A HISTORY OF HERTFORDSHIRE 



The accumulation of rubbish in the corridors over the burnt debris, on the 

 top of which a fresh floor level was made, suggests that the town toojc long 

 to recover itself and the meanness of the repairs certainly denotes poverty. 



The episode with which Verulamium is associated in most English- 

 men's minds is the alleged martyrdom of St. Alban about a.d. 303. This 

 event is treated elsewhere, but the traditions connected with it and the 

 subsequent visit of St. German in 428 suggest that this town contained an 

 element of Christianity in the 4th century. 



Verulamium continued to be inhabited for some time after the 

 withdrawal of the Roman legions from Britain." What little evidence 

 has been afforded by excavation seems to show that the final ruin of 

 both the forum and theatre" was caused by neglect and by the hands 

 of the mediaeval despoiler." Ealdred and Eadmar, Abbots of St. Albans 

 during the early part of the nth century, destroyed much of what 

 then remained above ground, for the purpose of obtaining material for 

 rebuilding their abbey and preventing the ruins from continuing a resort of 

 robbers and evil-disposed persons," one of whose barbaric hearths was 

 found on a tessellated pavement in the recent excavations. Thus Verulamium 

 became a quarry for the builders of St. Albans Abbey and the churches and 

 houses of the neighbourhood. Some of the Oolite stones at the base of the 

 tower-piers of the abbey church would fit the beds in the sleeper walls 

 of the forum, and the stone used in the Saxon baluster shafts in the 

 transepts corresponds to stone found in the same Roman building. A great 

 part of the abbey church was built of Roman bricks and some of the relics 

 of St. Albans Abbey were Roman cameos and other ornaments found at 

 Verulamium." The destruction of the remains did not cease with the 

 mediaeval despoilers. Dr. Stukeley writing in 1724 states that three years 

 before, a good part of the wall was standing, but since then it had been 

 pulled down to the foundations to mend the highways. He adds, ' I met 

 hundreds of cart loads of Roman bricks, &c., carrying for the purpose as I 

 rode through the old city though they have stone cheaper.' " The destruc- 

 tion continued through the first half of the 19th century, so that now except 

 for certain blocks of the city walls nothing remains above ground, 



Verulamium covers an area of nearly 200 acres, and its circumference 

 is almost 2 miles." Its shape is irregular but approaches an oval form, the 

 length being nearly double its width. The site, which is on the slope of a 

 hill rising about 100 ft. from the Ver, which flows on its north-east side, presents 



*3 Minimi, possibly of the 6th century, have been found on the site. 



" R. Grove Lowe, Descriptlm of the Roman Theatre ofVerulam, 1 6. 



^* Gesta Abbatum Mon. S. Albani (Rolls Ser.), i, 24-8. Geoffrey of Monmouth's account ot the defeat 

 of the Saxons at Verulamium at the end of the 5th century by the fabulous Uther Pendragon has probably 

 no foundation (Geoff, of Monm. Hist. Brit. bk. viii, cap. 23, 24). 



*^ Corroborative evidence of this was found in the excavation of the theatre, which, it was noticed, had 

 been filled up with artificial soil brought to the site to a depth of 9 ft. (R. Grove Lowe, Description of the 

 Roman Theatre of Feru/am, 16). By the time that the Saxon part of the chancel of St. Michael's Church was 

 built the Roman level must have been almost at its present depth (some 7 ft. or 8 ft. from the surface), as 

 the foundations of this part of the church are a very little below the existing ground level. 



" Wright, Essays on Arch. Subjects, i, 275 ; Cott. MS. Nero, D I. 



^8 Stukeley, Itin. Curiosum, i, 116. 



55 The area of Roman London was 330 acres, of Cirencester about 240, of Wroxeter 170, of Colchester 

 and Leicester no, and of Silchester 100 acres (Haverfield, Roman London: Journ. of Roman Studies [191 1], 

 152). Mr. J. W. Grover compares its shape and size with Pompeii {Journ. Brit. Arch. Assoc, xxvi, 50). 

 Such resemblance, however, must be quite fortuitous. 



128 



