Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

American history and black history cannot be separated.

If you can’t control your emotions, someone else will.

The fundamental promise of conservatism all over the world is a return to an idealized past that never existed.

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

I am pretty sure these ‘journalists’ were not always such a bootlicking sycophants.

Someone should tell Republicans that violence is the last refuge of the incompetent, or possibly the first.

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”

The revolution will be supervised.

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

Museums are not America’s attic for its racist shit.

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

Fight for a just cause, love your fellow man, live a good life.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

“But what about the lurkers?”

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

You are here: Home / Photo Blogging / On The Road / Hiking Hadrian’s Wall / On The Road – Athenaze and Ariobarzanes – Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III

On The Road – Athenaze and Ariobarzanes – Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III

by | 13 Comments

This post is in: , ,

On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.

From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.

Submit Your Photos

Athenaze and Ariobarzanes

This post continues our travelogue of two through-hikes we made along Hadrian’s Wall. If you haven’t done so already (and if you have the time), we recommend that you read Part 1 for some background and context—but even if you don’t, we hope that you’ll enjoy the following pictures!

Before we get into today’s pictures, we want to acknowledge the amazing people at two organizations. First, the folks at English Heritage, who have done a lot of work since the 1980s to preserve, interpret, and display important sites along and around Hadrian’s Wall. In particular, they painstakingly disassembled many of the in-situ remains of the Wall that still survive and reconstructed them, stone-by-stone, using modern bonding agents. Thanks to their efforts, those remains will hopefully survive intact for centuries yet to come. Second, the people at Natural England, the organization that maintains England’s network of long-distance National Trails, including Hadrian’s Wall Path. Without their hard work, neither of these trips would have been possible.

On The Road - Athenaze and Ariobarzanes - Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III 8
The countryside between Thirwall Castle and Walltown Quarry (mile 35.5)
We really like this picture, for two reasons. First, it shows just how striking the British countryside can be in fine weather. We took this picture on our first trip in 2010, in late August; it shows the view to the west from a point near Walltown Quarry. Second, this picture offers us an opportunity to talk a little bit about the trail itself. Like a lot of English footpaths, Hadrian’s Wall Path consists mostly of a public right-of-way that cuts across privately-owned land (although there are also sections that cross Northumberland National Park). In practice, this means that hikers constantly need to cross field walls and fences that separate one piece of property from another. Stiles like this one exist to help hikers clamber over field walls without knocking anything over; we went up and down hundreds of these during each of our treks. The white acorn blaze you can see on the stile is the emblem used by Natural England to mark the seventeen different National Trails that fall under its jurisdiction.
On The Road - Athenaze and Ariobarzanes - Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III 7
An Encounter on Mucklebank Crags (mile 37)
Much of the landscape through which the path passes is pastureland. This means that hikers constantly encounter herds of cattle. Most cows along the path are used to hikers and are usually pretty relaxed about such encounters, like the ones we ran into here on the Mucklebank Crags. If calves are present, however, all bets are off, and cows can become aggressive (and terrifying!). At one point, we were forced off the path and into some trees by a cow and her calf that were determined to drink from a water hole we had just crossed; the cow was not in the mood for any nonsense. It could have been a *lot* worse: angry cattle typically kill six or seven ramblers a year in the UK.
On The Road - Athenaze and Ariobarzanes - Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part I of III 10
An Encounter near Melkridge Common (mile 41)
Hikers on the path encounter flocks of sheep even more frequently than they encounter herds of cattle. Happily, sheep are a lot less frightening than cows—if anything, they’re inclined to run away if you round a corner and blunder into them (as we did here).
On The Road - Athenaze and Ariobarzanes - Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III 6
Crag Lough, from the top of Steel Rigg (mile 42)
At roughly the 35-mile mark, the Wall (and the path) begin to climb a big basaltic rock shelf called the Great Whin Sill. This means that hikers have the pleasure of walking a 12-15 mile stretch featuring a series of ascents and descents as the path negotiates a number of steep, precipitous hills (called crags or riggs). Pictured here is the view eastward from Steel Rigg, at roughly the 42-mile mark. In the distance, Crag Lough (mile 43) lies beneath the next major set of hills, Highshield Crags; if you look carefully, you can see the line of the Wall as it makes its way up their shoulder.
On The Road - Athenaze and Ariobarzanes - Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III 5
Castle Nick (mile 43)
The oft-photographed castle Nick lies in a little saddle below Peel Crags, a series of minor bumps between Steel Rigg and Highshield Crags. In our first series, we noted that the Wall was punctuated by a series of so-called “milecastles” (because there was one roughly every Roman mile) and observation towers. Formally known as Milecastle #39 (as measured from the Wall’s terminus at Wallsend), Castle Nick gives viewers an excellent impression of the layout of these structures. Like the other milecastles, it exists to control a crossing point at the wall: the northern gate in the wall itself and the milecastle’s southern gate are both clearly visible. Traces of the milecastle’s internal structure can also be seen. It would have held several barracks and service buildings—enough to serve a couple of small detachments of auxiliary non-citizen soldiers detailed from one of the fifteen larger forts along the wall.
On The Road - Athenaze and Ariobarzanes - Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III 4
Sycamore Gap (mile 43.5)

Named after ancient tree that dominates this shot, Sycamore Gap is (or rather, was—see below) the most iconic spot along the wall. Pictures of the gap and its tree have graced countless postcards, pamphlets, and books. It has also appeared in at least one major movie, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, in a scene in which Kevin Costner and Morgan Freeman climb the wall beside it. (We hate that scene. This is a rare stretch of Wall that still has original Roman masonry with no reconstruction. We have each spent lots of time yelling at students not to climb on things when we visit archaeological sites, and seeing other people do exactly that drives us absolutely fuc—but we digress; apologies for the interruption.)

Sadly, the sycamore tree you see here (which had been on that spot for at least 300 years) stands no more. On September 28, 2023, one or more vandals took a chainsaw to it and cut it down. At the moment we are writing this (early October, 2023), police have arrested two suspects, both of whom have been released on bail. Forensics experts are working hard to see if they can match traces of lubricating oil left behind on the stump by the chainsaw used to fell the tree to oil sampled from a chainsaw found in the possession of one of the suspects.

On The Road - Athenaze and Ariobarzanes - Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III 3
A Roman Re-Enactment at Housesteads (mile 45)

The major Roman fort at Housesteads (probably Vercovicium for the Romans) sits on the wall just before the path reaches the eastern end of the Great Whin Sill. It’s a popular stop for day-trippers, since there are a lot of ruins there and since it gives easy access to some scenic stretches of the trail along the crags. When we straggled into the fort in 2010, footsore and wind-burnt after dealing with 50mph winds, we discovered that the site was hosting its annual “Roman Days”, which feature re-enactments by members of the Ermine Street Guard, the UK’s premier Roman re-enactment group. They do a bunch of interesting demonstrations of period handicrafts, cooking, camp life, and combat. At one point, for instance, they fired off some nerf-like missiles from a replica of a Roman ballista, and then sent all the kids who had gathered to watch off to hunt for the spent missiles in the long grass.

This picture captures a small group of Guard members decked out in full military kit. Most are dressed as members of a citizen legion—the six legionaries with their bright red scuta (shields) and pila (javelins), as well as the two signifers (standard-bearers) with their standards and wolf-skin helmet coverings. The one on the far right is dressed as the member of a non-citizen auxiliary unit. Although soldiers belonging to citizen legions built the wall, the garrisons stationed at forts like Housesteads consisted of non-citizen auxiliary troops drafted by the Romans from various provinces of the empire; in the 130s, for instance, Housesteads was garrisoned by about 1000 Tungrian soldiers from what is now Belgium. Auxiliary soldiers generally signed up for 25-year tours of duty, and if they survived until the end, they could normally expect to receive Roman citizenship.

On The Road - Athenaze and Ariobarzanes - Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III 2
Ruined Roman Latrines at Housesteads (mile 45)
No set of pictures of Roman ruins would be complete without a shot of one of the most characteristic aspects of permanent Roman bases—the communal latrines! The wooden seats of ease have long disappeared, but you can still clearly see the deep latrine ditches (which would have been flushed constantly by running water), some fragments of the broad flagstones on which soldiers would have rested their feet while sitting down, and the conduit that circulated fresh water at their feet so that they could wet the communal sponges they used to clean themselves when they finished their business. Yay for preventing dysentery!
On The Road - Athenaze and Ariobarzanes - Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III 1
Vindolanda (off-trail, near mile 45)
Not too far from Housesteads are the remains of another Roman fort, Vindolanda, which sits a couple of miles south of the Wall itself. It predates the Wall by some 30-40 years, a holdover of an earlier frontier system in which the region’s main feature was a military road (now called the Stanegate) connecting several forts as it made its way from east to west. Vindolanda remained an important settlement, and an environmental oddity has made it famous: the soil in the region is extremely anaerobic, which means that lots of period artifacts of wood, leather etc. survived here (and are on display in the local museum or in London). It’s a phenomenal site, and the ongoing archaeological excavations here look for volunteer workers every summer.
On The Road - Athenaze and Ariobarzanes - Hiking Hadrian’s Wall—Part II of III
Writing tablets in the British Museum (London, way off-trail)
Vindolanda’s wooden writing tablets are definitely the site’s most important surviving artifacts. Most are very thin pieces of local wood, folded in half, on which residents of the site wrote letters in ink. As a group, they have lots to tell us about life on the frontier. This one is a letter from Claudia Severa (written partly in her hand and partly in someone else’s, probably her slave’s) inviting her friend Sulpicia Lepidina to a birthday celebration! Most of these tablets now reside in London at the British Museum.

Reader Interactions

13Comments

  1. 1.

    Chris T.

    … it shows just how striking the British countryside can be in fine weather

    So, just a couple of days a year? 😀

  3. 3.

    TedR

    Really enjoying these. Thank-you for writing them up!

    Re. Stanegate: that name’s a remnant of Viking settlement in northern England. The Norse ‘gata’ means ‘street’. Meanwhile, the Norse ‘barra’ (beam) turned into ‘bar’, meaning a city gate, so the city of York is known as the place where the streets are gates, the gates are bars and the bars are pubs.

  4. 4.

    AM in NC

    Loving all that I am learning in your series. And the photos, of course!   Seeing the sycamore here was a gut punch.

  5. 5.

    Marleedog

    What a great walking history tour!

    The tree that the English call sycamore is really a maple. Different species than the splotched bark large leaf American sycamore, except the leaves are somewhat similar.

    I want to go to England for my summer vacation to be a volunteer archeologist and coax out my inner Indiana Jones.

  7. 7.

    Betsy

    I remember going over a stile on my first walk in the English countryside.  I had wanted  to climb over a stile since I was a little bookish girl!

  8. 8.

    kalakal

    Really enjoying this series, thanks very much! Makes me feel nostalgic 😀

    @TedR: A real give away in the UK as to where the vikings hung around is place names ending in -by.  Just means place or village/town/city eg Grimsby, Whitby, Formby etc. Still means that in modern Scandanavian languages

  9. 9.

    StringOnAStick

    Thanks for the photos and discussion.  Truly, who wants “killed by an angry cow” in their obituary.

    The town name origin discussion is interesting too.  I read a book about salt once but I can’t remember what the suffix is that indicates a salt mining town; I’ll get someone here knows.

Comments are closed.