Maia, or Mais, (with the modern name of

Bowness-on-Solway Bowness-on-Solway is a village in the Allerdale borough of Cumbria, England. It is situated to the west of Carlisle on the southern side of the Solway Firth estuary separating England and Scotland. The civil parish had a population of 1,126 at ...

) in

Cumbria Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in North West England, bordering Scotland. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local government, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. C ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

was a

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

fort 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'' ...

on Hadrian's Wall, and was the last (or first) fort at the western end of the Wall, overlooking the

Solway Firth The Solway Firth ( gd, Tràchd Romhra) is a firth that forms part of the border between England and Scotland, between Cumbria (including the Solway Plain) and Dumfries and Galloway. It stretches from St Bees Head, just south of Whitehaven ...

Name

The ''

Ravenna Cosmography The ''Ravenna Cosmography'' ( la, Ravennatis Anonymi Cosmographia, "The Cosmography of the Unknown Ravennese") is a list of place-names covering the world from India to Ireland, compiled by an anonymous cleric in Ravenna around 700 AD. Textu ...

'' gives the name of the fort as ''Maia'', and the

Rudge Cup The Rudge Cup is a small enamelled bronze cup found in 1725 at Rudge, near Froxfield, in Wiltshire, England. The cup was found down a well on the site of a Roman villa. It is important in that it lists five of the forts on the western section of ...

, the Amiens Skillet and the Staffordshire Moorlands Pan give the name as ''Mais''. Another name ''Maio'' appears a little earlier in the ''Ravenna Cosmography'' which may well be the same fort. The fort is not mentioned in the '' Notitia Dignitatum''. The name ''Maia'' means "The Larger". The fort was (by a small margin) the second largest fort on Hadrian's Wall. The largest fort was

Uxelodunum Uxelodunum (with the alternative Roman name of Petriana and the modern name of Stanwix Fort) was a Roman fort. It was the largest fort on Hadrian's Wall, and is now buried beneath the suburb of Stanwix, in Carlisle, Cumbria, England. Roman ...

, not far distant in Stanwix in Carlisle.

Description

The fort stands on a sea-cliff over high, rising steeply from the shore, and commanding lower ground in all directions. The name 'Bowness' means 'rounded headland', indicating the good position of the fort, having commanding views of the nearby coastline. It was built over the site of the eightieth

milecastle A milecastle was a small fort (fortlet), a rectangular fortification built during the period of the Roman Empire. They were placed at intervals of approximately one Roman mile along several major frontiers, for example Hadrian's Wall in Great Bri ...

. The fort was originally built with a turf and clay rampart, similar to the Turf Wall in that area, but when the Wall was rebuilt in stone, the fort was also rebuilt in stone. The fort is believed to have measured by , covering about . It is the second largest fort on the Wall, after Stanwix (

). The Wall approached the fort from the east, joining it at the north-east corner. The Wall continued on from the north-west corner, and from there it is uncertain where it went. Old inhabitants reported that, west of the fort a large quantity of stone was dug out of the beach. This may be an indication that the Wall was taken down to the low-tide mark, as it was at

Segedunum Segedunum was a Roman fort at modern-day Wallsend, North Tyneside in North East England. The fort lay at the eastern end of Hadrian's Wall (in Wallsend) near the banks of the River Tyne, forming the easternmost portion of the wall. It was in use ...

, at the eastern end of the Wall. Over the years the cliff face has been eroded, and the north wall of the fort collapsed into the sea long ago. The fort had three gates, east, west and south. The east and west gates were where the modern road enters and exits the village. There was seemingly no need for a north gate as the north wall was on the cliff-tops, unless it was for bringing in sea-borne supplies. But it there was a north gate, it has long since crumbled away. A civilian settlement, or

vicus In Ancient Rome, the Latin term (plural ) designated a village within a rural area () or the neighbourhood of a larger settlement. During the Republican era, the four of the city of Rome were subdivided into . In the 1st century BC, Augustus ...

, existed south of the fort lining the road to the fort at Kirkbride, and this was occupied well into the fourth century.

Garrison

Pavilion at the start and end of the Hadrian's Wall Path at Bowness, Cumberland - geograph-2884530

Little is known of the garrison, but its third-century commander was a

tribune Tribune () was the title of various elected officials in ancient Rome. The two most important were the tribunes of the plebs and the military tribunes. For most of Roman history, a college of ten tribunes of the plebs acted as a check on th ...

, indicating that it was probably a thousand-strong (military) cohort of infantry, perhaps part-mounted.

Excavations

When the site was excavated in 1930, the southern rampart was uncovered and the west gate was located. In 1967, further excavations found the western rampart. In 1973 more extensive excavations were carried out, and traces of the original turf and clay western rampart were found, as well as evidence of a timber gate-tower.

Notes

References

* J. Collingwood Bruce, Roman Wall (1863), Harold Hill & Son, * Frank Graham, The Roman Wall, Comprehensive History and Guide (1979),

External links

Maia at www.Roman-Britain.co.uk
{{Hadrian's Wall forts Roman sites in Cumbria Forts of Hadrian's Wall Roman fortifications in England Former populated places in Cumbria