Hadrian's Wall

Check out this amazing video by Absolute History to learn everything there is to know about Hadrian's Wall!

Key Facts

Where:

When was it made?

The construction of Hadrian's Wall began sometime around 122 AD, it would not be completed until around six years later.

History:

From 43 to 100 AD, the Romans conquered a majority of modern day England. At the end of this period, the Roman army had advanced to and established forts nearby the cities of Corbridge and Carlisle. 22 years later, Hadrian, the emperor at the time, came to Britain and declared that a great wall should be established to seperate the Picts, the tribes of modern day Scotland, from the Romans and their newly conquered lands. The wall was then built over the next 6 years. The wall contained 80 smaller forts, one every mile of the wall, 14 larger forts, several gates, and copious amounts of sentry towers. The wall would have been built by expert stonemasons and Roman soldiers who would soon be its defenders. After the dead of Hadrian, the new emperor Antoninus declared that a new wall be built further north to account for the Roman advance but this wall was later abandoned and the troops sanctioned there returned to Hadrian's wall instead.

Ethical Discussion of Hadrian's Wall

Prior to the conquering of Britain, the Romans believed the British tribes to be barbaric and uncivil. This lead them to fully conquer and organize these tribes into what they beleived the perfect way of life was: the Roman way of life. After the full conquest of modern day England, the Romans wished to push further into modern day Scotland. At this point they encountered heavy resistance from the Picts and decided to proctect the southern lands by constructing Hadrian's Wall and manning dozens of full forts along it to prevent these new 'savages' from entering the 'civilized' south. This leads to an intresting discussion about the creation of Hadrian's Wall. The moment the British tribes conformed to the Roman way of life, they suddenly turned from brutal savages to civilized citizens of the empire. Now, after discovering more tribes in the way of their conquest, they declare another group of native tribes as unruly savages and stage attacks against them. The creation of Hadrian's Wall not only keeps the 'savages' of the north out, but also prevents the conquered from fleeing from their overlords. It is a marker to the conquered tribes that they now belong to a forigen power and that the once free lands are now drawn out and defined by people who hardly know its history.