Villa Rustica (Wigginton)
The Villa Rustica near Wigginton is a former Roman manor house ( Villa rustica ) on the district of Wigginton , a village in the county of Oxfordshire , in England . It is on the Swere . In ancient times it was in the Roman province of Britannia ( Britain ).
A mosaic was found at the beginning of the nineteenth century, but only descriptions are known of it. First excavations took place in 1824 by Joseph Skelton and Reverend Clement Winstanley, who excavated a heated room that had an apse and was decorated with a mosaic. Another room was also decorated with a mosaic. Systematic excavations began in 1965 as it was feared that the villa could be badly damaged by agricultural activities. Large parts of a villa have been excavated. There were further excavations from 2003 to 2004. The excavations in their entirety have not yet been fully published.
The villa was oriented east-west with a portico on the south side and on the east and west side with corner projections . Several phases of construction can be distinguished. Most of the rooms were decorated with mosaics. Most of them show geometric patterns and date from the end of the third to the fourth centuries. A mosaic found in 2004 shows dolphins and fish and was once probably in the apodyterium of a bath. Remains of sophisticated wall paintings were found in the villa. There are fragments of circles that once adorned a ceiling, fragments of architectural paintings and a winged eros.
Individual evidence
- ^ Martin Henig, Paul Booth: Roman Oxfordshire. Sutton Publishing, Stroud 2000, ISBN 0-7509-1959-0 , p. 144, fig. 5.27
- ^ Norman Darvey, Roger Ling: Wall painting in Roman Britain , Alan Suton 1982 ISBN 0907764150 , 191-194
literature
- Stephen R. Cosh, David S. Neal: Roman Mosaics of Britain. Volume IV: Western Britain. The Society of Antiquaries of London, London 2010, ISBN 978-0-85431-294-8 , pp. 270-278.
Coordinates: 51 ° 59 ′ 56.8 " N , 1 ° 25 ′ 41.2" W.