ULAS
University of Leicester Archaeological Services

Vine St, Leicester - a Roman town house

In the 19th-century, part of a Roman mosaic pavement was discovered on Vine Street, suggesting a major building in the vicinity.

The excavations have revealed a substantial Roman townhouse at the junction of two streets. It is of courtyard plan, and measures about 40m by 38m. The house probably started life as two strip buildings of the 2nd century AD fronting on to each of the streets, which were then linked together during a major building phase that extended the west wing to the north, and added a north and east wing All these wings had corridors surrounding a central courtyard.

On the east side of the house, a semi-detached range of the building contained a bath suite, represented by this hypocaust (underfloor heating system) and a probable plunge pool. The north wing included an apsidal room, suggestive of a triclinium (dining room), whilst other rooms of this range were clearly heated, as indicated by remnants of the robbed hypocaust flues.

A projecting north-south orientated range seems to have been added at some point to the north wing and the presence of hypocausts may suggest that this represents another bath suite.

Most of the walls of the building had been robbed of their stone in the medieval period. Some fragments of flooring survived, including this tessellated pavement from a corridor.

Evidence for prolonged use of one of the corner rooms of the house for industrial processes, including smithing, and bone working elsewhere has led to the suggestion that the status of the building declined in later periods. However, another possibility is that some of the rooms on the frontage were always used for commercial or industrial activity, with residential rooms behind.

A rectangular structure to the east of the house may have been a large public building, based on the massive size of its walls.

Click here to view reconstruction drawings of the Roman buildings from Vine Street.

Buried savings:-

In the east wing of the house, several dispersed coin hoards, deposited in around AD 341, were discovered buried inside one of the rooms and appeared to have been disturbed in antiquity perhaps during digging to retrieve hoarded items of greater value. In an adjacent room, a lead ingot had been deliberately buried and covered over with roofing slates.

Curse those who have stolen my cloak…

This flat piece of lead found on the site is a Roman ‘curse’, and bears a latin cursive text asking a god to punish those who have stolen a cloak.

Right is a lead seal of the twentieth legion –
L(egio) XX, used to seal official documents or consignments of goods.

The site was excavated between 2004 and 2006, and the fieldwork was directed by Tim Higgins.

Read more about Vine St in Projects, or click here