Huddersfield in Roman Times
By Ian A. Richmond

THE DISTRICT UNDER AGRICOLA AND HIS SUCCESSORS,
A.D. 80-117

THE FORT AT SLACK—MAIN STREETS
The main street (via principalis), along which stood the principal buildings, did not bisect the area of the fort, but lay fourteen feet too far east. This want of symmetry was regulated by the size of the buildings which had to be fitted in behind the main buildings. But the via praetoria, which led up to the headquarters building (praetorium), followed a line of bisection from the east, which was taken also by the via decumana, leading to the south-western gate of the fort. The base lines used in planning a fort were eventually taken by these four roads, and thus when the plumb-lines of the instrument with which “sights” were taken for castrametation were askew, the whole fort became slightly irregular, as at Melandra Castle, Gellygaer and the larger fort at Castleshaw. At Slack, however, the instrument seems to have worked well, for the streets are straight.

Outer Court of the Headquarters at Slack, showing two levels of paving

THE FORT AT SLACK—MAIN BUILDINGS
Unfortunately it has been impossible to excavate to the south of the praetorium, where the commandant’s house certainly awaits discovery, and where latrines may have existed. But the plan of the other main buildings at Slack is clear.

The headquarters (praetorium) is distinguished by its two courtyards, the outer, which was repaved once and provided on three sides with closed-in buildings, probably rooms for the storage of arms (armamentaria); and the inner yard which was roofed over, since its floor was rammed earth, which turns to mud in wet weather, and since many roofing tiles, among which some were marked COHIIIIBRE, were found on it. At the back of it was a range of rooms, probably five in number, and its north side was partly occupied by another small room. The use of these rooms is not wholly clear, although one at least would house the regimental records; while elsewhere and in later times similar rooms were connected with the administration of surrounding districts. The central room was a small shrine (sacellum), which usually contained various altars, erected to Jupiter or to the Divinity and Discipline of the Emperor. Here also were kept the standards of the cohort and the pay-chest, to contain which a sunken strong-room was often added in forts occupied at a later date than Slack. Thus the sacellum of the praetorium was the centre of official life in the fort.

Entrances to Galleries at Slack

The purpose of the building north of the praetorium is not clear. The place was nether well-built nor roofed with tiles, since the few tiles found at its northern end came from the granaries. Perhaps, therefore, it is thought of best as the workshop, which seems to have existed in every Roman fort for the performance of rough and ready repairs. The great fort at Newstead, near Melrose, for example, possessed a smithy, of which the stock-in-trade was found by excavators, thrown away at a time of disaster. At Slack, moreover, there does not seem to be room for such a place elsewhere.

Beyond this building lay a pair of granaries, which were stocked annually with corn, since obviously each garrison could not grow its own wheat. Calculations based on a modern scale of full rations – for the Roman army depended for food upon cereals, and found a meat diet a distinct hardship – have established that most were provided with enough food to last for nearly two years. This was very necessary, since many forts must have been liable to isolation in bad weather, and a poor harvest might upset arrangements for supply. The buildings themselves, which were simply planned, lay either in pairs, as at Chesters, or in conjunction to save roofing space, as at Slack. Their floors were raised upon pillars or upon dwarf walls to avoid dampness, and the basement thus formed was kept dry by apertures communicating with the open air. At Slack the entrance was at the back of the buildings, while in front lay an unloading platform, for the use of wagons on the main street. The corn-bins presumably lay along each side of the buildings, with a passage between them.

"Tank" beneath the east wall of the south granary at Slack,
showing grooved beam which held its sides of wood

These granaries, however, were not erected when the fort was first built. Under their eastern wall was found an Agricolan construction. It is a tank-like rectangular pit, seventeen by ten feet in size, which perhaps served originally as a cellar. At Newstead, near Melrose, the four rectangular pits were each connected somehow with domestic buildings of early date. Yet close parallels are not easy to find : at Templebrough, near Rotherham, a rectangular storage-pit existed in the commandant’s house; at Zugmantel, in the Taunus mountainland of Germany, pits occur in abundance in a Roman frontier fort, in connection with half-underground dwelling houses of typically German type. But it is hard to see what purpose a “dug-out” could have had at Slack, within the ramparts of a regularly planned Roman fort. Therefore it seems best to leave the question open. Whatever the purpose of the building, it as used for some time before the granaries were built, and a good deal of rubbish accumulated upon its floor. The significance of this is discussed later.

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