187 



The chief attacks on the Province Britannia Prima (district 

 south of a line from Gloucester to the mouth of the Thames) 

 would therefore be from the South Welsh only; and would 

 accordingly be made in the direction of the first points at ivhich 

 they could readily get across the Severn. This the Romans guarded 

 against by the camps along the Cotteswold Hills, and still more 

 by the triple rampart afforded by the strong walled cities of 

 Caerleon, Caerwent, and Gloucester, against which the waves of 

 a Silurian uavasion would be compelled to break in succession 

 before they could overflow Britannia Prima. Any attempt of the 

 Silures to get round into the Province by way of central Wales, 

 would be checked by the forces at Magna (near Hereford) and 

 by troops of the twentieth legion sent from Chester and its 

 subordinate stations to support them. 



The extraordinary strength of the barrier thus opposed to the 

 Silures, by massing the Roman forces on the Severn, is shewn 

 in the accompanying map (No. Y,) in which the larger squares 

 represent cities capable of affording shelter to an entire Legion; 

 and the smaller ones stations sufficient to receive from a fourth 

 to a half as many men. The outline squares represent some of 

 the larger camps on the Cotteswold Hills, and those of Bloody 

 Acre, and of Oldbury on Severn. 



A great number of smaller intermediate camps are omitted. 



When Hadrian arrived in Britain (a.d. 120) he either found 

 this plan of defence on the Severn, or possibly, perfected it. 

 Whether he built any part of the wall of Gloucester I 

 cannot tell ; but putting together the facts I have mentioned, 

 as to the correspondence both in the style and material of the 

 masonry, and in the measurements of the castles, and other 

 details of our wall, and that which Hadrian is hnown to have 

 built from the Tyne to the Solway, I think there can be no room 

 for doubt that the same men he employed — i.e. the Engineers op 

 THE Second Augustan Legion — were also the builders of the 

 work I have been examining. 



Besides the identity of masonry, we have the broad fact that 

 the second legion was the one which conquered most of the 

 southern portion of Britain, and certainly the Cotteswolds ; as 



