Ravenglass Roman Bath House (also known as Walls Castle) is a ruined ancient Roman bath house at Ravenglass,

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. ...

, England. Belonging to a 2nd-century

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 lett ...

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'' ...

and

naval base A naval base, navy base, or military port is a military base, where warships and naval ships are docked when they have no mission at sea or need to restock. Ships may also undergo repairs. Some naval bases are temporary homes to aircraft that u ...

(known to the Romans as ''Itunocelum''), the bath house is described by Matthew Hyde in his update to the

Pevsner Guide The Pevsner Architectural Guides are a series of guide books to the architecture of Great Britain and Ireland. Begun in the 1940s by the art historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, the 46 volumes of the original Buildings of England series were publish ...

to Cumbria as "an astonishing survival". The still standing walls are 13 ft (4 m) high, there are patches of the internal rendering, in dull red and white cement, and traces of the splayed window openings remain. Ravenglass1

The remaining fragment appears to be the west end of a building which was about 40 ft/12 metres wide and about 90 ft/27 metres long (see plan). It consisted of a suite of rooms arranged in a double sequence along the building. The entrance and changing area (''

apodyterium In ancient Rome, the apodyterium (from grc, ἀποδυτήριον "undressing room") was the primary entry in the public baths, composed of a large changing room with cubicles or shelves where citizens could store clothing and other belongin ...

'') contains niches, perhaps originally for statues. The use of the other rooms is not known, but there would have been a range of warm rooms, a hot bath and a cold plunge. The north and south walls have external buttresses which were probably intended to take the weight of a vaulted roof. Excavations were carried out at the bath house in 1881. Remains of the

hypocaust A hypocaust ( la, hypocaustum) is a system of central heating in a building that produces and circulates hot air below the floor of a room, and may also warm the walls with a series of pipes through which the hot air passes. This air can warm th ...

heating system were uncovered, but they have since been reburied.

Roman fort

The bath house is located to the north east of the Roman fort. The fort's defences were originally of turf and timber, although in the early 3rd century a stone wall was constructed. The fort appears to have been occupied continuously from AD 130 until the end of the 4th century. There is evidence that the bath house was fed with water from higher ground to the east of the fort. As the bath house is located outside the walls of the fort, some sources assume it served the civilian community as well as the military. However, prior to 2013, when a dig was started, little information was available about the

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 ...

at Ravenglass.

Conservation and access

The relatively good state of preservation of the bath house is believed to be attributable to its being adapted for domestic use in the medieval period. The building was identified as being Roman in the nineteenth century, although it was initially thought to be a villa and was not identified as a bath house until the twentieth century. It has been designated as a

scheduled 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 ...

, and is in state care, being managed 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 ...

. It has been included in the World Heritage Site Frontiers of the Roman Empire. The site can be reached from Ravenglass via a "miles without stiles" pedestrian route (part of a project to improve access for people with disabilities to places in the Lake District National Park). The route follows a private road which runs parallel to the railway. The ditch of the fort is visible from the bath house, but it is on private land and is bisected by the railway tracks of the

Cumbrian Coast Line The Cumbrian Coast line is a rail route in North West England, running from Carlisle to Barrow-in-Furness via Workington and Whitehaven. The line forms part of Network Rail route NW 4033, which continues (as the Furness line) via Ulverston an ...

, which runs from

Carlisle Carlisle ( , ; from xcb, Caer Luel) is a city that lies within the Northern England, Northern English county of Cumbria, south of the Anglo-Scottish border, Scottish border at the confluence of the rivers River Eden, Cumbria, Eden, River C ...

Barrow-in-Furness Barrow-in-Furness is a port town in Cumbria, England. Historically in Lancashire, it was incorporated as a municipal borough in 1867 and merged with Dalton-in-Furness Urban District in 1974 to form the Borough of Barrow-in-Furness. In 2023 the ...

, with a station at Ravenglass.

References

External links

English Heritage site

Ravenglass Roman Bath House at cambridgemilitaryhistory.com

Roman Britain Website
{{English heritage cumbria Ancient Roman baths in England Roman sites in Cumbria Ruins in Cumbria Scheduled monuments in Cumbria Tourist attractions in Cumbria English Heritage sites in Cumbria Archaeological sites in Cumbria

Roman fort

Conservation and access

See also

References

External links