Silchester

The Romans favoured urban development; the Celtic inhabitants of this island did not. This is practically the only conclusion you can reach upon visiting the site of Silchester. Yet this cannot be entirely true. Urban settlements like London, Colchester, St Albans, Winchester, Dorchester and Cirencester survive today upon their Roman foundations but Silchester, a once large and important town turned into a ghost town after the Romans left in 400AD.

In Roman times it was known as Calleva Atrebatum. The tributes were the dominant tribe of the region and it is likely that the Prince of the Atrebates was a client-king of the Romans and Silcheter may have been his capital.

It was probably founded as an iron age fort in the first century BC before the Romans arrived. After Claudius completed the conquest Roman influence was exerted and the less-than-regular distribution of buildings established by the Celts was replaced by a grid street pattern. Defensive walls were constructed around the entire perimeter of the town and about 70 AD an amphitheatre was constructed just outside the town walls.

Once the Romans departed from this island Silchester declined in importance and was abandoned. Archaeologists have discovered wells that were deliberately filled in so the abandonment was conscious rather than accidental. nobody really knows why but possibly the development of Reading, favoured by the saxons, made Silchester redundant. In any case, the centralised structure of the Roman empire collapsed in England after their departure. Centralised villa agriculture gave way to smaller independent homesteads and the absence of a taxation system diminished the infrastructure.

The site was first investigated by  the Reverend J.G. Joyce, vicar at Stratfield Saye between 1864 and 1878. Between 1890 and 1909 the Society of Antiquaries conducted a thorough archaeological excavation ad developed the town plan based upon the stone foundations. Later archaeologists have speculated that these early interventions may have destroyed evidence of wooden buildings. Be that as it may, the fact that Silchester was not subject to later development as other towns were means that a more complete picture of Silchester emerges than, say, St Albans. More recent investigations have been conducted by professional archaeologists under the auspices of the University of Reading.