Beadlam Roman villa is a

Roman villa A Roman villa was typically a farmhouse or country house built in the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire, sometimes reaching extravagant proportions. Typology and distribution Pliny the Elder (23–79 AD) distinguished two kinds of villas n ...

on the east bank of the

River Riccal A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of wate ...

North Yorkshire North Yorkshire is the largest ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county (lieutenancy area) in England, covering an area of . Around 40% of the county is covered by National parks of the United Kingdom, national parks, including most of ...

, England. It is in the district of

Ryedale Ryedale is a non-metropolitan district in North Yorkshire, England. It is in the Vale of Pickering, a low-lying flat area of land drained by the River Derwent. The Vale's landscape is rural with scattered villages and towns. It has been inha ...

between

Helmsley Helmsley is a market town and civil parish in the Ryedale district of North Yorkshire, England. Historically part of the North Riding of Yorkshire, the town is located at the point where Ryedale leaves the moorland and joins the flat Vale of Pi ...

and the village of

Beadlam Beadlam is a village and civil parish in the Ryedale district of North Yorkshire, England. According to the 2001 census it had a population of 250, reducing to 229 at the Census 2011. It is situated about west of Pickering, near the southern ...

. This

Scheduled Ancient Monument In the United Kingdom, a scheduled monument is a nationally important archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorised change. The various pieces of legislation that legally protect heritage assets from damage and d ...

is the remains of a large

Romano-British The Romano-British culture arose in Britain under the Roman Empire following the Roman conquest in AD 43 and the creation of the province of Britannia. It arose as a fusion of the imported Roman culture with that of the indigenous Britons, a ...

farm built in the third and fourth centuries AD. The site was first explored in 1928 when Romano-British tile and pot and

tesserae A tessera (plural: tesserae, diminutive ''tessella'') is an individual tile, usually formed in the shape of a square, used in creating a mosaic. It is also known as an abaciscus or abaculus. Historical tesserae The oldest known tesserae ...

were found. Further excavation in 1966 revealed a mosaic pavement in a building in the northern part of the site. The field in which it was found was purchased by

English Heritage English Heritage (officially the English Heritage Trust) is a charity that manages over 400 historic monuments, buildings and places. These include prehistoric sites, medieval castles, Roman forts and country houses. The charity states that i ...

. More detailed excavations took place in 1969, 1972 and 1978 when the remains of buildings forming three sides of a courtyard were uncovered. The walls of one building can be viewed ''in situ''; the other building is visible as an earthwork.Beadlam Roman villa
, Online Archaeology, retrieved 15 May 2012

References

External links

English Heritage: Beadlam Roman Villa
{{Authority control Houses in North Yorkshire Villas in Roman Britain Archaeological sites in North Yorkshire Scheduled monuments in North Yorkshire Roman sites in North Yorkshire 1928 archaeological discoveries 2nd-century establishments in Roman Britain 5th-century disestablishments in Roman Britain