Professor Roger Tomlin on the Arthurian Battles

                The Arthurian Battles

The above map was sent to Professor Roger Tomlin the other day. What follows is the accompanying message and then his reply to that message. Note that his assessment of the map agrees with those of Nicholas Higham and other experts on sub-Roman Britain.

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So, I sent the attached map to several historians and archaeologists whose specialization is the sub-Roman period in Britain. Without telling them where I got the projected battle sites from, I asked if they thought the map was more likely to portray the battles of a Dark Age chieftain or a Roman general.

All of them thought it looked distinctly Roman.

I'm now asking you the same thing, although from the perspective of an expert on the Roman period. Yes, I realize you're more than slightly biased!

Please let me know what you think.

Prof. Tomlin's response:

Their axis is from the Antonine Wall to York, north to south, suggesting resistance to penetration from the north rather than to seaborne invasion from the east, but that's all that I can say. Suggestive of Roman advance from York or subsequent breakthroughs from the north, so I would go for Roman period.