While in North East England in August we made our first ever visit to a Roman Site called Arebia. Its in South Shields in the middle of a residential area near the city of Newcastle.
Hadrians wall is a defensive wall that stretched across the top of England and marked the northern edge of the Roman empire. It was there to keep us unruly Scots at bay ! The wall can still be seen in many places which is incredible considering that it is 1900 years old this year. However, it is a ruin, but not in South Shields, where they have reconstructed a Roman Gate on the wall, full size !
The site is quite incredible actually. There are the remains of an entire Roman fort. In the pic above you can see a lot of the foundations, and the rebuilt gate of to the left. And just beyond are the houses of South Shields - it really is smack bang in the middle of a residential area !
I love the picture above, because here you can see the 1900 year old remains of the actual Roman wall, which then lead onto the reconstructed gates and defensive towers. I had known about the site for maybe 10 years and always wanted to visit, and we were able to get there finally this year !
You can go inside the gate house, and the pic above was taken from atop the towers looking back over the site, and the white building in the other corner is a reconstruction of the generals quarters, the person in charge of the fort.
There are lots of Roman remains all over Britain, but these are mostly just foundations, or fragments of walls, so it is great to come to South Shields and get a real idea of what these Roman buildings would have actually looked like.
Above shows the beauty of their work. There would have been nothing else like this at all in Britain at the time, and it must have been amazing to see these structures being built by the Romans - although to be fair they were invaders, so I'm sure the locals would not have been that impressed !
Above is another shot of the internals, and I love the colours and decorations. And these are quite typical, as such wall paintings can still be seen in places like Rome on the palatine hill and Herculaneum in the Vesuvius National Park - where they have survived from Roman times.
Above is the remains of one of the guard towers at one of the fort corners, with a depiction of what it would have looked like.
Again in the pic above you can appreciate just how close this site is to the residential area.
Above is possibly a bath/bathing pond.
And here is another reconstructed room in the generals quarters - its lovely to see what it would have been like.
The site is quite large and kept us entertained for quite some time, especially exploring the generals quarters and the gate towers.
And surprisingly it was free to enter ! I was quite surprised at how quiet it was, there was only about 3 other visitors while we were there so we basically had the place to ourselves !
Well it was an impressive site for me. I love Roman history and really like visiting the sites along Hadrian's Wall, and I was glad to finally get to Arebia to see the reconstructed gates. Well worth the visit, and I'm sure I'll visit it again !
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Great my friend, love this i will have to go check this out some time, it is not that far from me really i live in Northampton have the best weekend 😎
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Many thanks - it was quite impressive !
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What a fantastic find. Thanks for sharing
Aye - its pretty cool to see what a real wall gate would look like !
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Many thanks !!!
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Really fantastic to see this site through your pictures, as I have said before I am very interested in history, and here you can see how it looked like, and not just imagine it from the ruins, thanks a lot for sharing and stay !ALIVE
Many thanks, it is a really cool place to visit - we loved it !
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We have friends in South Shields and checked out the fort whilst visiting them. It really is a gem of a place and not what we expected at all. There were actually houses built over the site even though the fort had been discovered and some of it is still under the remaining houses. We've been to Pompeii and Herculaneum and this reproduces the Roman buildings well.
I see you commented on my post about it.
Yes, I remember seeing your post which was about a week or two before we went. I had been looking forward to going for a long time, and really loved it. Further along the wall you see lots of places where gates used to be and only really see the wall footings so it was great to actually see these reconstructions !
Looks like you had a glorious day to visit. I find it bizarre that it is amongst a housing estate, but would be fascinating to visit.
Aye, it is quite odd to see if in the middle of a built up area, and it was so worth the visit
I can imagine.
Thanks for sharing your trip my friend have the best one
@hoosie
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Many thanks - its appreciated !
You are welcome have the best day
@hoosie
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