Project Consultant Christine Shaw
The background to the initiation of this project is given under the Core Research title "Construction of a Roman Villa".
Reynolds (1999) has recently described some aspects of the early stages of a reconstruction of parts of a Roman Villa based on an excavation at Sparsholt, Hampshire, UK. The reconstruction concentrates on the house element from the site and a plan drawing of this is given. The early stages draw on the northern corner where considerable evidence of the hypocaust structures existed, including floor levels and an indication of the location of at least some of the wall flues. Scrutiny of the excavation photographs, using a hand lens, has suggested the existence of at least one flue other than those shown in the drawing - a salutary lesson about the difficulties of recording excavations accurately!
During construction it was found that, quite fortuitously, modern ceramic flue tiles are virtually the same shape and dimensions as their Roman equivalents - saving a lot of time and effort.
The walls have provided many valuable
lessons. Quoting from the reference below:
"Walls constructed of rough stones are described by
Vitruvius, a Roman architect of the first century who wrote a
treatise "On Architecture", as opus
insertum, as opposed to buildings constructed of
orthagonal blocks. This therefore is the work of the rough stone
mason but nonetheless is highly skilled,
Field flints come in all shapes and sizes and, apart from having to be collected from the fields after autumn ploughing, have to be graded on site before use. For the wall to be strong it has to be tied by through stones, long stones which reach from the outer surface of the wall deep into the interior. Such stones are at a premium and during the last 3 years of flint collection an assessment of their frequency against all other shapes comes out at a ratio of about 1:90. They are much sought after, prized and handled with extraordinary care!
The walls are built with facing stones inside and out, with every 3rd or 4th stone being a through stone and then the interior of the wall is carefully put in place. It is an absolute misnomer to describe such walls as being "rubble filled". Each and every stone is carefully mortared into position whether on the faces or in the interior.
The mortar, the same as in the original is a mixture of quicklime and grit at a ratio of 1:6. In reality, the mortar holds the stones apart rather than sticking them together.
The sheer quantities of material necessary are quite surprising. For example, a cubic metre of wall requires two tonnes of flint!"
The pictures below show the construction details as the different stages were reached.
The hypocaust with the opus signinum floor
laid.
Returning to the article, the first evidence of the behaviour of the hypocaust was described as follows.
In March of this year (1999) the temptation to test the hypocaust, complete with its cement floor, proved irresistible! A smoke pellet was ignited just inside the praefurnian arch of the stoke hole.
There was no fire, no preheating and even the wind was blowing in the wrong direction. Within thirty seconds smoke began to issue from the tubuli nearest the stoke hole and within 40 seconds all ten tubuli were belching smoke. The Romans seem to have got it right - while visiting heating engineers were full of gloom laden prophecies."
Work on the Roman Villa is currently being led by Rick Wilgloss and progress reports will be prepared as appropriate.
For those who like to see how technology persists, the following photograph, taken in Paris in 2001, shows a ceramic/pottery box tile flue up the side of a 5-storey apartment block.
Reference.
Dr Peter J. Reynolds, "A New Hypocaust for the Millenium", ARA, The Bulletin of the Association for Roman Archaeology, Spring/Summer 1999.
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Created 01 August 2001 - Updated 4 April 2008