Llanio
About
A cohort of Asturian cavalry from northern Spain garrisoned this nearly square fort in the Teifi valley from around 75 CE. Its rounded corners enclosed a defense some 130 metres across, room for around 500 soldiers watching the upland route into Ceredigion. Pottery from the site suggests the garrison marched out not long after Trajan's death, sometime in the 120s. Its ramparts and an attached bathhouse remain traceable in the fields today.
What happened here
Five hundred men, sometimes a thousand, recruited from a province rather than from citizens, and often stationed a long way from where they were raised. Cavalry units get a bigger fort and far more stabling; the smell tells you which kind you are in before the plan does. The layout copies a legionary fortress at a quarter of the size — headquarters, commander's house, granaries, barracks, a bath house usually built outside the walls because of the fire risk. Duties are patrolling, escorting, customs, and policing rather than pitched battle. After twenty-five years a man is discharged with citizenship for himself and his children, recorded on a bronze diploma he keeps for life. A village grows outside the gate within a decade.
Sources
Nearby
Roman Maps shows the empire frozen at 11 August 117 CE, the day Trajan died — its moment of greatest territorial extent. Explore the full map →