Roman mosaics in Britain

More than 2,000 Roman mosaics have been discovered in Britain. Most of them are decorated with geometric patterns or motifs; about 200 contain figures (animals or people, often mythical) in the design. Of these 200, perhaps a third survive largely intact (or intact enough for the full mosaic to be recreated); a third exist only in fragments; and a third have been destroyed, recorded only in drawings, photographs, written descriptions or contemporary reports of their discovery. The quality of these records can vary from a few lines in an old newspaper article to comprehensive archaeological or antiquarian accounts, including detailed sketches, plans and measurements.

Skilled craftsmen
What has long been clear from even a cursory study of these mosaics, and the buildings in which they were once situated, is that they do not fit with the once-common view of Britannia as a rather backward Roman province on the edge of the empire. Rather, they suggest a thriving, wealthy region, some of whose inhabitants were able to fund the best domestic lifestyles that the empire had to offer.

Indeed, while many Romano-British mosaics are of indifferent quality, some of the villa mosaics of 3rd and 4th-century Roman Britain are comparable with the best among their Mediterranean counterparts. This suggests that during this period at least there was sufficient demand (and money) in Britannia to employ some of the most highly-skilled mosaic craftsmen in the empire.

Where the mosaics were laid
Although no Roman mosaics have been found in Scotland or the far north of England, they have been uncovered in places from Yorkshire, in the north, to the Isle of Wight, in the south, and from south Wales and Devon, in the west, to Essex and Kent, in the east. Most are found in the counties of Somerset, Dorset, Gloucestershire, Wiltshire and Hampshire. There is also a small concentration of mosaics in the area of the Humber estuary. Where to see Roman mosaics in Britain.

When they were laid
Mosaics span virtually the entire period of the Roman occupation – and were possibly still being laid for a little while longer, into the 5th century AD, after the departure of the legions in 410. Most, however, date from two specific periods:

• AD 150-200, when there was a mini-boom in mosaic construction in the towns and cities of Roman Britain; and
• the late third and fourth centuries AD, when no country villa worth its salt could be considered complete without decorated mosaic floors in its major rooms.

'Rich and varied' designs
As well as simple geometric patterns and other motifs, many Romano-British mosaics are decorated with figures. According to Patricia Witts, an independent mosaics specialist and author of Mosaics in Roman Britain (Tempus, 2005), these comprise 'one of the richest and most varied collections of figured mosaics from the Roman world'. She says the British mosaics are notable in three respects:

• A high proportion – more than a third – show mythological characters, either alone or as part of a scene telling a story.
• A number of the mosaics include not just one mythological character or scene but several.
• Some of the mosaics feature very rare characters or scenes not found on mosaics elsewhere.

These designs were obviously meant to be decorative but they also told stories and were a vivid expression of their owners' religious and other beliefs and practices. For example, Bacchus, the Roman god of wine, was particularly popular among the Romano-British, often accompanied by Venus. And the Bacchic cantharus, or wine vessel, a small version of which decorated one of the mosaics excavated by Time Team at Coberley, was also extremely common, either in its own right or alongside the god in person.

Where to see Roman mosaics in Britain

A full list of locations of Roman mosaics in Britain is available as part of the Association for the Study and preservation of Roman Mosaics website at www.asprom.org/mosaics. The following are among Time Team's favourites:

Fishbourne Roman Palace and Gardens
Salthill Road
Fishbourne
Chichester
Sussex PO19 3QR
Tel: 01243 785859
The remains of the north wing of the palace are enclosed within a cover building where there is the largest collection of in-situ mosaics in Britain, including the famous 'Cupid on a Dolphin' mosaic.

Corinium Museum
Park Street
Cirencester
Tel: 01285 655611
A welcoming and airy museum with one of the finest collections of antiquities from Roman Britain, including various mosaics and the famous Septimus Stone, featured on Time Team's Cirencester programme in the 2000 series, which records the restoration of a column to Jupiter by a governor called Septimus.

Bignor Roman Villa
Bignor
Pulborough
West Sussex RH20 1PH
Tel: 01798 869259
One of the less well-known Romano-British sites open to the public, the villa has a marvellous collection of mosaics. It is six miles north of Arundel, signposted from the A29 and the A285.

British Museum
The British Museum
Great Russell Street
London WC1B 3DG
The British Museum has a number of fine Romano-British mosaics, including the early depiction of Christ found in the Hinton St Mary mosaic floor and the first- or second-century Leadenhall Street mosaic, featuring Bacchus on a tiger.

Other websites

Channel 4 is not responsible for the content of third-party sites.

Association for the Study and Preservation of Roman Mosaics (ASPROM)
www.asprom.org/index.html
The Association for the Study and Preservation of Roman Mosaics website offers a wide variety of materials relating to mosaics in Britain, including their design, construction and the buildings in which they have been discovered. There is a catalogue of every Roman mosaic discovered in Britain, as well as articles providing an insight into the relationship between mosaics and art, architecture, religion and history. ASPROM is supporting former English Heritage chief illustrator David Neal and Steve Cosh's project to catalogue and publish details of every Roman mosaic in Britain, further details of which can be found on its website.

The best and worst Roman mosaics in Britain
www.cix.co.uk/~archaeology/timeline/roman/
mosaics/mosaics.htm
Mosaics expert and illustrator David Neal has been working with Steve Cosh to produce a four-volume account of all the known mosaics in the country. Here they choose four of their best – and worst – Roman mosaics in Britain. This illustrated web page is an abridged version of an article that appeared in Current Archaeology 157, published in May 1998.

Recording Roman mosaics
www.asprom.org/publications/recording.html
How can Roman mosaics best be illustrated? Many mosaics are known only from photos (usually black and white), but they are difficult to photograph even under good conditions. Because of their size and situation, often only an oblique view is possible, and rarely can the entire mosaic be captured. Thus to get an overall idea of what an ancient mosaic looked like, the best solution is a painting to scale, together with photographic evidence, and this is the solution adopted in the forthcoming corpus of Romano-British mosaics by David Neal and Steve Cosh. This illustrated article gives a detailed account of the background to their work and the history of recording Roman mosaics in Britain.

The Romans in Britain: Roman mosaics
www.romans-in-britain.org.uk/
arc_roman_mosaics.htm
Good basic introduction to Roman mosaics, their design, construction, peculiarities and mistakes.

Roman mosaics gallery
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/
romans/mosaics_gallery.shtml
Online gallery of mosaics from Fishbourne Roman Palace and Bignor Roman villa.

Piazza Armerina, Sicily
www.bluffton.edu/~sullivanm/armerina/
armerina.html
A large, early 4th-century Roman villa and estate in Sicily, the Piazza Armerina has many well-preserved mosaics that feature on this website.

Pyrrha's Roman pages
www.pyrrha.demon.co.uk/index.html
This website provides information on how a couple with classical enthusiasms made a Roman mosaic and garden. The site also contains an introduction to the Latin language, poetry and how to read Latin inscriptions.

Mosaic Workshop
www.mosaicworkshop.com/acatalog/index.html
Shop: 1a Princeton Street
London WC1R 4AX
Tel: 020 7831 0889
Workshop: Unit B
443-449 Holloway Road
London N7 6LJ
Tel: 020 7263 2997
The Mosaic Workshop supplies materials and organises courses on mosaic-making.

Further reading

Ancient Mosaics by Roger Ling (British Museum, 1998) paperback £12.99 ISBN: 0714122181
Traces the history of mosaics and their regional variations from Hellenistic to early Christian times, including mosaic techniques and their relationship to ancient interior design.

Geometric Patterns from Roman Mosaics by Robert Field (Tarquin Publications, 1988) paperback £2.95 ISBN: 0906212634
A compact and interesting guide.

Romano-British Mosaics by Alan McWhirr (Shire Publications, 1995) paperback £10 ISBN: 0852638914
Illustrated guide to Roman-British mosaics in the popular Shire Archaeology series.

Vitruvius: On Architecture translated by Frank Granger (Harvard University Press, 1996) hardback £12.95
Studied by architects from the Renaissance to the present, Vitruvius's book is an incredible DIY handbook ranging from recipes for plaster and paint to the aesthetic use of marble and the construction of siege engines. An invaluable reference for Time Team cameos and a guide to the styles and means of construction of Roman buildings that survive today.

Mosaic
Annual journal of the Association for the Study and Preservation of Roman Mosaics [see website]. Vol 27 includes the article 'Recreating the mosaic from Basildon Roman villa' by Steve Cosh. The recreation was carried out for Time Team as part of the excavation of a Roman villa at Lower Basildon for the 2001 series.