Rutupiae

Also known as Richborough, a major port and point of entry to the province in the time of the Romans. A major port now silted up, very much in the way of Brading, where we usually stay when in the Isle of Wight, with similarity carried through to nearby cliff fringed high ground. In Kent the Isle of Thanet to the north east, in the Isle of Wight Culver Down to the east. But while Kent runs to two Forelands, the island has just the one.

The most visible remains are those of the third century fort, illustrated left, one of a line of forts designed to give some protection against visting Saxons. All most impressive, with walls up to 10m high and 3m thick at the base. Mostly flints, arranged in a cement matrix in a sort of herringbone fashion, with two tile courses every metre or so and faced with dressed stone. Most of this last having been pinched by one lot or another over the years, but some can be seen bottom left. Once again impressed by the industry of the Romans (see reference 1).

Before it was a big fort, the original little fort had become what was, for the time, a large port town, complete with hotels to lodge generals who might be passing through on their way to take up their commands in the frozen north. Complete also with a substantial triumphal arch, some 30m high with 10m foundations proportional, an arch which must have been quite a sight as one get off one's boat. Sadly the arch had to go when the big fort was built, with some of its marble facings finding their way into the new walls.

It seems that quite late in the Roman period a Christian church was built in the corner of the fort, with a substantial font still standing from that time, although more a small bath than a font of the modern sort. Furthermore, whoever built the church saw fit to abuse a statue of Demeter by placing her face down under the threshold of the church. Not a very Christian way to treat one's enemies at all. But at least she, Demeter that is, survives to be exhibited in the small museum attached to the site.

We completed the visit by visiting the amphitheatre down the road, although had we not been told we would never have known that this saucer like depression in the top of a gently rounded hill was once the site of a substantial theatre.

All free at the point of entry as a result of buying a two person annual ticket the day before.

Reference 1: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/britannia.html.