A walk for all ages

This wall ought to be unchanging. It’s been there nearly two thousand years and when you first look at it, whether as a few blocks in a hoary old field boundary with a splendidly gnarled and ancient tree reaching crazily for the sky above it, or as the still-impressive earthworks and ditches that flanked it on its march across the entire country, and above all staring out from behind it, over the plummeting brow of the Whin Sill.

Around 1900 years ago, Hadrian came to Britain and commissioned the Wall’s construction.

In what’s emerging as a real golden age for the archaeology: new digs and surveys are prising ever more details from earths grip at sites old and new. make this a great time to visit. Famed Vindolanda is giving up outstanding details of a rich and once-unexpected post-Roman life strewn with Dark Age churches, as well as the amazing everyday items that make it one of the world’s greatest sites – the Roman hairnets, shopping bags, toilet seats, letters, and hairbrushes.

Birdoswald’s new excavations, begun only last year, are already bringing great Roman buildings to light. If you’re a Roman archaeologist, you’re already salivating at the prospect of the new excavations at Carvoran, and the potential for perfect preservation they offer. Everywhere seems to be alive with new things emerging. The story of the sites, the communities and the ancient lives of Hadrian’s Wall is getting richer by the day, and there’s no better time to see future history books being written.

History is marked wherever you look – from Roman forts and towns, through ethereal mediaeval abbeys and the rugged castles bearing witness the violent history of the land after the empire was gone. And all of it rests on the folds and crags of one of the most wildly beautiful parts of England.

For tours of Hadrian’s Wall...Find out more here.

(Pic: courtesy of Peter Sommers)

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