Incredible Antiquities

We have spent the past 2 days roaming among ancient ruins and artifacts. Since our trips to Scotland, Ireland and our European River Cruise we have gotten accustomed to medieval castles and cathedrals but the Roman ruins in Bath and the Monuments at Stonehenge which significantly predate the Romans, makes medieval times seem modern by comparison.
We slept well in the Queens bed at the Cross Hands hotel, had a wonderful breakfast and set off for Bath. This being Saturday, we had been forewarned that the tourist sites would be very crowded. We did make reservations in advance for our stops but we weren’t convinced that this would help if it was especially busy. Our only hope was that it was “Royal Wedding Day” and most people that we had spoken with had plans to watch. We arrived in Bath 30 minutes early and found parking a few blocks from city centre. We checked in for our tour and were allowed in ahead of schedule. This was fortunate because by the time we left, it was very crowded.
Bath is named after, and was built around, a Roman Temple and Baths that were discovered here. They are located more than 40 feet below street level because other buildings including the King’s Bath (17th Century) were built on top of them. The Temple there was built in between 60-70 A.D., with the bathing complex gradually added over the next 300 years. Just wrap your heads around that!!! 2000 years ago the Romans were building these amazingly complex structures, harnessing geothermal water and routing to several large pools for communal bathing.

The interesting thing is that you had hundreds of naked Romans bathing, among other things reportedly, right outside of a sacred temple. There was a complex roof structure that was self supporting…no columns!!! It appears that it was in use until the first decade of the 5th century when the Romans withdrew from England and fell into disrepair. There are reports of flooding with evidence that the Temple and Bath complex were destroyed sometime in the 6th century. The King’s bath was built on top of the original Roman location sometime in the 12th century with several modifications over the next 500 years.

Since being discovered the Roman complex is still being excavated. In addition to the original structures and carvings, they have found more than 25,000 coins and 130+ curse tablets; lead sheets inscribed with curses, mostly against thieves for stealing patrons clothing while they were bathing. Many of these were quite harsh, “May the one who stole my clothes lose their mind and their eyesight.” It was really interesting and a bit hard to grasp the shear ancient nature of the stones that we were walking on.

From Bath we made our way to Stonehenge. Perhaps everyone or nearly everyone in the modern world has heard of Stonehenge. I for one had the iconic stone structure in my mind’s eye but had no real understanding of its history or purpose. There is still a lot that is not known but the building at Stonehenge started more than 5000 years ago with the familiar standing stone circle completed about 4,500 years ago. It is apparent that it was a temple of some sort whose purpose was primarily ceremonial during the Neolithic and Bronze age. It remained significant for at least 1000 years as hundreds of burial mounds sprung up on surrounding hillsides within sight of it during that time. The fact that people of that time were able to undertake it’s monumental construction and leave behind pottery, tools, weapons and other artifacts is truly remarkable. I took a number of photos, I probably didn’t need to mention that, but the sheer feeling of being in the presence of this antiquity was overwhelming.

We left Stonehenge and made our way to Salisbury, our home for the next 2 nights. Back to modern time…Medieval that is, We arrived at the Cathedral View B & B. We can see the Cathedral (the spire anyway) from our room. Our hosts are friendly and very knowledgeable about the area. They gave us several walking maps to explore. We decided that we would hang around town for the next day+ and just recharge after a lot of hectic driving in the past few days. The highlight in the area is the Salisbury Cathedral and it did not disappoint. We walked over to the Cathedral before heading to dinner and had a real “Holy Cow!!,” moment when we turned the corner.

It is incredibly huge!!! By far the largest we have seen. We went to dinner at a small Indian restaurant. I know what you’re thinking….we try to eat only local food in our travels. Well, our host convinced us that Indian food is very “typical” British food now. It is one of the most common places for British people to go eat. The food was AMAZING!!! So flavorful and complex, a really wonderful experience.
Today we walked nearly the entire town and ended up at the Cathedral to see the inside along with one of the 4 remaining Magna Cartas that they have there.

The inside of the Cathedral was as impressive as the outside. Because of its sheer size there were at least 10 different small chapels inside along with the main sanctuary and a series of Military flags that a local policeman told us about that are on display in perpetuity. The oldest is from the War of 1812. There are only threads left but it is to honor those who fought and died. The other remarkable things are 2 features that are modern. The first a Font (fountain) in the middle of the main transept, whose surface is smooth as glass providing incredible reflections. The other is the presence of more than 2000 paper doves suspending above the main aisle sweeping their way toward the alter. It is impossible to describe the affect. The other unique experience that we had was attending Evensong, a cross between a choir performance and short Sunday service.

The very accomplished Salisbury Boy’s Choir raising their pure voices in this immense Godly place was sincerely moving, regardless of your Religion or beliefs. As has been our habit thus far we ended our evening at a local pub with a pint of local beer and a great dinner. Nearly done blogging for now and headed to bed soon. Love and miss everyone. Good Night.