Accessibility

Font Size

100% 150% 200%

Background Colour

Default Contrast
Close Reset

Falkirk, Camelon, Nailer Road

Inhumation(S) (Roman), Sword (Roman)

Site Name Falkirk, Camelon, Nailer Road

Classification Inhumation(S) (Roman), Sword (Roman)

Canmore ID 46915

Site Number NS88SE 19

NGR NS 8697 8065

Datum OSGB36 - NGR

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/46915

Ordnance Survey licence number AC0000807262. All rights reserved.
Canmore Disclaimer. © Copyright and database right 2024.

Toggle Aerial | View on large map

Digital Images

Administrative Areas

  • Council Falkirk
  • Parish Falkirk
  • Former Region Central
  • Former District Falkirk
  • Former County Stirlingshire

Archaeology Notes

NS88SE 19 8697 8065 to 8717 8055

(NS 8717 8055) Cist found 1922 (NAT)

OS 1:1250 map (1971).

See also NS88SE 117.

A Roman burial was found in April 1922 (at NS 8717 8055) in a sand-pit 270 yds SE of Camelon railway station. It consisted of a cist, 4' x 1'6" x 2', the walls of which were formed of two courses of large stones, mostly boulders, while the cover was composed of three contiguous slabs. Inside there were the fragmentary remains of an extended skeleton and part of a Roman sword.

In December 1922, a Flavian coarse pot was found together with three bronze discs, two small fragments of bronze, some corroded fragments of iron and particles of wood, in the same sand-pit (at NS 8697 8065) 90 yds SSW of the station. The sand above the deposit had been disturbed, and although no human remains were observed, there can be no doubt that the objects accompanied a burial, probably by cremation.

It is worth noting that a line joining the two burials, if prolonged westwards, would intersect the E side of the "South Camp" at Camelon (NS88SE 23), and in view of the Roman practice of burying the dead alongside main roads, it seems possible that these burials, one of which is firmly dated on the ceramic evidence to the Flavian period, give an indication of the route originally taken by the Roman trunk road from York to the Tay in the vicinity of Camelon. Such a 1st century route may well be perpetuated in part by the present Nailer Road which borders the sand-pit in which the burials were found.

M Buchanan and J G Callander 1923; RCAHMS 1963, visited 1958

Roman burials are indicative of pre-Antonine course of Roman road (NS88SE 117) (RCAHMS 1963).

RCAHMS 1963.

Finds analysed in conjunction with those of a military burial to the NW of Camelon fort (cf NS88SE 16).

D J Breeze, J Close-Brooks and J N G Ritchie 1976.

Activities

Note (1978)

Camelon, Roman Burial NS88SE 19

Probable cremation burial found in sand-digging in December 1922 at NS 869 806, with a pottery vessel of Flavian date, three sheet-bronze bosses and iron hinges.

RCAHMS 1978

(Buchanan and Callander 1923, 246-50; Breeze, Close-Brooks and Ritchie, 1976)

References

MyCanmore Image Contributions


Contribute an Image

MyCanmore Text Contributions