The School Teaching of Roman Britain

Abstract

This is no place, and to-day there should be no need, to attempt to justify the inclusion of a study of Roman Britain in the school curriculum, nor to stress its fundamental purpose of demonstrating the power, grandeur, and humanity of Roman civilization as expressed in one of the least and most remote—yet to us the most familiar—of the Imperial provinces. This article is concerned with ways and means of teaching the subject and is intended as a response from an archaeologist to the difficulties expressed by teachers in handling unfamiliar material.As I see it, the problem of relating a study of Roman Britain to the study of Latin is part of the larger problem of devising methods of introducing the archaeological approach to the past into school teaching. And by the archaeological approach I mean getting in touch with the past through material things, the things that man has lost, or thrown away, the ruins of his home, his tomb, or his city for instance, the things that happen to survive to the present time; in short the things that are generally called ‘Roman Remains’. It is in this respect that Archaeology differs from History (even Ancient History), not in the aim, which they share—the recovery and interpretation of man's past—but in its methods and in the nature of its evidence. Of course it is not suggested for an instant that the textual and archaeological approach are conflicting, for it is generally recognized that they are complementary and must work together.