The Billingsgate Roman Bathhouse was discovered in 1848, and is now open to the public every Saturday from April to November on pre-booked tours.
Operating as usual
Archaeological archives are full of objects. Here’s one of our favourites – a brooch that was dropped on the ruins of our site in around AD 450 #Archive30
Archaeological archives are full of objects. Here’s one of our favourites – a brooch that was dropped on the ruins of our site in around AD 450 #Archive30
Here’s a beautiful fragment of a drinking vessel in the Museum of London Archaeology archive from our site #Archive30
An unusual item in our archive at the Museum of London Archaeology Archive is a wooden stopper from a bottle. Wooden items don't often get preserved except on wet sites like ours, which is very close to river level. #Archive30
An unusual item in our archive at the Museum of London Archaeology Archive is a wooden stopper from a bottle. Wooden items don't often get preserved except on wet sites like ours, which is very close to river level. #Archive30
Our archive is split partially in our building and partially in the Museum of London Archaeology archive.
On the last day of #WomensHistoryMonth watch our video with Dr Rebecca Redfern about the archaeological evidence for women and their lives in London
CW: discussion of evidence for domestic violence
https://www.ourcitytogether.london/do/women-in-roman-london
Explore the evidence of women's lives in Roman London with Billingsgate Bathhouse and Museum of London.
Before the end of #WomensHistoryMonth read an article by one of our great volunteers about the evidence for women’s lives in the Roman world. https://www.ourcitytogether.london/inspire/the-role-of-women-in-the-ancient-roman-world
Actresses, doctors, calligraphers and wives. Roman women took on many roles in an ancient society whilst still being deemed as the lesser s*x.
This spring the bath is getting a clean. Watch our video with Inspector of Ancient Monuments Jane Sidell about this process. What are you spring-cleaning? https://www.ourcitytogether.london/do/cleaning-the-bath-conservation
Learn about conservation efforts that prevent environmental damage at Billingsgate Bathhouse, an 1800-yr-old Roman archaeological site near the River Thames.
Clocks go forward this weekend. For the inhabitants of Londinium, the sun would instead continue to rise earlier and earlier. Should we still keep daylight saving?
The Roman spring festival of Minerva, Quinquatria, started on 19th March and may have involved plays, feasting and gladiator displays. How do you celebrate the spring?
This article was written by one of our wonderful volunteers about the evidence for women's lives in the Roman world, including Roman London. https://www.ourcitytogether.london/inspire/the-role-of-women-in-the-ancient-roman-world
Actresses, doctors, calligraphers and wives. Roman women took on many roles in an ancient society whilst still being deemed as the lesser s*x.
In case you missed it first time round, watch our recorded talk with Dr Rebecca Redfern of the Museum of London about the evidence for women’s lives in Roman London.
Content warning: short discussion of evidence for domestic violence.
https://www.ourcitytogether.london/do/women-in-roman-london
Explore the evidence of women's lives in Roman London with Billingsgate Bathhouse and Museum of London.
Which book are you looking forward to reading? Rebecca Stott’s book set in our house after the end of the Roman occupation in AD 500 is published next year and we can't wait to read it! Find out more about it here. https://www.ourcitytogether.london/do/the-work-of-giants-rebecca-stott
Novelist and historian Rebecca Stott, winner of the Costa Prize for Biography 2017 for her memoir In the Days of Rain, talks about writing her latest novel set
Our City Together | Women in Roman London
Explore the evidence of women's lives in Roman London with Billingsgate Bathhouse and Museum of London.
Our talk with Dr Rebecca Redfern of the Museum of London for International Women's Day about the evidence for women’s lives in Roman London will premiere in five minutes. Watch on the link below.
https://www.ourcitytogether.london/do/women-in-roman-london
Explore the evidence of women's lives in Roman London with Billingsgate Bathhouse and Museum of London.
Watch our talk with Dr Rebecca Redfern of the Museum of London about the evidence for women’s lives in Roman London for #IWD2021. It'll premiere at 2.00pm on Monday 8th March. https://www.ourcitytogether.london/do/women-in-roman-london
Explore the evidence of women's lives in Roman London with Billingsgate Bathhouse and Museum of London.
It’s #WorldBookDay! What’s your favourite book set in the Roman world?
Book on to our British Science Week free family online event this Saturday with The Salters' Company and Tower Bridge https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/online-family-workshop-surprising-science-tickets-140822226069
Book onto our Surprising Science free online family event on Saturday 6th March for British Science Week with Tower Bridge and the Salters' Company. https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/online-family-workshop-surprising-science-tickets-140822226069
A series of heroes saved our site from deterioration, including the London Inspector of Ancient Monuments, Dr Jane Sidell, who advises us still on conservation at the site. Hear about the job she does in the video. Who are your heritage heroes? https://www.ourcitytogether.london/do/cleaning-the-bath-conservation
Learn about conservation efforts that prevent environmental damage at Billingsgate Bathhouse, an 1800-yr-old Roman archaeological site near the River Thames.
A series of heroes saved our site from destruction and deterioration, including the volunteers of the City of London Excavation Group under Peter Marsden in 1967-70 and a team from the Department of Urban Archaeology, later Museum of London Archaeology, under Peter Rowsome in 1987-90. There are links to their articles about the site in the London Archaeologist in the comments. Who are your heritage heroes?
A series of heroes saved our site from destruction and deterioration, including the volunteers of the City of London Excavation Group under Peter Marsden in 1967-70 and a team from the Department of Urban Archaeology, later Museum of London Archaeology, under Peter Rowsome in 1987-90. There are links to their articles about the site in the London Archaeologist in the comments. Who are your heritage heroes?
A series of heroes saved our site from destruction, including Mr Bunning the City architect in 1848 when the bathhouse was first discovered. Who are your heritage heroes?
A series of heroes saved our site from destruction, including Mr Bunning the City architect in 1848 when the bathhouse was first discovered. Who are your heritage heroes?
Looking for something fun to do in #halfterm? Book on to our free Building Londinium Day on Thursday with Guildhall Art Gallery and London’s Roman Amphitheatre and the Salters' Company https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/building-londinium-tickets-139836104553
Calling all time explorers and budding architects! Discover Roman London and help bring it to life through craft and design activities.
Hearts being made from building blocks on a background of a Roman tesselated floor at Billingsgate Roman House and Baths
Looking for something fun to do in #halfterm? Book on to our free Building Londinium Day with London's Roman Amphitheatre and the Salter's Company https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/building-londinium-tickets-139836104553
Calling all time explorers and budding architects! Discover Roman London and help bring it to life through craft and design activities.
It was on this day in 1848 that the article about the discovery of our site appeared in the Illustrated London news alongside this painting of the site.
It was on this day in 1848 that the article about the discovery of our site appeared in the Illustrated London news alongside this painting of the site.
Read about the love the emperor Hadrian had for Antinous https://www.ourcitytogether.london/inspire/hadrian-and-antinous
Homos*xuality was not uncommon for the Romans and Emperor Hadrian made his affections known for his favourite lover Antinous after his premature death.
Make a Roman gatehouse using this pattern from our friends at
Guildhall Art Gallery and London's Roman Amphitheatre or make your own Roman building for our Building Londinium challenge.https://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/assets/Things-to-do/make-your-own-roman-gateway.pdf
Make your own Anglo-Saxon brooch based on the one found at our site using this video to guide you. https://youtu.be/zjXbaY7U5zE
Beneath the curious cobbled pathways of the Square Mile lies a rich Roman history surviving 2,000 years of building, fires and bombings.Lower Thames Street i...
Our City Together | Archaeological illustrator Judith Dobie
The team at Billingsgate Bathhouse talk to archaeological illustrator Judith Dobie about her works in reconstructing the Baths.
We still want to see your models of Roman buildings – keep sending them in! We're "Building Londinium"!
https://www.ourcitytogether.london/do/building-londinium-gallery
Welcome to our gallery of impressive creations from the Building Londinium Challenge!
We talked to @RebeccaStott64 last year about her novel (out next year), which is partially based at our site in the 5th/6th century. Can’t wait to read this story!
https://www.ourcitytogether.london/do/the-work-of-giants-rebecca-stott
Novelist and historian Rebecca Stott, winner of the Costa Prize for Biography 2017 for her memoir In the Days of Rain, talks about writing her latest novel set
Cats and dogs left pawprints on these tiles as they were drying before being fired. What naughty thing has your cat or dog got up to?
There doesn’t seem to be any evidence for figurative mosaics at our site (though we do need to get into the archive to confirm this), only red tessellated floors, like this one in the frigidarium.
We have recently had a question about the reconstruction of the bathhouse from the Welwyn Archaeological Society - whether the barrel vault over the bathhouse was external as shown in our reconstruction drawing or internal under a pitched roof. The idea of the external barrel vault may have been propagated from early reconstruction images based on surviving bathhouses at Leptis Magna in Libya. But would the barrel vault have needed a pitched roof in rainy Britannia?
We need to go back to the archive at the Museum of London, but there is some tantalising written evidence sent to us from colleagues there that both voussoir (vaulting) tiles and tegulae and imbrices (pitching tiles) were found on the frigidarium floor. So... back to the drawing board?
Here’s a gift from us to teachers. A new Amazing Artefacts quiz about artefacts from our site that you could run on a video call or on the whiteboard when you’re back in the classroom.
https://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/assets/Things-to-do/amazing-artefacts-quiz-final.pdf
101 Lower Thames Street
London
EC3R 6DL
Nearest tube stations are Tower Hill and Monument.
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