The Port of Roman London

Goods could travel long distances in Roman times and were often transhipped – transferred from one means of transport to another – several times before reaching their destination. None of the remains of Roman vessels discovered in modern times in Britain and Northern Europe are of a Mediterranean style of construction. The implication is that ships from southern Europe rarely visited Londinium. Most goods to and from other parts of the empire would have travelled by river and land rather than directly by sea, typically along the rivers Rhine, Rhône and Sôane, Loire, and Garonne, and their tributaries. Yet the dangerous crossing of the English Channel or North Sea still had to be made and most probably confined to the summer months.

The remains of three Roman-era ships were discovered in the Thames in London during the 20^th century. The first was found in 1910 during the construction of the new County Hall, perhaps 20 metres long by 5 metres wide. Built in the 3^rd century, it was round-bottomed and must therefore have moored in mid-stream, with its cargoes ferried back to the riverside by flat-bottomed lighters such as the second example. That was found at Bermondsey in 1958 and was 16 metres long and 4 metres wide. The third vessel, discovered at Blackfriars in 1962, 16 metres long by 6 metres in width, was also flat-bottomed but worked on both rivers and in salt-water around the coast, perhaps similar to later Thames sailing barges. It had sunk when carrying 26 tons of Kentish ragstone from the Medway and is dated from around 150AD. Built in the Romano-Celtic style, rather than that of the Mediterranean, it was probably typical of the type of small ships visiting Londinium. It possibly had a single mast, rigged with a square sail, and would have been slow and difficult to manoeuvre without a favourable wind.

There have been some discoveries of Roman remains including a cemetery to the east of London around Beckton where the River Roding flows into the Thames. Roads appear to have linked the area with Londinium to the east. It is unlikely to have been a farming community and its location on the shore of the wide river reach at the seaward side of the Isle of Dogs bend is more likely to have been connected with shipping, perhaps ship-building and repair and the laying up of large vessels during the unfavourable winter months.

It seems that London’s importance as a Roman port was mostly during the late 1^st and early 2^nd centuries. Initially most of the goods being imported were to supply the military campaign and for the first wave of Roman occupiers. Commerce expanded rapidly in the second half of the 1^st century. Raw materials were needed as towns and settlements were built or rebuilt. More domestic luxury goods were required from other provinces as new populations settled. By the middle of the 2^nd century the military campaigns had ended, and many previously imported items were being manufactured locally.

The people of Londinium needed to be fed. Meat could be brought to the town on the hoof along the roads but the Roman diet was high in grain-based foods. Londinium was not surrounded by cornlands and grain too bulky to carry overland from any great distance. However, a little further afield, further up the Thames Valley, there was arable land suitable for the growing of rye, oats, and particularly wheat and barley. It could be brought down the Thames from the countryside to the west, or down the River Lea from the north. Other supplies came from Wiltshire and Hampshire around the coast.

For wealthier people, and for light, valuable goods, it was normally quicker and less dangerous to cross the Channel from Gaul and arrive at Richborough, which in Roman times was a more important harbour than Dover, and then continue by road. For passengers without the financial means who needed to travel, it was cheaper to take water transport to and from Londinium than pay the high cost of a coach fare. Despite the good road network created by the Romans, overland transport of heavy, bulky goods such as corn and metal was costly, particularly in comparison to their value, so it was often better to use shipping all the way to Londinium where possible. There were also a number of coastal harbours serving towns such as Eboracum (York) and Clausentum (Southampton) from which goods were transported by coastal ships.

Some manufactured goods arriving at Londinium came from distant parts of the empire, particularly from northern Gaul, the Rhine ports, and Bordeaux but there were also some from Spain and Mediterranean harbours. Certainly, there have been sculptures, bronzes, ceramics, pottery and crockery, glassware, household goods, silk, and foodstuffs unearthed in London that are of Italian, Spanish or Mediterranean origin, and even from beyond the empire. Wine was imported from southern Gaul, the Rhine and Moselle areas and possibly as far as Italy and Greece. Many buildings were partly built of Kentish ragstone that was brought up the river from the River Medway. London did not possess stone or marble for building so that had to be brought by ship from elsewhere, probably from around the coast. Marble of varying colours that was used in mosaics came from around the Mediterranean. Salt was brought from Essex. Goods exported from Britain, some of which would have passed through Londinium, included wool and cloth, metals, including lead and silver, hunting dogs, bears, and slaves from Scotland and Ireland. In the late-3^rd and early-4^th centuries pottery manufactured in Oxfordshire was being shipped to the Continent.