the present tower). It is suggested in _V.C.H._ that this was an
embankment, but _causeway_ was one of the regular names for a Roman
road. At Rochester one 5 ft. or 6 ft. thick of hard stuff has been found
crossing some soft ground.
The best way now to see again the old Roman City of London is to go to
the foot of the hill below St. Magnus the Martyr and then, turning away
from the riverside quays of the seaport, to walk up the street which
still retains something of the look of a High Street in an old market
town. Behind it we may still discern the ghost of the Roman Axis Street.
Right and left are narrow streets with red plastered houses separated by
little “drangways.” Here at a corner is a small temple with a dedication
to the deified emperor. There is the great City Bath. Farther on is the
civic centre, the market-place and hall; one, a square piazza containing
imperial statues in gilt bronze, and the other a big building having
internal ranks of tall Corinthian columns, a wide apse, and an open
timber roof—sombre but noble. Round about are many isolated and
widespreading mansions, one doubtless being the palace of the Governor
of the province. Beyond are the walls and gates which will be next
described, and in the background rise the northern heaths and wooded
hills now called Hampstead and Highgate.
“On alien ground, breathing an alien air,
A Roman stood, far from his ancient home,
And gazing, murmured, ‘Ah, the hills are fair,
But not the hills of Rome.’”
MARY E. COLERIDGE.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
+CHAPTER III+
WALLS, GATES AND BRIDGE
“Gem of all Joy and Jasper of Jocundity, Strong be thy walls that
about thee stand; London, thou art the flower of cities all.”
WILLIAM DUNBAR.
THE walls, gates and bastions of the City may be traced by the record of
early maps such as that of Braun and Hogenberg. The bastions of the east
side are particularly shown on a plan of Holy Trinity Priory made in the
sixteenth century; the west side from Ludgate to Cripplegate plainly
appears in Hollar’s plan after the fire, 1667. There were two bastions
between Ludgate and Newgate, then an angle bastion to the north; three
more on the straight length to Aldersgate, then one beyond that gate at
the angle where the wall turned north again; two bastions occurred
between this angle and the bastion at the corner where the wall again
turned east, which now exists in Cripplegate Churchyard.
Several of the gates stood until 1760. In an old MS. book of notes I
find under the heading “Remarkable Transactions in ye Mayoralty of Sir
J. Chitty.”—“In July, ye gates of Aldgate, Cripplegate and Ludgate were
sold by public auction in ye council chamber, Guildhall, and were
accordingly taken down without obstructing either ye foot or cartway,
and their sites laid into ye streets. Aldgate for £157, 10s.;
Cripplegate, £93; and Ludgate for £148.” Many old drawings of parts of
the wall are preserved in the Crace, the Archer and other collections.
The exact line of the wall and positions of the bastions has been
verified by modern excavations and discoveries. For full description and
a plan, see the _Victoria County History_ and _Archæologia_, lxii.
(1912). A good description of what was visible in 1855 is given in _The
Builder_ for that year.
[Illustration:
FIG. 29. See p. 61.
]
[Illustration:
FIG. 30.
]
In September 1903 an important section of the Roman wall was found in
excavating the site of Newgate Prison; in some parts it was about a
dozen feet high. I saw it in October and noted—“The wall is about 8½ ft.
wide. On the outside and inside one or two courses of facing stones were
first raised and the core of rubble was then filled in to that height;
first there was a thick couch of mortar, then a layer of rubble stones,
then another liberal supply of mortar running down between the stones as
grout; there were two or three such levellings-up in the heights between
the tile bonding courses.” The wall had a rough rubble foundation, then
a course of plinth stones on the outside, with three tile courses
corresponding to it on the inside of the wall, then followed five
courses of the fairly square facing stones on both sides of the wall,
then two rows of tile, five courses more stone and two rows of tile,
then five more stone courses; above this level the wall had been
destroyed. The stones and tiles were set in mortar, and the latter,
except for the three courses at the bottom on the inside, which served
as a plinth, were carried right through the thickness of the wall; the
“tiles” were Roman bricks about 18 in. by 12 in. and 1½ in. thick, laid
in what we call Flemish bond. The stone facing courses were a little
higher at the bottom than upwards, but all were comparatively small and
square; there was a clear distinction between the wrought facings and
the rubble filling, which was practically concrete. The “facings” were
hard skins adhering to the filling and required by the method of
building as described above (Fig. 30).
The mode of construction of the wall is likely to be misunderstood when
we speak as we almost necessarily do of facings and filling and of bond
tiles. The “facing” stones were small, roughly wrought, and set in much
mortar; they formed outer skins to the concreted mass into which they
tailed back. The whole was homogeneous. The method was analogous to the
facing of concrete with triangular bricks notching back into the core.
The tile courses in the City Wall were doubtless bonds, but they also
divided the wall into strata locking up the moisture of the mortar from
too rapid absorption and evaporation. I have little doubt that the wall
was carried up a stratum at a time over long lengths; it would thus have
been available as a defence from an early stage, and scaffolding would
not have been required. The building of this wall and casting the ditch
about it required a great constructive effort. A strip of ground some
100 feet wide must have been cleared as a preliminary. Then the immense
quantity of stone required would have been brought by ships and barges.
It is often said that old material was not re-used in the wall, but I
can hardly think that two miles of chamfered plinth had to be provided
out of new stone at the very beginning of the work. And material from
destroyed monuments was doubtless broken up for the small facing stones.
The lime-burning, brick-making, stone-cutting, as well as the actual
building, called for much labour. It would be interesting to have the
quantities taken out and an estimate prepared.
The south wall along the river front is well described in _V.C.H._ Roach
Smith, in an article in vol. i. of the _Archæological Journal_, recorded
the fact that it had “alternate layers of red and yellow plain and
curve-edged (_i.e._ flanged) tiles”; the rest being of ragstone and
flint. It was founded on piles. In _The Builder_ (January 19, 1912) it
is recorded that in digging for a foundation at No. 125 Lower Thames
Street, between Fish Street Hill and Pudding Lane, there was found the
base of the Roman wall resting upon long and thick timber balks laid
crosswise, with piles beneath them; there were three courses of rough
rag and sandstone capped with two courses of yellow bonding tiles, all
in reddish mortar; what remained was about 3 ft. high and 10 ft. wide,
and was at 24 ft. below the existing pavement. Full evidence of the
course of the City Wall along the river front has been found (_Archæol._
xliii.). It may be noticed that in mediæval regulations foreign sailors
might not go beyond Thames Street; that is, pass where the wall had
been, into the City proper. This south wall, like the bastions,
contained remnants of Roman monuments.
The south wall would have been interrupted at the outlet of the
Walbrook, which must have been a tidal creek. This was doubtless the
original harbour, and there would have been quays within the line of the
wall. Daremberg and Saglio’s plan of Bordeaux shows a remarkable
parallel to Londinium, standing on the bank of a great river, flanked by
a little stream and with a port within the walls (Fig. 29). It seems
probable that the strong wall which Roach Smith reports as having been
found on the east side of the Walbrook may have been a quay wall. The
Thames has been much encroached on where it passes the City. In making
the approach to new London Bridge three successive embankments were
found, one being of squared trunks of trees. A similar timber wall has
just been found in Miles Lane. In Lower Thames Street the Roman house
found on its north side was built on piles, “probably on the river bank”
(_Athen._, 1848), and the south City Wall was wholly built on timbering.
In earlier Londinium, Cannon Street must have been the southern
thoroughfare.
_Bastions._—In July 1909, when the angle bastion near Giltspur Street
was excavated, I noted that close to it the City Wall was badly
fractured, and inclined outwards; there had evidently been a serious
settlement here, which was sufficiently accounted for by the nature of
the ground—wet clay on the bank of a stream. The wall was taken lower
than the ordinary level here, and the bastion was founded at a lower
level still. The bastion was not bonded to the City Wall, but merely
built against it with a straight joint; it was of horseshoe shape on
plan and projected about 27 ft., the masonry was rubble in thin courses,
and the whole looked mediæval to me. In the careful report in
_Archæologia_ it was said that some evidence for Roman date was
discovered in the foundation. The facts suggested to me not only that
the bastion had been built against the wall, but that it was probably
built at a point of failure in the original wall. It is agreed that the
bastions were built later than the wall, and with a straight joint
between them and it, and I would suggest that they were built to cover
cracks and form buttresses as well as for their additional defensive
value, and this may very well have been the general procedure. It would
have been impossible to build a wall measured by miles on inferior
foundations without bad settlements; the Egyptians provided for them by
building such walls in sections with inclined straight joints at
intervals.
M. Blanchet, writing of the walls of the cities of Gaul, says: “Often
the curtains are not bonded with the towers. This independence reminds
one of a precept of Philo’s, which advises that the method should be
followed so as to prevent the consequences of unequal settlement between
the two. But there is a more simple explanation—the town under immediate
danger ensures itself first with the curtain and adds the towers after.
Most of the fortifications are those which the Romans built on the
approach of the Barbarian invasions. To this period belong the walls of
Rome and those of the cities of Gaul.” Choisy again has an interesting
account of the towers of the walls of Constantinople, with a diagram of
arches in the sides of the towers at the ground level, which were built
so that the effective part of their foundations should be kept clear of
the wall. Now, the foundations of the London bastions provide evidence
of a similar way of thinking.
[Illustration:
FIG. 31.
]
In Fig. 31 I give a sketch of this angle bastion made on July 5, 1909.
Here is seen the City Wall curving round from the north to the west, and
against it the bastion. The Roman wall was badly cracked and leaning
outward (A); in the corner by the bastion the plinth and the foundation
are seen, and below a sloping bank of wet clay (C), and farther out
water (W). The bastion was built of rubble, and was hollow to the base;
the form was different below and above (see B). In the sketch the tile
courses are seen going through the thickness of the wall.
The bastions which have been most carefully examined are those on the
site of the General Post Office, described in _Archæologia_, lxiii.
(1912). One is said to have been built in “the usual manner of random
rubble”; it was separate from the City Wall, and the foundation was
deeper than that of the wall. A second was built in a very soft spot.
“Why it should have been selected is not easy to see, as at a little
distance either way the builders could have found firm soil.” Its site
was an old stream bed, and the conditions might well be the cause of a
settlement at the point. This, as suggested above, may have been the
reason the bastion was erected just here. (For the bastion by Giltspur
Street, see _S. A. Proceedings_, 2 S. xxii. 476.)
[Illustration:
FIG. 32.
]
Nothing very definitely Roman was found in these bastions, but one at
All Hallows was certainly Roman. This is described as (I condense)
“built of stonework which, like the rest, so far as they have been
observed, is of random rubble, built principally of irregular pieces and
ragstone with portions of Roman tile (none complete) and other material;
much of it appears to have done duty in some previous building. A base
was formed of large square stones a uniform height of 2 ft.; they had
been employed in some former building; several had lewis holes. This
base rested on a table of large flat stones 9 in. thick. Most of these
seem to have been portions of a cornice. Roman origin was shown by red
mortar in which the joints had been set.” The foundation was about 3 ft.
below that of the City Wall, and projected into the original Roman
ditch. What is called the “table” above was a square-fronted lower base;
the back of this base was set in advance of the City Wall; indeed, it
was 3 ft. in front of it on the eastern side and “the gravel in this
intervening space was undisturbed.” This gap is specially to be noted.
The description of the masonry as random rubble must apply mainly to the
core of the work, for the illustrations show an approximation to courses
on the face; indeed, on the east side, thirteen courses may be counted
in the photograph up to a line which seems to be the top of a sloping
plinth; these courses averaged about 4½ in. high. The full significance
of this account is only brought out on comparing it with Price’s
description of what was found in excavating the Camomile Street bastion.
This bastion was founded on two deep courses of heavy stones taken from
Roman buildings, many sculptured, and having lewis holes in them. These
masonry courses were set 1½ ft. in advance of the City Wall, one over
the other, forming a straight joint, and leaving a gap “separated from
the wall by an intervening space filled with rubble” (Price) which was
filled with small stones. This curious and carefully-arranged
construction in both bastions was clearly with the object of making the
foundations of the bastions take their bearings away from the wall so
that they would tend to lean inwards against the wall; it is analogous
to the arches of the Constantinople towers. This bastion had a batter or
slope at the bottom of about 4 ft. high. Price describes the masonry as
“rag rubble walling faced with random courses. The size of the blocks of
which the facing was composed varied from 3 in. to 8½ in. thick [high]
and from 5 in. to 14 in. long.” This account is supported by the
carefully-executed illustrations which show coursed facings of small
stones which seem almost identical with the facings of the City Wall.
Such masonry of small facing “blocks” with concreted rubble behind is
certainly Roman. The masonry at the All Hallows bastion seems to have
approximated to the same character; there it may be noticed the courses
became narrower upwards. This was certainly not so regular as the
masonry of the City Wall, but it may be said to have resembled it (Fig.
32).
At the Guildhall Museum is “a group of architectural remains and
fragments of sculptured stones from tombs, public buildings, etc., found
in a bastion of London Wall, Duke Street, Aldgate, 1881.” This find is
best described in _The Athenæum_ for that year. Mr. Watkins, while
excavating in Houndsditch and Duke Street, found the City Wall and a
mass of masonry extending 18 ft. outward from the wall; the stones were
dressed and weighed from 1 cwt. to 1½ tons. “In the structure he
observed a channel 15 in. deep by 18 in. wide, which showed signs of use
as a watercourse. It had been filled with concrete composed of chalk and
flints. The site was the foundation of one of the bastions composed of
sculptured stones in character similar to those previously recorded,
upwards of twenty in number.” This was the second bastion east of
Bishopsgate. The channel filled with concrete suggests a gap dividing
the bastion from the City Wall as already described; but see also
account in _V.C.H._
In 1887 Mr. Loftus Brock reported to the British Archæological
Association the removal of part of the City Wall on the east side of
Wormwood Street. Nearly opposite Bevis Marks Synagogue the foundation of
a circular-fronted bastion was found of worked freestones and not bonded
into the main wall (_The Builder_, May 28, 1887). A paper by J. E. Price
in 1884 (London and Middlesex Archæol. Soc.) referred to the discovery
of a bastion containing several sculptured stones in St. Mary Axe (_The
Builder_, November 22, 1884, and compare _V.C.H._).
[Illustration:
FIG. 33.
]
In 1852 an excavation was made against the outside of the City Wall on
Tower Hill, and a number of large wrought and carved stones were found
(_The Builder_, September 4, 1852) (Fig. 33). In an account given in the
_Journal of the British Archæological Association_ the workmen are said
to have discovered a “complete quarry of stones cut in various forms and
evidently belonging to some important building ... 125 making 40 cart
loads.” Fairholt made an etching of the place while the work was in
progress, which shows that the “quarry” was heaped against the external
face of the wall like the bases of the other bastions, and that, in
fact, it was a ruined bastion Fig. 34 from Roach Smith’s _Roman London_,
slightly modified). Another account is given in the Antiquarian Etching
Club by A. H. Burkitt, with a plate: “These interesting remains were
discovered during the excavations in June 1852, which laid bare the wall
to its base. The various portions of stone, which amounted to about
forty cart loads, bear evidence of having belonged to an important
building. The inscription and band of laurel leaves, which probably
formed an ornament above it, indicate a monument of considerable
magnitude to the memory of a commander of the Roman Navy. There were
found at the same time fragments of frescoes with inscriptions.” (In
Fig. 33 the fragment with laurel leaves is represented upside down.)
[Illustration:
FIG. 34.
]
The two stones specially mentioned are now in the British Museum. It
appears from the accounts and illustrations that this bastion was built
against the wall without being bonded to it in the lower part, that its
foundation was formed of large carved and moulded stones, and was at a
lower level than that of the wall. (The part below the plinth in Fig. 34
on the left is rough foundation.)
We thus have clear record that several of the bastions on the east and
north sides of the City were constructed in a similar way. Those farther
west near the Post Office were probably rebuilt in mediæval times. These
were hollow at the base, not solid like the others.
[Illustration:
FIG. 35.
]
The towers of the city wall of Carcassone, described by Viollet le Duc
(_Dict._, vol. i.), were so similar in construction that it is plain our
bastions were constructed according to general custom. In the
illustration we see big stones at the base of the bastion only; large
window-like openings closed with woodwork above; and an upper storey
rising higher than the wall top. Fig. 35 is a suggested restoration of
one of the London bastions, showing the foundation gap A, and an upper
storey overlapping the City Wall.
It is probable that most, or all, of the bastions from Tower Hill to
Cripplegate were built in the same way as those just described, and
there is evidence to suggest that the western bastions were also
similar. In 1806 fragments of Roman monuments were found near Ludgate;
“these may have come from a later Roman gate or from the adjoining
bastion” (_V.C.H._). Allen says: “At the back of the London
Coffee-house, Ludgate Hill, a circular tower and staircase was
discovered; and about 3 ft. below the pavement some remains of Roman art
were found.” An etching of the stones published by T. Fisher in 1807
describes them as “dug out of the foundations of the wall of the City, a
few yards north of Ludgate.” Archer, speaking of an inscribed pedestal,
says it was found “in extending the premises at the back of the London
Coffee-house. It appeared in a bastion of the City Wall, and was built
in with the masonry near some remains of a circular staircase” (_Illust.
Family Jour._, _c._ 1850). Now, Horwood’s plan of 1799 shows the back of
the Coffee-house adjoining the line of the old wall and extending a long
way north—apparently much more than sufficient to overlap the bastion
numbered 55 on Mr. Reader’s plan. The Post Office excavations recently
made down Ludgate Hill show that the natural ground is here only about
10 ft. below the modern level.
The Camomile Street and All Hallows bastions were about 20 ft. wide and
projected about 16 ft. In mediæval days the bastions rose above the
parapet walk on the main wall, and each formed a round-ended chamber
having loopholes. This is well shown on the Survey of Holy Trinity,
Aldgate, 1592, which I published about 1900 in _Middlesex Notes and
Queries_. (Several round-fronted bastions are planned as well as Aldgate
itself.) The mediæval arrangement, I have no doubt, followed the Roman
scheme. The openings in the original bastions would, we may suppose,
have been wider than mediæval loops, and have had semicircular arches of
brick over them. (See Viollet le Duc’s _Dictionary_, vol. i. p. 333.)
The walls and bastions which still exist at Le Mans and Senlis more
closely resemble those of Londinium than any others I have seen. At Le
Mans a long portion fronting, but some way back from the river Sarthe,
has three bastions 60 yds. to 70 yds. apart, round on the front about 20
ft. wide, and 15 in. or 16 in. projection. The curtain is about 30 ft.
high, and the bastions rise higher—say, to 45 ft.; they rise sloping for
some way from the ground (Fig. 36). The bastions at Senlis are very
similar, but some of these have two storeys of large openings, three in
each.
[Illustration:
FIG. 36.
]
For a long time it was argued that the bastions of the Wall of London
were mediæval; then very considerable difference of construction from
the City Wall has been alleged. It has been said that their masonry was
unlike the other, and that there were no tile bands. We only know with
any certainty the lower parts of the bastions now recognised as Roman,
and there is no reason for asserting that there were no tile bands in
the upper parts. The bastion illustrated by Roach Smith from a sketch by
Gough had bands of brick, but in the illustration this bastion appears
as square, and this is unlikely (see _Archæol._ lxiii.). It is possible,
however, that the form is a misreading of a rough sketch. This, I think,
is more likely than the suggestion in _V.C.H._ that it was mediæval. An
illustration of a round-fronted bastion near Falcon Square given by
Thornbury (_Old and New London_), shows two bands of tile. This seems to
be bastion 40 of _V.C.H._, which was about 40 ft. high; “in the upper
part was a row of tile-brick, probably due to later patching.” There are
also some other references to tiles in bastions, and on the whole I
conclude that they probably had tile bands more or less like the wall.
Both the bastion just mentioned and that of Gough’s sketch had openings
below the upper storey, showing that in these bastions there were
chambers below the level of the parapet. So there must have been at Le
Mans (Fig. 36) and Senlis. Compare also V. le Duc’s _Dictionary_, vol.
i. p. 333.
In an article on the City Walls in the _Journal of the London Society_
(November 1922), Dr. Norman says: “Last summer the remains of another
bastion were laid bare not far from the west end of the Church of St.
Anne and St. Agnes.” This was “the inner angle bastion” near Aldersgate.