More information : TR 117 342: Stutfall Castle.
LEMANIS (NR)
ROMAN FORT (NR) (Remains of) (1)
Lemanis. (2)
Stutfall Castle excavated by C Roach Smith in 1850 (a) and Sir Victor Horsley in 1894 (b). (See plan AO/62/141/5). An irregular shaped fort with east, north and west walls surviving. (3-6)
The Saxon Shore fort at Lympne is probably dated to the last quarter of the 3rd century. (7)
Stutfall Castle is scheduled as an ancient monument. (8)
The remains of this Saxon Shore fort are very fragmentary. Owing to numerous springs in the clay soil on which it was built, landslips have occurred and large portions of the walling have either fallen down or been thrown out of their original positions, the south wall having disappeared entirely. The remaining walling, constructed of typical Roman masonry with tile bonding courses varies between 3.7 metres and 4.5 metres in thickness and stands in places to a height of about 5 metres. Three bastions survive at the north, north-west and south-east corners whilst the sites of two more can be identified in the middle and at the south end of the south west side. There is now no trace of gateways or posterns. Published earthworks (25") revised. (9)
Excavations by Roach Smith located a second century altar covered with salt water barnacles, reused in a gate platform. The altar had been dedicated by Aufidius Pantera, Commander of the British fleet (see illustration). This and tiles of the Classis Britannica suggest a naval base nearly a century before the construction of the fort. Excavations by Barry Cunliffe between 1976 and 1978 at Lympne failed to reveal an underlying Classis Britannica base but further reused masonry and an uninscribed altar and more tiles stamped by the Classis Britannica were found. It seems likely that the Classis Britannica base did not lie beneath the later Saxon Shore fort but the ruins were fairly close when Stutfall Castle was built. It is quite likely that the base has already disappeared because of the erosion along the coast. The excavation allowed tentative reconstructions of the east gate, at least two storeys high, and the fort plan (see illustrations). It is thought that the fort was built in the late third century and abandoned circa 350 AD. (10-15)
LEMANIS, PORTUS LEMANIS - the Roman fort at Stutfall Castle, Lympne Kent. (16)
TR 117 342: Most of the circuit of the walls, of irregular polygonal plan, can be traced, but the greater part is fallen and large chunks of the walls and towers lie about. It is built of flint with the bonding courses and had semi-curcular bastions. Substantial portions of the perimeter walls run along the north east and west boundaries. In places these have collapsed. Practically all the dressed stone has been robbed, exposing stonework. Some dressed stone survives on the west side. (17)
The Roman fort of Lemanis, hanging on a clay slope below the village of Lympne, is one of the few ruins still to retain a Victorian flavour. Springs, cutting into the clay have caused serious subsidence and and slipping of the Roman walls, giving a confusing impression, but originally the walls enclosed a semi-rectangular fort 10-11 acres in extent. They were 12-14 feet thick and 20 feet high. Externally a number of semicircular bastions projected from the wall. The main gate lay in the centre of the east wall, little remains, but Victorian excavations showed it to be a simple opening flanked by two bastions. Two masonry buildings have been excavated inside, the principia, and a small bath suite. The fort was probably built in the 280s under Carausius, but judging from quantities of earlier material there must have been a naval base here in the 2nd century. Coin evidence suggests abandonment about 370 AD, possibly because of the land-slipping. (18)
In 1943, Mrs E S G Robinson presented to the Haverfield Library Sir Victor Horsley's field notes of the 1893 excavation in the east part of the south ramparts, plus a report of what was found in four of the seven trenches dug. The scale plan, photographs, pottery, coins and metal objects were all missing and there was no account of work in 1894. (19)
Stutfall Castle was visited by members of the Royal Archaeological Institute on 29th July 1896. Stutfall Castle seems to have occupied a broad point of land forming the north shore of a strait separated by a wide tract of marsh and sandbank from the mainland. This sea channel gradually disappeared to become part of Romney Marsh but excavation has demonstrated that the shoreline was originally 1.8 metres below the present level of the marsh. The siting of the fort and its Classis Britannica predecessor, with the command of this narrow estuary, made good strategic sense enabling it to control all shipping entering the harbour and to oversee the transport of the iron mined and extracted in the Weald. Air photographs in 1945-1952 showed the threat to the site with the wealden clays slipping downhill. This resulted in buildings being displaced and the fort wall shifting. This has led to a suggestion that perhaps the fort was originally rectangular and it is the land movement that has caused its irregular shape. However Philp believes that with the available evidence, Roach Smith's reconstruction of a pentagonal plan to the fort is the best suggestion. He believes that the movement may have not been as much as suggested and the majority of shore forts built at the end of the 3rd century were, in fact, trapezoidal. At Lympne, where the steep slope of the hill was a major consideration, a pentagonal plan is probably the most likely possibility. (20-24)
A date in the reign of Carausius is strongly suggested by the coin series for Lympne. (25)
The name Lympne applies to other locations with an ecclesiastical settlement being no more than an open possibility. The borough and port of Limen may well have been situated within the shore fort and it has been suggested that a church may have likewise. (26)
Additional bibliography. (27-43)
This survey confirmed the pentagonal plan of the Saxon Shore fort. (44)
Additional reference. (45) |