THE ROMANS IN BRITAIN.*
Tins popular account, by a competent archaeologist, of Roman Britain was very much needed and will be welcomed by many readers. Much has been done, especially in the last twenty years, for Roman-British studies, and a number of sites have been properly excavated. But few attempts have been made, except by the late Professor Haverfield and the late Mr. John Ward, to put together the results of all this work in a readable form ; one has to search the volumes of the Victoria County History, the learned periodicals, the publications of societies and various elaborate monographs like Mr. Curie's or Mr. George Macdonald's, to find out what modern scholarship has to say about Roman Britain. Sir Bertram Windle, who is familiar with the literature and, what is still better, with many of the Roman sites and the collections in local museums as at Colchester or Chester, has now surveyed the whole field in a most interesting fashion. He begins with a short sketch of the conquest and of the occupation ; he describes the northern frontier walls, where the Roman troops were mainly concentrated, and then deals clearly with the roads and the chief cities In them. Next, he gives an attractive account of the Roman-British house and its contents, passing on to consider the religions, notably that of Mithras, which for a time flourished here before Christi- anity triumphed. He concludes with a chapter on the Roman administration and a comparison between Roman and British methods of ruling alien races. The author would be the first to admit that the survey is far from complete, and that some of the views expressed—as, for instance, in regard to the country villa—are highly controversial and open to correction as our knowledge is increased by the spade. The Roman occupation probably endured beyond the year 410— perhaps, as Professor Bury suggests, till 450 or later. But in the main Sir Bertram Windle's book is both accurate and entertaining, though the proofs should have been read with more care. The illustrations are well chosen and the outline maps of the roads and forts are most useful. The list of authorities. though not inadequate, might with advan- tage have been more precise, more especially as it is intended for the inexpert reader. We are glad to see again among the photographs the South Shields tombstone to Regina, wife of Barathres, a Palmyrene standard-bearer, whose own tomb- stone occurs elsewhere. Such memorials bring out the romantic side of the Roman rule. A strange chance brought that veteran from the Syrian desert to Northumbria, where he married a British girl and died at the age of sixty-eight.
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