Speaking Through the Centuries:
The Vindolanda Writing Tablets

Andrew Keats

           Over the heather the wet wind blows,
           I’ve lice in my tunic and a cold in my nose.

           The rain comes pattering out of the sky,
           I’m a Wall soldier, and I don’t know why.

           The mist creeps over the hard grey stone,
           My girl’s in Tungria; I sleep alone.

           When I’m a veteran with only one eye
           I shall do nothing but look at the sky.
                         W.H. Auden, Roman Wall Blues

In the uppermost reaches of Northern Britain, on the border with Scot­land between Luguvalium (Carlisle) and Coria (Corbridge), lay the fron­tier of the empire. Although Agricola had led his victorious armies 200 miles further into Scotland proper in the mid-80s A.D., it was the road linking these two towns, the Stanegate, that formed the boundary between Roman Britain and the wild expanses to the north. During this Agricolan period of conquests and the subsequent reversion to the Stane­gate frontier, many timber forts were constructed along the Stanegate (Birley, 1977: 12). One of these forts was named Vindolanda, and it was at this site that in March 1973, while excavating a ditch dating to the pre-Hadrianic timber fort, Robin Birley uncovered two small, thin fragments of wood. These fragments, upon closer inspection, were thin leaves of oak containing ink writing (Birley, 1977: 132). Although only one such ink writing tablet had been found previously in Britain, approximately 2,500 fragments have been found in the two decades of excavations at Vindo­landa (Bowman, 1998: 15).

           It is these writing tablets, more than any other find at the Vindo­landa site, which can give insight into the lives of the people who lived in and around the fort for the period 90-120 A.D. The wealth of information provided both by official accounts and by private correspondences is paralleled only by the papyri and ostraka of Egypt. Therefore, the tablets of Vindolanda are unique for the picture they can provide of Roman life in the northwestern corner of the empire. And they do provide quite a surprising picture, completely opposite of the vision of the lonely, cold, homesick soldier portrayed by W.H. Auden. The life of a soldier at Vin­dolanda was a busy one, and a soldier’s health was well looked after. In addition, the writing tablets show a very literate culture, and also the existence of women and children at the fort. The tablets also shed light upon the economic life of the province, with the fort as a center of Indus­try and manufacturing and a local economy supported by military spend­ing. Finally, the tablets of Vindolanda give writings which show the com­mon human condition shared between the average Roman in the prov­inces and the modern individual, elements noticeably missing from the writings of the elite scholars and historians.

           As for notation, I will refer to tablets by their numbers as laid out in The Vindolanda Writing Tablets (Tabulae Vindolandenses II), by Alan K. Bowman and J. David Thomas. Therefore, Tab. 246 will refer to text 246 in Bowman and Thomas. When the Latin is used, I will provide a trans­lation in a footnote. When the English is directly quoted from Bowman’s translation, I will provide the Latin in a footnote. When the tablet is merely paraphrased, I will provide the English in a footnote.

Unlike W.H. Auden’s depiction in Roman Wall Blues, the average soldier at Vindolanda did not spend his entirely sitting on guard duty, peering into the bleak and barren moors, looking for signs of enemy activity. As Tab. 155 and 156 show, the soldiers were kept busy with many non-mili­tary tasks. Tab. 155 is a list of assignments “to the workshops”.[17] The 343 men are distributed between a number of tasks: 12 to the shoemakers, 18 to build the bath-house, and others to the wagons, to the hospital, to the kilns, and for clay, for plasterers, for tents, and for rubble.[18] Tab. 156 is a similar list of assignments, detailing the activities of three groups of men, all of which deal with regular construction work, necessary for the upkeep of a timber fortress. The first group of 30 men is sent with Mar­cus, the medical orderly, to build a “residence”,[19] probably for an officer within the fort. The second group of 19 men is sent “to burn stone”,[20] probably referring to lime-kilns. A third group is sent to make clay for the wattle fences for the camp. As these two documents indicate, the life of a soldier was one of constant action and activity, not simply shivering in the rain, sitting on the wall on guard duty. The soldiers were involved in a plethora of construction, fabrication, and other non-military duties. Some of these tasks may have resulted in the production of commercial goods for sale by the fort, explained below.

           Not only was the soldier at Vindolanda more busy and active than the lone watchman sitting on a wall in the rain, guarding the frontier as indicated by W.H. Auden, but the average soldier at Vindolanda was not even at the fort. Tab. 154 is an unusually large diptych containing a strength report of the First Cohort of Tungrians. It is interesting to note that Tungrians manned Vindolanda as early as 90 A.D., considering that Tungria and Batavia had revolted against Roman rule in the 69-70 A.D. (Bowman, 1994, pg.26-7). Trusting the security of the frontier to such a unit hailing from a rebellious area after only 30 years truly reveals the strength of Roman power and the process of Romanization to stabilize recently conquered, or reconquered, areas.

           The strength report itself contains many insights into the workings of Vindolanda, other forts along the frontier, and the administration of the province of Britain. Of the 752 troops and six centurions of the cohort, all infantry, 46 are assigned as “guards of the governor”[21]. At this time, the mid-90s or early 100s A.D., the governor of Britain was Lucius Nera­tius Marcellus, and it was common for a governor to maintain a corps of 500 infantry and 500 cavalry as a bodyguard and for any special duties necessary for the administration of the province. These troops are believed to have been stationed in the Cripplegate fort outside London (Bowman, 1998: 52). In addition, 337 soldiers and two centurions were at Coria (Corbridge), and one centurion had been sent to London. In total, 456 troops and 5 centurions are listed as being absent from the fort. A full 2/3 of the unit is on assignments outside their home fort. However, this is not to be unexpected. The revolts in Pannonia in 6-9 A.D., the mutiny of the legions in the Rhineland in 14 A.D., and the uprising of Verox in 68 A.D. prompted Vespasian to reform the Roman army in 69 A.D. He stopped the practice of stationing legions in the provinces and frontier regions where they had been raised, so they would not sympathize with ambitions of local leaders. In addition, large concentrations of units were broken up and spaced out along borders and frontiers (Ward et al., 1999: 322). These reforms are clearly evident in Tab. 154, with the Tungrians stationed far from their home up on the Scottish frontier, and with most of the unit on duty in Corbridge, or in London, or in various other loca­tions.

           Even among the 296 troops and one centurion that remain at Vindo­landa, not all of them are ready for service. Fifteen are listed as sick, six as wounded, and ten suffer from “inflammation of the eyes”.[22] These are exempt from active service, and as indicated by the mention of the “med­ical officer”[23] in Tab. 156 and the “hospital”[24] in Tab. 155, would have had their health looked after by professionals. Another surprising fact is the large number of sick and otherwise incapacitated soldiers: a full ten per­cent of remaining section of the cohort is in medical care. Also, Tab. 154 dates from the same period as Tab. 155. Since Tab. 154 declares that 265 soldiers are ready for active duty, and Tab. 155 states that 343 men are assigned to the workshops, this would indicate that another unit was sta­tioned at Vindolanda. This is affirmed by the correspondence of Flauvius Ceralis, prefect of the Ninth Cohort of Batavians, which was also sta­tioned at Vindolanda during the turn of the second century A.D.

The tablets from Vindolanda show support of a surprisingly literate community. The next collection of documents, Tabs. 166-76, are all requests for a leave-of-absence from soldiers to their commanding officers. Most of these are not particularly noteworthy, and merely follow the pattern: “Gannallius (centuriae) Felicionis / rogo domine Ceralis / dignum me habeas /cui des commeatum / Ulucio … / …”[25] In the above fic­tional model, Gannalius is the name of the soldier requesting leave, Feli­cio is his commanding centurion, Ceralis is his praefectus[26], and Ulucium is the place to which he is requesting a leave. Tabs. 166-72, 174, and 176 follow this format exactly. Tab. 173 differs only in the inclusion of te[27] as the expressed object of rogo[28], as opposed to being implied. Tab. 175, on the other hand, is completely unlike the other requests for leave. Although obscured by dirt, possible readings could include having two requests written together or Messicus filling out his request in duplicate. However, the request most likely reads: “dignum me habeas cui / des commeatum / Coris Messicus te / rogo domine … / …”[29] Even if the request differs from the normal pattern in word order only, and not in a dramati­cally different message being conveyed, it underscores a surprisingly detailed and in-depth understating of Latin and literacy and written expression for the average soldier on a border fort on the far northern frontier of the empire. Instead of the simple copying of a formula for requests for leave, which would be found with soldiers possessing a very low level of literacy, we see the format and the pattern tweaked, altered, or otherwise changed in two of the ten existing requests for leave. This ability to change the existing pattern for emphasis or other use, or merely understanding that the word order can be changed without completely changing the meaning, demonstrates a high level of literacy, and such literacy among the common troops illustrates a highly educated society.

           Although the requests for leave hint at the existence of a literate cul­ture on the Roman frontier, nothing highlights this literate society more than the letters of Claudia Severa. Claudia Severa was the wife of Aelius Brocchus, who was writing to Sulpicia Lepindina, wife of Flavius Ceri­alis. Cerialis was prefect of the Ninth Cohort of Batavians, stationed at Vindolanda, and because Severa addresses Lepindina as “sister”,[30] it can be assumed that they are social equals and Brocchus is an officer of equestrian status. The existence of the letters gives clear indication that the prefects took their wives with them to their commands, and the existence of women at Vindolanda.

           Two texts among the writings of Severa are amazingly complete, Tabs. 291-2. Both are personal correspondence, and the first, Tab. 291, is actually a birthday invitation. Severa invites Lepindina to visit for her birthday, and sends greetings to Lepindina’s husband, Ceralis. Then Sev­era indicates that her husband and her “little son”[31] send their greetings as well. This would indicate that wherever Brocchus is stationed, he has both his wife and his young son with him. In Tab. 292, Severa is declaring her intentions to come visit Lepindina. There is proof that Severa and Lepindina maintained a regular correspondence: “you will receive my letter by which you will know what I am going to do”.[32] Thus, these letters are not aberrations, but part of a pattern of written communica­tion between two literate women.

           However, it is not the bodies that are the most interesting aspects of the letters. In both documents, a personal closing is written in a second, different hand than the rest of the letter: in Tab. 291, “I shall expect you, sister. Farewell, sister, my dearest soul, as I hope to prosper, and hail”,[33] and in Tab. 292, “Farewell my sister, my dearest and most longed-for soul”.[34] It is almost certain that the closing is in her own hand, making these documents the earliest examples of writing in Latin by a woman (Bowman et al. 1994: 256). In addition, while the practice of the author writing a personal closing was commonplace in the Vindolanda tablets, Severa’s closings are by far the most ornate, wordy, and poetic. The clos­ings of Tabs. 291-2 can be compared with the closings of Tabs. 250, 252, 256, and 295, all of which were written in a second hand. All of these closings are a simple, “Farewell brother”[35] or, “Farewell my lord and brother”.[36] Even Tab. 312, which closing reads, “I pray that you enjoy good health. Farewell”,[37] is relatively complex when compared to the average closing written in a second hand. The use of the superlatives and of mea anima[38] stand out as examples of superior prose that provide an intimate and personal message and emphasizes the high level of literacy of the author. That the author is female as well is astonishing, and points towards a fully literate society, at least among the equestrian officer class.

           Women were not the only literate figures that also inhabited Vindo­landa and the Roman frontier, but it seems that children also occupied the fortresses. Tab. 118 contains a draft of a letter on one side, and on the other, a line from Virgil’s Aeneid 9.473: interea pavidam volitans pinnata per urbem. The text is written mostly in all capitals, or literary script, with a few letters, especially towards the end of the line, written in Old Roman Cursive. However, the text, as it appears on the fragment, is problematic and difficult to read. The last words appear as pinnata ...bem, with only two letters appearing between pinnata and bem instead of the five necessary to complete the line. It is likely that the text was merely miscopied, and that this line was part of a writing exercise. Plenty of evidence exists for both the use of Virgil in elementary writing exer­cises and also examples of lines of Virgil found in documents from a military context (Bowman et al., 1994, pg 65-6). The unearthing of this fragment in Vindolanda seems to indicate elementary instruction at the fort, and the existence of children as well. When taken with Tab. 291 and the mention of “my little son”,[39] it seems that commanding officers would have their children as well as their wives with them at the fortress­ses on the frontier. Not only are the children growing up and living in the forts, but they are being educated, and taught to write, further indication of a highly literate culture among the equestrian officers. Coupled with the evidence of literacy among the soldiers from the requests for leave, the fort at Vindolanda supported a clearly literate society.

           The presence of women and children in a border fort also deserves mention. No husband would put his family, especially his sons, who would carry on the family name, into danger. This would point towards the function of the fortresses on the border as more than simple military strongholds. It is doubtful that Vindolanda itself was the target of attacks. But if Vindolanda was not serving to withstand enemy assaults, what purpose did it serve? Much of its function may have been linked to trade and manufacture.

We have already seen Tabs. 155-6, which assign soldiers to various con­struction and manufacturing duties. With the figure of 343 men commit­ted to the workshops on one day in late April from Tab. 155, and consid­ering that only 265 were men fit for active duty from one cohort in the fort on another day, and taking into account the size of the fort and how many troops could be stationed there at any one time, it would be not be unreasonable to guess that a majority of the men stationed there would have been assigned to non-military tasks on any given day. Although much of the construction and the manufacturing were assuredly for the fort itself, one document seems to suggest not all the goods were intended for use by the army. Tab. 178 is a list of revenues for the fort, giving five consecutive days and incomes for each day.[40] A total is given, with a sum in excess of 83 ½ denarii. It can only be speculated what would have produced these revenues, but I believe it was the sale of manufactured items to the surrounding natives and villages. Tab. 155 indicates work producing shoes, clay, and working at the kilns, and the unearthing of hundreds of shoes at Vindolanda would support their manufacture (Birley, 1977: 124-5). I believe that Vindolanda, and other forts along the Roman frontier in Britain were not solely, or even pri­marily, for military purposes, in the strictest sense of the fighting of bat­tles. I suggest that these forts were industrial centers, fostering the trade, manufacture, and distribution of goods, and as such were instrumental in the creation and fueling of the economy in the province.

           Tab. 343, a very long and complete letter from Octavius to Candidus concerning many matters of trade, verifies this conclusion. The amounts which are discussed are extremely large; Octavius is requesting 500 denarii, and has already given a security deposit of 300 denarii.[41] At this time, 300 denarii was a year’s pay for the average soldier (Bowman et al., 1994: 322). In addition, the letter discusses goods in huge quantity, 5,000 modii of grain and hundreds of hides.[42] These amounts would surely indi­cate they were destined for the supply of the military, for no other organ­ization could afford to buy, nor to use, goods in such volumes. The men­tion of the hides at Cataractonium (Catterick)[43] fits well with archaeo­logical evidence of a large tannery at the fort during the pre-Hadrianic period. The prevalence of financial terms, deposits, accounts credited, and cash payments in the letter underscore a sophisticated, money-based economy.

           Money was used for more than bulk military purchases and accounts. Tab. 181 indicates individual debts and sums repaid in much smaller denominations, each fewer than 10 denarii.[44] Accounts listing goods and their price are common at Vindolanda, the examples of Tabs. 182, [45] 184,[46] and 185[47] being especially complete. The widespread use of money and the pricing of goods attest to a fluid economy advanced beyond the simple barter by a stable currency and large public spending through the army.

           The forts, as bastions of economic strength, were not limited to the purchase and sale of goods, but also distributed them. Tab. 180 is a lengthy account of the allocation of wheat to various people, not all of whom are soldiers. Military personnel are indicated as such in the list, with the wheat for the “the beneficiarius”[48] and “the legionary soldiers”[49] clearly labeled. Meanwhile, eight modii are allotted “to the oxherds at the wood”,[50] and “Amabilis at the shrine”[51] receives three modii. It is likely that these men are civilian personnel, with the grain being payment for services or goods rendered to the army. This would make the army, and the fort at Vindolanda, an engine in the local economy, purchasing or manufacturing goods, and redistributing them among various parties as payment. The influx of public spending from the military was perhaps the anchor and foundation upon which the local economy was built.

           Although the letters provide for such dramatic conclusions as the fort at Vindolanda both supporting a highly literate culture and provid­ing a foundation for the local economy, they also leave room to tell a much more mundane story. The writing tablets show a personal side of the Romans that is not conveyed by contemporary histories written by the wealthy elite. No texts exemplify this human side like Tabs. 311 and 312. Both are personal letters between friends, the first from Chrauttius to Veldeius and the second from Sollemnis to Paris. Tab. 311 begins, “Chrauttius to Veldeius his brother and old messmate, very many greet­ings. And I ask you brother Veldeius – I am surprised that you have written nothing back to me for such a long time – whether you heard anything from our elders, or about…”,[52] while Tab. 312 begins:

“Sollemnis to Paris his brother, very many greetings. I want you to know that I am in very good health, as I hope you are in turn, you neglectful man, who have sent me not even one letter. But I think that I am behaving in a more considerate fashion in writing to you…” [53]

These letters both reveal old friends neglecting to write. While the exist­ence of men too lazy to write their old messmates may not seem like a huge find, especially considering the potential difficulties of writing and sending a letter in the Roman provinces, it certainly makes them more human. Even in modern times, sometimes people overlook writing let­ters to their close friends, either through laziness or forgetfulness. Occa­sionally, modern people might write their friends, offering gentle chas­tisement at the lack of correspondence. The fact that the Romans behaved in a similar manner almost 2,000 years ago makes them much more alive and accessible to the modern reader.

           Tabs. 343 and 234 also illustrate the common human condition shared between the modern and the Roman individual. Tab. 343 is the letter between Octavius and Candidus concerning trade already dis­cussed above. Tab. 234 is a draft of a letter sent from Flavius Cerialis to September. However, one sentence in each letter is significant: in Tab. 343, “I would have already been to collect [the hides] except that I did not care to injure the animals while the roads are bad,”[54] and in Tab. 234, “… I will provide some goods… by means of which we may endure the storms even if they are troublesome”.[55] While it may seem common sense that the roads in northernmost England would be bad in the winter, or that those far reaches would have troublesome storms, it serves to show that the Romans had to negotiate with the same environmental condi­tions as modern people. In the same manner as the friends who do not write back, these conditions form a common shared human experience that can bring the ancient Roman to life for the modern reader.

           The tablets unearthed at Vindolanda are invaluable for the wealth of knowledge they provide about the Roman frontier. They show the life of the soldier as being busy and not focused on fighting but rather on non-military tasks such as construction, manufacturing, and general upkeep around the fort. They illustrate a highly literate culture among three unlikely groups: average soldiers, women, and children. The texts give evidence of the fortress as an economic center, manufacturing goods for sale to the local populace, purchasing goods and redistributing them. In addition, the writing fragments point towards the widespread use of money and prices for goods, even in a frontier region subdued at most 15 years previously. Finally, as ordinary and commonplace as chastising friends who do not write back and bad weather in northern England is, I would argue that these are the most valuable facts gleaned from the Vin­dolanda writing tablets. By showing the ways in which the ancient Roman was not much different than a modern person, a picture of the common human experience begins to develop. Through these common experiences, to which the modern reader can relate, the Roman frontier comes alive through nearly two millennia. The biggest conclusion that can be drawn from the tablets is that the Romans behaved in ways and endured conditions familiar a modern person, and that the Romans were human beings, much like us, the modern readers.

Auden, W.H. 1976. Collected Poems, London.

Birley, Robin. 1977. Vindolanda: A Roman frontier post on Harian’s Wall. Thames and Hudson, Ltd., London.

Bowman, Alan K. Life and Letters of the Roman Frontier. 1998. Routledge, New York.

Bowman, Alan K. 1983. The Roman Writing Tablets from Vindolanda. British Museum Publications, Ltd., London.

Bowman, Alan K. and J. David Thomas. 1994. The Vindolanda Writing-Tablets (Tabulae Vindolandenses II). British Museum Press, London.

Bowman, Alan K. and J. David Thomas. 1983. Vindolanda: The Latin Writing-Tablets. Alan Sutton Publishing Ltd., Gloucester.

Ward, Allen M., Fritz M. Heichelheim, and Cedric A. Yeo. 1999. A History of the Roman People. Prentice-Hall, Inc, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey.