This interesting volume, the first of a new series published by British Archaeological Reports dedicated to the archaeology of Roman Britain, aspires to record the collecting activities of John Clayton (1792–1890), a leading citizen of Newcastle and for many years its town clerk. His country mansion of Chesters contained the remains of the Hadrian’s Wall fort of Cilurnum in its front garden, and he excavated this over his very long life. In the process, he amassed quantities of sculptures, inscriptions and small finds, and he installed these in a purpose-built museum, which has largely survived intact to our day. Moreover, he also acquired vast stretches of Hadrian’s Wall, with turrets and milecastles, as well as three other forts on the Wall – Housesteads, Carrawburgh and Carvoran – as well as Vindolanda on the Stanegate, south of the wall. Apart from Cilurnum, Clayton’s most notable archaeological foray was the excavation of the well-shrine of the goddess–nymph Coventina at Carrawburgh, a full account of which has previously been published by Lindsay Allason-Jones and Bruce McKay (Coventina’s Well: A shrine on Hadrian’s Wall, Hexham: Chesters Museum, 1985). Clayton’s collection thus, exceptionally, embraced not only objects, but entire Roman forts, and much of the best section of the Roman wall itself, protecting it from quarrying and stone robbing.