Street Station (5/8)
The Street Station
Now to the main attraction. It was not a big fortress. In fact, it merely covered 10 yards square. The remaining earth walls are just 1 yard high. It was not designed to withstand a military attack but hosted a few civil servants and some soldiers as “highway patrol officers”. Maybe tolls were collected. The steep ascent made sure all travellers had to drive very slowly so nobody escaped the Roman civil servants. The landscape prevented evasive manoeuvres.
Pile of rocks at Point 5
Pile of Rocks.
Some meter north of the former station at pile of moss covered rocks can be seen. Silent witness of the former structure.
Southern wall
Plateau Southern Wall.
View to the west along the southern wall. The station stood on the elevated plateau on the right.
Plateau View 1
Street Station View 1.
The surface of the former station is very uneven. In contrast to detectorists, who do focused digs after detected items and make relative small holes, here people did a lot of shovel work to find hidden treasure. Who knows whether that happened decades or centuries ago.
Plateau View 2
Street Station another view.
Another view on the plateau.
Archaeological Trench at Point 6
Archaeological Trench View 1.
The biggest surprise during the walk was this archaeological trench through the south-west corner of the station’s wall. Its size is some 5 x 0.5 x 0.5 m. This was not done to find treasure but to investigate the construction of the wall. When I mentioned this observation to the monument protection authorities, however, they said they did not do it. So this seems to be the work of some amateur archaeologist.
Trench View 2
Archaeological Trench View 2.
Another view of the trench.
So much for our little walk around the site.
(C) Thorsten Straub www.metal-detecting.de 2006-2019.