Hadrian Wall - Roman-period Names

Roman-period Names

The only ancient source for its provenance is the Augustan History. No sources survive to confirm what the wall was called in antiquity, and no historical literary source gives it a name. However, the discovery of a small enamelled bronze Roman cup in Staffordshire in 2003 has provided a clue. The cup is inscribed with a series of names of Roman forts along the western sector of the wall, together with a personal name and the phrase .

Bowness is followed by Drumburgh-by-Sands until now known only as from the late Roman document, the Notitia Dignitatum. Next comes Stanwix, then Castlesteads .

is the ablative form of the Latin word rigor. This can mean several things, but one of its less-known meanings is ‘straight line’, ‘course’ or ‘direction’. This sense was used by Roman surveyors and appears on several inscriptions to indicate a line between places. So the meaning could be 'according to the course'.

There is no known word as vali, but vallum was the Latin word for an earthen wall, rampart, or fortification; today vallum is applied to the ditch and berm dug by the Roman army just south of the wall. The genitive form of vallum is valli, so one of the most likely meanings is, ‘of the vallum’. Omitting one of a pair of double consonants is common on Roman inscriptions; moreover, an error in the transcription of a written note could be the reason: another similar bronze vessel, known as the Rudge Cup (found in Wiltshire in the 18th century) has VN missing from the name, for example, although the letters appear on the Staffordshire Moorlands cup. The Rudge Cup only bears fort names.

The name was Hadrian's nomen, his main family name, the gens Aelia. The Roman bridge at Newcastle upon Tyne was called Pons Aelius.

can be translated as ‘ of Draco’. It was normal for Roman manufacturers to give their names in the genitive (‘of’), and ‘by the hand’ would be understood. The form is common, for example, on Samian ware.

The translation, therefore, could be:

"Mais, Coggabata, Uxelodunum, Camboglanna, according to the line of the Aelian wall. of Draco." Another possibility is that the individual's name was Aelius Draco, which would only leave us with an unspecified vallum, 'wall'.