Folkestone Roman Villa

The Roman villa and earlier Iron Age workshop are located on the head of a low, slumped cliff, overlooking a shingle beach. The cliff here is composed of a band of gault clay that is nearly 100 feet thick, which overlies the Lower Greensand stone formation. The greensand is not actually sand: it is a loose, unconsolidated sandstone bed that forms part of the underlying structure of southeast England. The exposed greensand at Folkestone, referred to as the Folkestone Formation or the Folkestone Beds, is a unique geological feature of the area, and is rich with fossils and ichnofauna. The formation extends about 5 miles to the northwest of Folkestone to town of Stanford. At the junction where the gault meets the greensand, the gault is nearly liquid, resulting is major erosion and landslides over the years. This erosion has threatened to destroy the villa site, which was another 400 – 500 meters from the sea during Roman times, but which now sits near the edge of the cliff. The site is crumbling into the sea at about a rate of 6 inches per year. Numerous rescue excavations have been undertaken over the years, as archeologists race to rescue the site from slow destruction. == History ==

Mesolithic to Neolithic: c. 10,000 BC – c. 2000 BC Scattered evidence of human habitation near the Villa site has been uncovered during archeological digs, suggesting that the area was lived in or traveled through since Mesolithic times. In 2010, excavators uncovered Mesolithic worked flints below the Roman villa site. Although these flints probably originated from a nearby location and were washed into the villa site, they do establish human presence in the area during the Mesolithic period. Tools dating to the Neolithic period have been discovered at the Bayle in Folkestone, and there is some evidence to suggest that there was a Neolithic settlement at nearby Castle Hill (sometimes known as Caesar's Encampment, though there is no evidence or Roman activity at this site). Bronze and Iron Age settlements On the outskirts of Folkestone, an important early Bronze Age settlement was discovered at Holywell Coombe in 1987 and 1988 during archeological excavations in advance of the construction of the Channel Tunnel. Findings included "round houses", fields, trackways, and pottery fragments. Beneath the remains of the Romano-British villa was probably an Iron Age oppidum. Remains beneath the Roman villa suggest that querns, or stones used to grind cereal crops into flour, were produced here during the Iron Age on an almost industrial scale. and that when the Roman Emperor Claudius invaded Britain in AD 43, his troops did not come ashore at Folkestone. By c. 75 AD, the Iron Age settlement had been replaced with a Roman villa. The first version of the villa to be built consisted only of block A, and was built of tufa blocks laid on foundations of flint and ironstone. Classis Britannica tiles found at the site indicate that the villa might have a connection to the Roman Navy in Britain, or that the villa was possibly some sort of signalling station. It is unclear who inhabited the villa, but such villas were high status, and would have been occupied by important or wealthy Romans or by the Romano-British elite. For reasons that are unclear, the villa seems to have been abandoned sometime in the late third century. It was briefly reoccupied in the 4th century, before it was abandoned and buried under sediments. == The Roman Villa ==

Block A Building The Block A building is thought to be the earliest part of the villa built, although it was renovated or rebuilt at the time block B was constructed. Block A is around 212 feet long, and consists of two corridors, or verandahs, with wings at each end. The entrance to the villa was on the seaward side, and through the corridor into the best room in the villa, room no. 40. The rooms to the north and west of this are all furnished with hearths and fine flooring, and were probably the bedrooms of the villa. Block B Building Block B was built at the same time that Block A was renovated, and contains many similar features – hypocaust, Roman baths, a kitchen, and an especially large room warmed by the hypocaust are featured. The furthest edge of Block B was unfortunately already crumbling over the cliffside when Winbolt excavated in 1924. == Excavation ==

The Roman Villa Site was known to inhabitants for many years before it was formally excavated. In the 18th century, the land was notoriously difficult to farm because of "old stones" which damaged farming equipment. The site was mainly a rescue mission, to locate the villa remains, determine the condition of the surviving Roman masonry, and ascertain how much of the villa had fallen over the cliff since 1924. It was organized by Canterbury Christ Church University, the Folkestone People's History Centre and Canterbury Archaeological Trust. It was awarded £300,000 from the Heritage Lottery Trust, and was additionally funded by the Roger De Haan Charitable Trust, the Folkestone Town Council, the Kent Archaeological Society and the Folkestone and Hythe District Council. The excavation eventually won the "Rescue Dig of the Year" award by Current Archaeology magazine. ==References==