|
Pumpsaint
Pumsaint is a village in Carmarthenshire, Wales, halfway between Llanwrda and Lampeter on the A482 road, A482 in the valley of the Afon Cothi. It forms part of the extensive estate of Dolaucothi, which is owned by the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, National Trust. The name is Welsh language, Welsh for "Five Saints" (''Pump'' being the word for "five"). The name is derived from the stone block at the nearby gold mines, opposite Ogofau Lodge, which has four sides, each of which has hollows probably caused by pestle impacts. It was used as an anvil for crushing gold ore in the Roman Britain, Roman period. Excavations in the 1990s of the area adjacent to the stone showed that the stone was originally horizontal and used as an anvil for a water-powered crushing mill. There are many parallels from Spanish mines of the Roman period with similar stone anvils. Places of interest The nearby conservation area has several scheduled ancient monuments inc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carmarthenshire
Carmarthenshire ( cy, Sir Gaerfyrddin; or informally ') is a county in the south-west of Wales. The three largest towns are Llanelli, Carmarthen and Ammanford. Carmarthen is the county town and administrative centre. The county is known as the "Garden of Wales" and is also home to the National Botanic Garden of Wales. Carmarthenshire has been inhabited since prehistoric times. The county town was founded by the Romans, and the region was part of the Kingdom of Deheubarth in the High Middle Ages. After invasion by the Normans in the 12th and 13th centuries it was subjugated, along with other parts of Wales, by Edward I of England. There was further unrest in the early 15th century, when the Welsh rebelled under Owain Glyndŵr, and during the English Civil War. Carmarthenshire is mainly an agricultural county, apart from the southeastern part which was once heavily industrialised with coal mining, steel-making and tin-plating. In the north of the county, the woollen industr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cisterns
A cistern (Middle English ', from Latin ', from ', "box", from Greek ', "basket") is a waterproof receptacle for holding liquids, usually water. Cisterns are often built to catch and store rainwater. Cisterns are distinguished from wells by their waterproof linings. Modern cisterns range in capacity from a few litres to thousands of cubic metres, effectively forming covered reservoirs. Origins Early domestic and agricultural use Waterproof lime plaster cisterns in the floors of houses are features of Neolithic village sites of the Levant at, for instance, Ramad and Lebwe, and by the late fourth millennium BC, as at Jawa in northeastern Lebanon, cisterns are essential elements of emerging water management techniques in dry-land farming communities. The Ancient Roman impluvium, a standard feature of the domus house, generally had a cistern underneath. The impluvium and associated structures collected, filtered, cooled, and stored the water, and also cooled and ventilated t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fortification
A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is also used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Latin ''fortis'' ("strong") and ''facere'' ("to make"). From very early history to modern times, defensive walls have often been necessary for cities to survive in an ever-changing world of invasion and conquest. Some settlements in the Indus Valley civilization were the first small cities to be fortified. In ancient Greece, large stone walls had been built in Mycenaean Greece, such as the ancient site of Mycenae (famous for the huge stone blocks of its 'cyclopean' walls). A Greek '' phrourion'' was a fortified collection of buildings used as a military garrison, and is the equivalent of the Roman castellum or English fortress. These constructions mainly served the purpose of a watch tower, to guard certain roads, passes, and borders. Though smaller than a real fortress, they act ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry De La Beche
Sir Henry Thomas De la Beche KCB, FRS (10 February 179613 April 1855) was an English geologist and palaeontologist, the first director of the Geological Survey of Great Britain, who helped pioneer early geological survey methods. He was the first President of the Palaeontographical Society. Biography De la Beche was born in Welbeck Street, Cavendish Square, London. He was the only son of Thomas De la Beche (1755–1801) and his wife, Elizabeth. The family name was originally Beach, but his father changed it to create a fictional connection with the medieval Barons De la Beche of Aldworth, Berkshire. His father served as a brevet major (later lieutenant-colonel) in the Norfolk Yeomanry, a regiment of fencibles in the British Army, and was a slave owner with an estate in Jamaica. In 1800 the family travelled to the plantation in Jamaica when Thomas inherited the estate and his father died there in the following year. Mother and son returned to England, having been shipwrecked to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It documents the story of human culture from its beginnings to the present.Among the national museums in London, sculpture and decorative and applied art are in the Victoria and Albert Museum; the British Museum houses earlier art, non-Western art, prints and drawings. The National Gallery holds the national collection of Western European art to about 1900, while art of the 20th century on is at Tate Modern. Tate Britain holds British Art from 1500 onwards. Books, manuscripts and many works on paper are in the British Library. There are significant overlaps between the coverage of the various collections. The British Museum was the first public national museum to cover all fields of knowledge. The museum was established in 1753, largely b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hoard
A hoard or "wealth deposit" is an archaeological term for a collection of valuable objects or artifacts, sometimes purposely buried in the ground, in which case it is sometimes also known as a cache. This would usually be with the intention of later recovery by the hoarder; hoarders sometimes died or were unable to return for other reasons (forgetfulness or physical displacement from its location) before retrieving the hoard, and these surviving hoards might then be uncovered much later by metal detector hobbyists, members of the public, and archaeologists. Hoards provide a useful method of providing dates for artifacts through association as they can usually be assumed to be contemporary (or at least assembled during a decade or two), and therefore used in creating chronologies. Hoards can also be considered an indicator of the relative degree of unrest in ancient societies. Thus conditions in 5th and 6th century Britain spurred the burial of hoards, of which the most famous a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aqueducts Of Rome
The Romans constructed aqueducts throughout their Republic and later Empire, to bring water from outside sources into cities and towns. Aqueduct water supplied public baths, latrines, fountains, and private households; it also supported mining operations, milling, farms, and gardens. Aqueducts moved water through gravity alone, along a slight overall downward gradient within conduits of stone, brick, concrete or lead; the steeper the gradient, the faster the flow. Most conduits were buried beneath the ground and followed the contours of the terrain; obstructing peaks were circumvented or, less often, tunneled through. Where valleys or lowlands intervened, the conduit was carried on bridgework, or its contents fed into high-pressure lead, ceramic, or stone pipes and siphoned across. Most aqueduct systems included sedimentation tanks, which helped to reduce any water-borne debris. Sluices, ''castella aquae'' (distribution tanks) and stopcocks regulated the supply to individual des ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caerleon
Caerleon (; cy, Caerllion) is a town and community in Newport, Wales. Situated on the River Usk, it lies northeast of Newport city centre, and southeast of Cwmbran. Caerleon is of archaeological importance, being the site of a notable Roman legionary fortress, Isca Augusta, and an Iron Age hillfort. Close to the remains of Isca Augusta are the National Roman Legion Museum and the Roman Baths Museum. The town also has strong historical and literary associations: Geoffrey of Monmouth elevated the significance of Caerleon as a major centre of British history in his ''Historia Regum Britanniae'' (c. 1136), and Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote '' Idylls of the King'' (1859–1885) while staying in Caerleon. History Pre-Roman history The area around Caerleon is of considerable archaeological interest with a number of important Neolithic sites. By the Iron age, the area was home to the powerful Silures tribe and appears to have been the centre of a wealthy trading network, both manufact ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roman Wales
The Roman era in the area of modern Wales began in 48 AD, with a military invasion by the imperial governor of Roman Britain. The conquest was completed by 78 AD, and Roman rule endured until the region was abandoned in 383 AD. The Roman Empire held a military occupation in most of Wales, except for the southern coastal region of South Wales, east of the Gower Peninsula, where there is a legacy of Romanisation in the region, and some southern sites such as Carmarthen, which was the civitas capital of the Demetae tribe. The only town in Wales founded by the Romans, Caerwent, is located in South Wales. Wales was a rich source of mineral wealth, and the Romans used their engineering technology to extract large amounts of gold, copper, and lead, as well as modest amounts of some other metals such as zinc and silver. The Roman campaigns of conquest in Wales appear in surviving ancient sources, who record in particular the resistance and ultimate conquest of two of the five na ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Demetae
The Demetae were a Celtic people of Iron Age and Roman period, who inhabited modern Pembrokeshire and Carmarthenshire in south-west Wales, and gave their name to the county of Dyfed. Classical references They are mentioned in Ptolemy's ''Geographia'', as being west of the Silures. He mentions two of their towns, Moridunum (modern Carmarthen) and Luentinum (identified as the Dolaucothi Gold Mines near Pumsaint, Carmarthenshire). They are not mentioned in Tacitus' accounts of Roman warfare in Wales, which concentrate on their neighbours the Silures and Ordovices. Vortiporius, "tyrant of the Demetae", is one of the kings condemned by Gildas in his 6th century polemic ''De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae''. This probably signifies the sub-Roman petty kingdom of Dyfed. Etymology and relationship to Dyfed The Latinized element ''Demet'' has a clear and well attested relationship with the Welsh ''Dyfed'' (proto-Celtic *dametos') and even after the imposition of the English Shire s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Silures
The Silures ( , ) were a powerful and warlike tribe or tribal confederation of ancient Britain, occupying what is now south east Wales and perhaps some adjoining areas. They were bordered to the north by the Ordovices; to the east by the Dobunni; and to the west by the Demetae. Origins According to Tacitus's biography of Agricola, the Silures usually had a dark complexion and curly hair. Due to their appearance, Tacitus believed they had crossed over from Spain at an earlier date."... the swarthy faces of the Silures, the curly quality, in general, of their hair, and the position of Spain opposite their shores, attest to the passage of Iberians in old days and the occupation by them of these districts; ..." (Tacitus Annales Xi.ii, translated by M. Hutton) Jordanes, in his Origins and Deeds of the Goths, describes the Silures. "The Silures have swarthy features and are usually born with curly black hair, but the inhabitants of Caledonia have reddish hair and large loose-joint ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quintus Petillius Cerialis
Quintus Petillius Cerialis Caesius Rufus ( AD 30 — after AD 83), otherwise known as Quintus Petillius Cerialis, was a Roman general and administrator who served in Britain during Boudica's rebellion and went on to participate in the civil wars after the death of Nero. He later crushed the rebellion of Julius Civilis and returned to Britain as its governor. Because he probably succeeded Caesius Nasica as commander of Legio IX Hispana, and since brothers are often attested as serving in succession in the same post, Anthony Birley suggests that Cerialis was the younger brother of Nasica, and had been adopted by Petillius Rufus, who was known as praetor in AD 28. However, in his monograph of naming practices in the first centuries of the Roman Empire, Olli Salomies argues that Cerialis was actually the biological son of Petillius Rufus by a woman named Caesia, who may have been the daughter of a Caesius Cerialis, therefore Caesius Nasica would not have been his brother "but a close ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
