting St Andrew and St George and the motto "AD. MAJOREM - DEI GLORIAM", as a First World War memorial; the largest memorial in the church is an alabaster tomb-chest carrying the effigies of Thomas Bromley, former Justice of the Queen's Bench, who died in 1555, his wife. Another tomb-chest carrying effigies is that of Sir Richard Newport, who died in 1570, his wife Margaret, the daughter of Thomas Bromley. John Barker of Haughmond Abbey and his wife, Margaret Newport, both of whom died in 1618, have another tomb chest, inscribed with the detail: "the said John Barker being in good perfect health at the decease of the said Margaret, fell ill
Roman Britain
Roman Britain was the area of the island of Great Britain, governed by the Roman Empire, from 43 to 410 AD. It comprised the whole of England and Wales and, for a short period, southern Scotland. Julius Caesar invaded Britain in 54 BC as part of his Gallic Wars. According to Caesar, the Britons had been overrun or culturally assimilated by other Celtic tribes during the British Iron Age and had been aiding Caesar's enemies, he received tribute, installed a friendly king over the Trinovantes, returned to Gaul. Planned invasions under Augustus were called off in 34, 27, 25 BC. In 40 AD, Caligula assembled 200,000 men at the Channel on the continent, only to have them gather seashells according to Suetonius as a symbolic gesture to proclaim Caligula's victory over the sea. Three years Claudius directed four legions to invade Britain and restore an exiled king over the Atrebates; the Romans defeated the Catuvellauni, organized their conquests as the Province of Britain. By the year 47, the Romans held the lands southeast of the Fosse Way.
Control over Wales was delayed by reverses and the effects of Boudica's uprising, but the Romans expanded northward. The conquest of Britain continued under command of Gnaeus Julius Agricola, who expanded the Roman Empire as far as Caledonia. In the summer of 84, Agricola faced the armies of the Caledonians, led by Calgacus, at the Battle of Mons Graupius. Battle casualties were estimated by Tacitus to be around the 10,000's on the Caledonian side and about 360 on the Roman side; the bloodbath at Mons Graupius concluded the forty-year conquest of Britain, a period that saw between 100,000 and 250,000 Britons killed. In the context of pre-industrial warfare and of a total population of Britain of c.2 million, these are high figures. Under the 2nd-century emperors Hadrian and Antoninus Pius, two walls were built to defend the Roman province from the Caledonians, whose realms in the Scottish Highlands were never controlled. Around 197, the Severan Reforms divided Britain into two provinces: Britannia Superior and Britannia Inferior.
During the Diocletian Reforms, at the end of the 3rd century, Britannia was divided into four provinces under the direction of a vicarius, who administered the Diocese of the Britains. A fifth province, Valentia, is attested in the 4th century. For much of the period of the Roman occupation, Britannia was subject to barbarian invasions and came under the control of imperial usurpers and imperial pretenders; the final Roman withdrawal from Britain occurred around 410. Following the conquest of the Britons, a distinctive Romano-British culture emerged as the Romans introduced improved agriculture, urban planning, industrial production, architecture; the Roman goddess Britannia became the female personification of Britain. After the initial invasions, Roman historians only mention Britain in passing. Thus, most present knowledge derives from archaeological investigations and occasional epigraphic evidence lauding the Britannic achievements of an emperor. Roman citizens settled in Britain from many parts of the Empire.
Britain was known to the Classical world. The Greeks referred to the Cassiterides, or "tin islands", placed them near the west coast of Europe; the Carthaginian sailor Himilco is said to have visited the island in the 5th century BC and the Greek explorer Pytheas in the 4th. It was regarded with some writers refusing to believe it existed at all; the first direct Roman contact was when Julius Caesar undertook two expeditions in 55 and 54 BC, as part of his conquest of Gaul, believing the Britons were helping the Gallic resistance. The first expedition was more a reconnaissance than a full invasion and gained a foothold on the coast of Kent but was unable to advance further because of storm damage to the ships and a lack of cavalry. Despite the military failure it was a political success, with the Roman Senate declaring a 20-day public holiday in Rome to honour the unprecedented achievement of obtaining hostages from Britain and defeating Belgian tribes on returning to the continent; the second invasion involved a larger force and Caesar coerced or invited many of the native Celtic tribes to pay tribute and give hostages in return for peace.
A friendly local king, was installed, his rival, was brought to terms. Hostages were taken, but historians disagree over whether any tribute was paid after Caesar returned to Gaul. Caesar conquered no territory and left no troops behind but he established clients and brought Britain into Rome's sphere of influence. Augustus planned invasions in 34, 27 and 25 BC, but circumstances were never favourable, the relationship between Britain and Rome settled into one of diplomacy and trade. Strabo, writing late in Augustus's reign, claimed that taxes on trade brought in more annual revenue than any conquest could. Archaeology shows. Strabo mentions British kings who sent embassies to Augustus and Augustus's own Res Gestae refers to two British kings he received as refugees; when some of Tiberius's ships were carried to Britain in a storm during his campaigns in Germany in 16 AD, they came back with tales of monsters. Rome appears to have encouraged a balance of power in southern Britain, supporting two powerful kingdoms: the Catuvellauni, ruled by the descendants of Tasciovanus, the Atrebates, ruled by the descendants of Commius.
This policy was followed until 39 or 40
Wales in the Roman era
The history of Wales in the Roman era began in 48 AD with a military invasion by the imperial governor of Roman Britain. The conquest would be completed by 78, Roman rule would endure until the region was abandoned in AD 383. Once the conquest was complete, the region and the people living there would be a anonymous part of Roman Britain until the Roman departure. Roman rule in Wales was a military occupation, except for the southern coastal region of South Wales east of the Gower Peninsula, where there is a legacy of Romanisation, some southern sites such as Carmarthen; the only town in Wales founded by the Romans, Caerwent, is located in South Wales. Wales was a rich source of mineral wealth, the Romans used their engineering technology to extract large amounts of gold and lead, as well as modest amounts of some other metals such as zinc and silver, it is the Roman campaigns of conquest that are most known, due to the spirited but unsuccessful defence of their homelands by two native tribes, the Silures and the Ordovices.
Aside from the many Roman-related finds along the southern coast, Roman archaeological remains in Wales consist entirely of military roads and fortifications. On the eve of the Roman invasion of Wales, the Roman military under Governor Aulus Plautius was in control of all of southeastern Britain as well as Dumnonia including the lowland English Midlands as far as the Dee Estuary and the River Mersey, having an understanding with the Brigantes to the north, they controlled most of the islands centers of wealth, as well as much of its trade and resources. In Wales the known tribes included the Ordovices and Deceangli in the north, the Silures and Demetae in the south. Archaeology combined with ancient Greek and Roman accounts have shown that there was exploitation of natural resources, such as copper, tin and silver at multiple locations in Britain, including in Wales. Apart from this we have little knowledge of the Welsh tribes of this era. In AD 47 or 48 the new governor, Publius Ostorius Scapula, moved against the Deceangli along the northeastern coast of Wales, devastating their lands.
He campaigned but indecisively against the Silures and the Ordovices, the most notable feature of, the leadership of both tribes against him by Caratacus. Scapula died in 52, the same year that the resurgent Silures inflicted a defeat on one of the Roman legions. Scapula was succeeded by a number of governors who made steady but inconclusive gains against the two tribes. Gaius Suetonius Paulinus was in the process of conquering Anglesey in AD 60 when the revolt led by Boudica in the east forced a delay in the final conquest of Wales. There followed a decade of relative peace; when expansion into Wales resumed in 73, Roman progress was steady and successful under Sextus Julius Frontinus, who decisively defeated the Silures, followed by the success of Gnaeus Julius Agricola in defeating the Ordovices, in completing the conquest of Anglesey in AD 77–78. There is no indication of any Roman campaigns against the Demetae, their territory was not planted with a series of forts, nor overlaid with roads, suggesting that they made their peace with Rome.
The main fort in their territory was at Moridunum, built around AD 75, it became the centre of a Roman civitas. The Demetae are the only pre-Roman Welsh tribe that would emerge from Roman rule with their tribal name intact; the mineral wealth of Britain was well-known prior to the Roman invasion and was one of the expected benefits of conquest. All mineral extractions were state-sponsored and under military control, as mineral rights belonged to the emperor, his agents soon found substantial deposits of gold and lead in Wales, along with some zinc and silver. Gold was mined at Dolaucothi prior to the invasion, but Roman engineering would be applied to increase the amount extracted, to extract huge amounts of the other metals; this would continue until the process was no longer practical or profitable, at which time the mine would be abandoned. Modern scholars have made efforts to quantify the value of these extracted metals to the Roman economy, to determine the point at which the Roman occupation of Britain was "profitable" to the Empire.
While these efforts have not produced deterministic results, the benefits to Rome were substantial. The gold production at Dolaucothi alone may have been of economic significance; the production of goods for trade and export in Roman Britain was concentrated in the south and east, with none situated in Wales. This was due to circumstance, with iron forges located near iron supplies, pewter moulds located near the tin supplies and suitable soil, clusters of pottery kilns located near suitable clayey soil, grain-drying ovens located in agricultural areas where sheep raising was located, salt production concentrated in its historical pre-Roman locations. Glass-making sites were located near urban centres. In Wales none of the needed materials were available in suitable combination, the forested, mountainous countryside was not amenable to this kind of industrialisation. Clusters of tileries, both large and small, were at first operated by the Roman military to meet their own needs, so there were temporary sites wherever the army went and could find suitable soil.
This included a few places in Wales. However, as Roman influence grew, the army was able to obtain tiles from civilian sources who located their kilns in the lowland areas containing good soil, shipped the tiles to wherever they were needed; the Romans occupied the whole of the area now known as W
