A HISTORY OF WARWICKSHIRE having occurred in Britain, and to point out which of these events took place, or may be imagined to have taken place, within the county. The result is always to give an impression that somehow the county had in Roman times some sort of local individuality and local history. We shall here adopt a different plan, suggested by the recent developments of topographical research. Utilizing the archaeological evidence, which is now far better known and appreciated than it was a hundred years ago, we shall try first to sketch briefly the general character of the Roman province in Britain, its military, social and economic features. We shall then point out in some detail how far the Roman antiquities of our county illustrate this general sketch ; that is how far the district now called Warwickshire was an average bit of Roman Britain. The Roman occupation was undertaken by the Emperor Claudius and commenced in A.D. 43. At first its progress was rapid. Within three or four years the Romans overran all the south and midlands as far as Exeter, Shrewsbury and Lincoln : part was annexed, part left to ' protected ' native princes. Then came a pause : some thirty years were spent in reducing the hill tribes of Wales and Yorkshire, and during this period the ' protected ' principalities were gradually absorbed. About A.D. 80 the advance into Scotland was attempted: in 124 Hadrian built his Wall from Newcastle to Carlisle, and thereafter the Roman frontier was sometimes to the north, never to the south of this line. The ' province ' thus gained fell practically, though not officially, into two marked divisions, which coincide roughly with the lowlands occupied in the first years of the occupation and the hills which were conquered later. The former were the regions of settled civil life, and among these we have to include the district now called Warwickshire. The troops appear to have been very soon withdrawn from them, and with a few definite exceptions there was probably not a fort or fortress or permanent military post throughout this part of our island after the end of the first century. On the other hand the Welsh and northern hills formed a military frontier-district, with forts and fortresses and roads, but with no towns or ordinary civilian life. It was the Roman practice, at least in the European provinces of the Empire, to mass the troops almost exclusively along the frontiers, and Britain was no exception. The army which garrisoned this military district was perhaps forty thousand men. It ranked as one of the chief among provincial armies, and constituted the most important element in Roman Britain. With the military district however we are not now concerned. For our present purpose it suffices to note its existence, in order to explain why traces of military occupation are absent in Warwickshire. But we may pause to examine the chief features of the non-military districts within which our county is included. These features are not sensational. Britain was a small province, remote from Rome and by no means wealthy. It did not reach the higher developments of city life, of culture or of commerce, which we meet in more favoured lands Gaul or Spain or Africa. Nevertheless it had a character of its own, 224
