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Four strange places to see London's Roman Wall

diamondgeezer.blogspot.com

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Re: Four strange places to see London's Roman Wall

#31

Post by asdff »

pmontra wrote: post #29
tom_alexander wrote: post #5

> ground level then was a few metres lower than now What?! That's huge. What happened?

If you leave ground alone all sort of things grow on it or lay on it. Dirt, mud, leaves etc. Soil grows at about 1 mm per year. 1 meter in 1000 years. Historically cities were hit by floods and wars and new buildings were built on top of the foundations of old ones. We had an article about that church in Rome built over another roman church built over another roman church, etc. down to an old temple on a spring, or s…

It might even happen faster than that. If I don't sweep my cement patio for about a month, the decaying leaves from the bushes are enough to make about an 1/8th inch of fresh brown soil under the leaf piles.

Re: Four strange places to see London's Roman Wall

#32

Post by mock-possum »

emmelaich wrote: post #20
defrost wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article: London's original wall was 2 miles long, 6 metres high and almost 3 metres thick at its base with a link to a graphic map and guide: https://colat.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/London-Wall-... that states it ran from the Tower of London to the Museum in the Barbican.

There is a London Wall Walk, starting at the Tower of London. Text copied from the plaques at the postern: (thanks Google Lens) > The London Wall Walk follows the original line of the City Wall for much of its length, from the royal fortress of the Tower of London to the Museum of London, situated in the modern high-rise development of the Barbican. Between these two landmarks the Wall Walk passes surviving pieces of…

> The Walk is 134 miles (2.8km) long and … Completion of the Walk will take between one and two hours

Sorry, this is suggesting I can walk over a hundred miles in 1-2 hours???

Re: Four strange places to see London's Roman Wall

#33

Post by willvarfar »

ipnon wrote: post #4

Not bad engineering to make it through a handful of civil wars, a Blitz, and a couple thousand V-1 rockets mostly intact. You have to wonder how long all the steel and concrete that's been laid around the Thames from our civilization will last.

Most of the wall has been plundered for stone and to make way for new development over the past millennium. Its not conflict that has destroyed 2 miles of a 6m high 3m thick wall, it's peace :)

Re: Four strange places to see London's Roman Wall

#34

Post by globular-toast »

turbonaut wrote: post #30
EFreethought wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a hard time remembering that distinction when I first read about the "City of London". Here is the US, the "city of Chicago" is the same as "Chicago".

For further confusion, ‘London’ does not exist at all as a well defined entity and the UK has no de jure capital.

For even further confusion "London" actually contains two cities: London and Westminster. London was a walled city but Westminster was not. So "London" was we know it today is more like Westminster than London.

Re: Four strange places to see London's Roman Wall

#35

Post by Scarblac »

turbonaut wrote: post #30
EFreethought wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a hard time remembering that distinction when I first read about the "City of London". Here is the US, the "city of Chicago" is the same as "Chicago".

For further confusion, ‘London’ does not exist at all as a well defined entity and the UK has no de jure capital.

What is the exact job of the mayor of London then?

Re: Four strange places to see London's Roman Wall

#36

Post by defrost »

Scarblac wrote: post #35
turbonaut wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For further confusion, ‘London’ does not exist at all as a well defined entity and the UK has no de jure capital.

What is the exact job of the mayor of London then?

Buying and selling cats for profit, since 1423.

For the people that don't know the City of London history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Whittington_and_His_Cat

Re: Four strange places to see London's Roman Wall

#37

Post by urban_winter »

If you're in the vicinity of the road called London Wall (where the car park referenced in the article is) then it's only a short walk to London's Roman amphitheatre [1]. It doesn't seem to be very well known but is quite impressive. It's one of very many bits of Roman history entombed in basements of London buildings.

The Merrill Lynch Financial Centre also has a big chunk of Roman stuff in the basement - but there's no public access and no access to the walkway around the ruins even if you're an employee.

[1] https://www.thecityofldn.com/directory/londons-roman-amphith...

Re: Four strange places to see London's Roman Wall

#39

Post by pmontra »

asdff wrote: post #31
pmontra wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you leave ground alone all sort of things grow on it or lay on it. Dirt, mud, leaves etc. Soil grows at about 1 mm per year. 1 meter in 1000 years. Historically cities were hit by floods and wars and new buildings were built on top of the foundations of old ones. We had an article about that church in Rome built over another roman church built over another roman church, etc. down to an old temple on a spring, or s…

It might even happen faster than that. If I don't sweep my cement patio for about a month, the decaying leaves from the bushes are enough to make about an 1/8th inch of fresh brown soil under the leaf piles.

Exactly. This is hard to understand when living in a flat in a modern city but it's immediately clear in any other case.

My figure of 1 mm is about the compacted result of decaying and layering. It may vary a lot according to the configuration of the ground.

Re: Four strange places to see London's Roman Wall

#40

Post by kergonath »

trenchpilgrim wrote: post #11

Note this is about the City of London, an entity much smaller and older than the modern city known as London. It's land area is about 3 km^2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London Title should probably read "the City of London" rather than "London".

> Note this is about the City of London

Not really. It’s about the Roman wall. It happens to be both in Greater London and around the City.

> Title should probably read "the City of London" rather than "London".

There’s only one Roman city wall in London, it is not ambiguous.

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