The Carsington Roman Villa is a Roman villa at Scow Brook, Carsington near Wirksworth, Derbyshire, England.
The site of the villa is currently submerged under the Carsington Water reservoir. Before the reservoir was built, the villa would have been located along the upper valley of the Scow Brook.
The villa contains a main house, a bathhouse, a courtyard, and a number of outbuildings. [1] The main house is 28 meters long by 9 meters wide, forming an area of 252 square meters (around three times the size of a modern house). The bathhouse, attached to the south-east corner of the main house, is 13.5 meters long and 4 meters wide, adding another 54 square meters to the structure. The villa was built on a platform raised above the surrounding fields, presumably to keep it dry. The main house has a verandah on the west side which would catch the evening sun in the summer.
The villa was constructed from sandstone and gritstone. The sandstone may have been quarried nearby at Warrington Knob, where archaeologists reported a small, disused quarry. Gritstone (millstone grit) could have been obtained from the south side of Pitty Wood, which is about 1.5 km south-west of Wirksworth. This would give it the appearance of a large stone-built Derbyshire barn or farmhouse but with crucial differences: The villa had a verandah on its main west frontage. It had small Roman windows (window glass was found in the excavations) with shutters, and the main house had a pink shiny stone slate roof composed of mica sandstone from a quarry at Wyver Wood at Belper Lane End. [2] The roof would have glittered in the sunlight, making it stand out against the green landscape. The bathhouse and verandah's orange, pantile roofs were composed of Roman imbrex (curved) tiles and tegula (flat) under tiles.
The main building consisted of the following rooms and features: [3]
1. At the north end of the building, there was a room with a hypocaust (i.e. a source of central heating) on the west side. This room may have been a dining room or study (most of the early Romans could read and write).
2. On the east side of the north end, there was a small unit which was most likely a utility, store, or servants room. It was quite large but had no distinct or unusual features in the excavation.
3. The main hall. This was the main living room of the villa and had two hearths, a large one and a smaller one. These were probably used for cooking/heating; braziers were also used for heating. The main door from this room would have opened onto the verandah on the west side, and there was presumably a back door opening on to the courtyard on the east side. Roman buildings did not usually have chimneys. However, there would have been a louver or roof vent to let the hearth smoke out of the building. The windows were also fitted with louvers or shutters over the glass. There was no mosaic at this villa, but two types of colored tile were found during the excavations, suggesting the building may have had a patterned floor.
4. The bedrooms. At the south end, there was a part of the main building, which was split into one large and two smaller partitioned areas, these appear to have been the bedrooms. Bedrooms in Roman or medieval buildings tend to be at the south side or south-east corners as this is where there is the most heat gain from the sun in the morning.
5. The bathhouse is attached to the south-east corner of the building, but not directly accessible from the main house, due to risk of fire outbreak from the furnace that heated the bath. Roman bathhouses are often detached or semi-detached for this reason. There were three rooms in this building, at the east end a changing room, in the middle a heated room (a place for drying off after a bath) and at the west end the bath itself. The bath was heated by a wood-burning furnace. The furnace would provide heat for the hypocaust (a similar furnace must have existed at the north end) and would have been underneath a copper or iron tank rather like the modern immersion heater. The hot air from the furnace would heat the tank and then pass into the hypocaust to heat the floor and then up through box flues in the walls to heat the walls, being vented under the eaves through vent tiles. Next to the furnace is the wood store. The furnace could have used wood or charcoal, but wood is much easier to obtain and would have been preferred.
6. The verandah, located on the west side of the main house, would have provided some shelter from bad weather and a place to sit and talk or do small tasks in good weather. The verandah had a clay and pebble floor, and if this was indeed the main frontage of the villa, it might have had a garden and the approach road on that side. The Romans were knowledgeable gardeners, and the garden would have provided a source of food, cookery, and medicinal items.
7. The courtyard was on the east side of the building, which somewhat sheltered it from the prevailing wind. There were at least two outbuildings; it is likely that these were a stable, and cart house, and one or more storehouses. These were on opposite sides of the courtyard so that the complete villa footprint would have been rather U-shaped looking at it from the east.
From the dating evidence, including Derbyshire ware pottery [1] and Samian ware, found during the excavation, it is assumed that the villa existed between 300AD and 400AD. Some of the coins found nearby were from the 380s, for example. It is assumed that the villa superseded an earlier timber structure. [2] The archaeologists felt there were no signs of a catastrophic or sudden end to life in the villa. There was no sign of fire or disaster. The interior was described as surprisingly clean as if the house had been tidied up, the doors locked and the occupants had quietly left. The villa appears to have had a slow, gentle decline and gradually became a ruin: by 500AD, it was gone. It remained in a grassy field undiscovered until 1964. [3]
Lullingstone Roman Villa is a villa built during the Roman occupation of Britain, situated in Lullingstone near the village of Eynsford in Kent, south eastern England. The villa is located in the Darent Valley, along with six others, including those at Crofton, Crayford and Dartford. Constructed in the 1st century, perhaps around 80-90 CE, the house was repeatedly expanded and occupied until it was destroyed by fire in the 4th or 5th century. The villa was occupied over various periods within the Romano-British period, but after its destruction, it is only thought to have been reoccupied during the Medieval Times. The occupants were most likely wealthy Romans or native Britons who had adopted Roman customs.
A hypocaust 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 the upper floors as well. The word derives from the Ancient Greek hypo meaning "under" and caust-, meaning "burnt". The earliest reference to such a system suggests that the temple of Ephesus in 350 BC was heated in this manner, although Vitruvius attributes its invention to Sergius Orata in c. 80 BC. Its invention improved the hygiene and living conditions of citizens, and was a forerunner of modern central heating.
Wirksworth is a market town in the Derbyshire Dales district of Derbyshire, England. Its population of 5,038 in the 2011 census was estimated at 5,180 in 2019. Wirksworth contains the source of the River Ecclesbourne. The town was granted a market charter by Edward I in 1306 and still holds a market on Tuesdays in the Memorial Gardens. The parish church of St Mary's is thought to date from 653. The town developed as a centre for lead mining and stone quarrying. Many lead mines were owned by the Gell family of nearby Hopton Hall.
In ancient Rome, thermae and balneae were facilities for bathing. Thermae usually refers to the large imperial bath complexes, while balneae were smaller-scale facilities, public or private, that existed in great numbers throughout Rome.
Letocetum is the ancient remains of a Roman settlement. It was an important military staging post and posting station near the junction of Watling Street, the Roman military road to north Wales, and Icknield Street. The site is now within the parish of Wall, Staffordshire, England. It is owned and run by the National Trust, under the name Letocetum Roman Baths Site & Museum. The site is in the guardianship of English Heritage as Wall Roman Site.
Crofton Roman Villa in Crofton, Orpington, in the London Borough of Bromley, is a Roman villa which was inhabited between approximately 140 and 400 AD. It was the centre of a farming estate of about 500 acres (200 ha), with farm buildings nearby, surrounded by fields, meadows and woods. The house was altered several times during its 260 years of occupation, and at its largest it probably had at least 20 rooms.
Duffield Castle was a Norman Castle in Duffield, Derbyshire. The site is a Scheduled Ancient Monument.
Chedworth Roman Villa is located near Chedworth, Gloucestershire, England and is a scheduled monument. It is one of the largest and most elaborate Roman villas so far discovered in Britain and one with the latest occupation beyond the Roman period. The villa was built in phases from the early 2nd century to the 5th century, with the 4th-century construction transforming the building into an elite dwelling arranged around three sides of a courtyard. The 4th-century building included a heated and furnished west wing containing a dining-room (triclinium) with a fine mosaic floor, as well as two separate bathing suites: one for damp-heat and one for dry-heat.
Piddington Roman Villa is the remains of a large Roman villa at Piddington, Northamptonshire, about 6 miles (9.7 km) south-east of Northampton, a county in the East Midlands of England.
Great Witcombe Roman Villa was a villa built during the Roman occupation of Britain. It is located on a hillside at Great Witcombe, near Gloucester in the English county of Gloucestershire. It has been scheduled as an ancient monument.
Rockbourne Roman Villa is a Roman courtyard villa excavated and put on public display in the village of Rockbourne in the English county of Hampshire. The villa was discovered in 1942 by a local farmer and excavated by A. T. Morley Hewitt over the next thirty years.
Carsington is a village in the middle of the Derbyshire Dales, England; it adjoins the hamlet of Hopton, and is close to the historic town of Wirksworth and village of Brassington.
Littlecote Roman Villa is an extensive and exceptional Roman villa, with associated religious complex, at Littlecote Park in Ramsbury, Wiltshire. It has been excavated and is on display to the public in the grounds of the estate.
The Welwyn Roman Baths are a Roman ruin preserved under the A1(M) just north of modern-day Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, England. The baths were a small part of the Dicket Mead villa, which was originally built in the 3rd century AD.
Borough Hill Roman villa is located on the north tip of Borough Hill, a prominent hill near the town of Daventry in Northamptonshire. The villa’s remains lie within the ramparts of an Iron Age fortress which covers the summit of the hill. The remains of the Roman villa were discovered in 1823 by the historian and archaeologist George Baker, who identified Borough Hill with the Benaventa of the Britons and Isannavaria of the Romans. The remains were not fully excavated until 1852 when local historian Beriah Botfield thoroughly excavated and recorded the site. Botfield employed an artist to make drawings of the site and these illustrations along with Botfield's notes, manuscripts and some of the antiquities found on the site are now kept at the British Museum.
North Leigh Roman Villa was a Roman courtyard villa in the Evenlode Valley about 0.5 miles (800 m) north of the hamlet of East End in North Leigh civil parish in Oxfordshire. It is a scheduled monument in the care of English Heritage and is open to the public.
Sparsholt Roman Villa was a Roman villa near the village of Sparsholt, Hampshire, England. It was constructed in phases from the 2nd to the 5th century, and then abandoned. It was excavated in 1965–72. Nothing is visible at the site today, but finds from the excavations are on display in Winchester City Museum, and one wing of the villa has been reconstructed at Butser Ancient Farm.
Billingsgate Roman House and Baths is an archaeological site in Londinium. The best preserved parts of the house are a bath with hypocausts. The ruins were discovered in 1848 while the Coal Exchange was built on the site. The remains were preserved and were visible in the cellar of the building. In 1967 to 1970, the Coal Exchange was replaced by another building and the Lower Thames Street was enlarged. Further excavations were made at the site and the remains were incorporated into the cellar of the new building, but were not open to the public.
Folkestone Roman Villa, also referred to as the East Bay Site, is a villa built during the Roman Occupation of Britain, and is located in East Wear Bay near the port town of Folkestone, in Kent, England. The villa is situated on a cliff top overlooking the English Channel, with views of the French coast at Boulogne on a clear day. It is situated near the start of the North Downs Trackway, and the area has been inhabited for thousands of years, with archeological finds in the area and at the villa site dating back to the mesolithic and neolithic ages. The villa was built around A. D. 75, and was almost certainly built within the confines of a preexisting Iron Age settlement.
Lutudarum was a town in the Roman province of Britannia, in the area that is now mid-Derbyshire. The settlement is believed to have been at either Wirksworth or nearby Carsington, although Matlock and Cromford are other candidates. The town was recorded as Lutudaron between Derventio and Veratino (Rocester) in the Ravenna Cosmography's list of all known places in the world in about 700 AD.
Coordinates: 53°03′41″N1°37′47″W / 53.061521°N 1.6296042°W
