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As several readers may know, my day job is looking after Chedworth Roman Villa in the Cotswolds. Chedworth sits comfortably within a region that supported some of the most prosperous rural estates in Britannia. Yet the world that sustained and shaped the villa extended far beyond the Coln valley. From the legionary fortresses of Wales to the frontier installations of the Tyne valley, from the sacred waters of Aquae Sulis to the first capital at Camulodunum, Britannia was a complex and varied province.

I have selected the ten sites below to represent the full range of Roman life here: military, urban, domestic, religious and administrative. Each tells a part of the story that we see only partially at Chedworth.

Chedworth Roman Villa from above (National Trust)

1. Bath (Aquae Sulis), Somerset

Aquae Sulis was built around a thermal spring whose presiding deity, the local goddess Sulis, the Romans absorbed into their own cult of Minerva. The resulting sanctuary drew visitors from across the province and beyond. The collection of curse tablets recovered from the Sacred Spring are small lead scrolls on which worshippers inscribed personal appeals to the goddess, frequently concerning theft or injustice. They give Roman Britain an unusually direct human voice.

For Chedworth visitors, the journey to...

On Sunday, 8 February 2026, Professor Richard Miles (Professor of Roman History and Archaeology at the University of Sydney and a visiting professor at Cambridge) gave a talk at Chedworth Roman Villa in the Cotswolds that had the audience gripped from start to finish. It was a masterclass in unravelling the mystery of a Roman villa that managed to go missing for two centuries by hiding in plain sight.

The story begins in the autumn of 1811, when ploughmen working a field near Withington accidentally struck something beneath the soil. What they'd found turned out to be a Roman villa with stunning mosaic floors. Samuel Lysons, an antiquarian who had already made his name excavating the villa at Woodchester, headed to Withington to investigate. Over the following months, he carefully excavated and documented a tripartite corridor villa with at least fifteen rooms. The mosaics were exceptional. There was an Orpheus mosaic showing the mythical musician surrounded by animals, a sea-creatures panel associated with Oceanus, and fragments showing a bear, a leopard, and a wild boar being chased by hunting dogs.

An artist's impression of what the mosaic looks like (via Richard Miles Presentation)

Lysons lifted the best pieces and sent them to the British Museum. A single bear mosaic was gifted to Bristol Museum, where it became the first Roman item...

The Great War of 1914 to 1918 was said to be “The War to End All Wars” and it symbolically ended with the signing of the Armistice (a truce), which gave the time and the date of when hostilities would cease – the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month 1918. However, the War only ended when all the treaties were signed and those signatures ranged between 1919 and 1923. The War began on the 1st August 1914 and was fought between two Alliances, the first being the Empires of Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottomans (the Central Powers) and the second being that of the Empires of France, Russia and Great Britain (known as the “Triple Entente”) and both sides truly believed that the War would be over by Christmas and it could well have been. The Germans were within a whisker of emulating the Prussian victory over the French of 1870, but they were checked, at the Battle of the Marne in September 1914 and going forward there would be four more wretched years of trench warfare.

The British Expeditionary Force (BEF), of six divisions (the “Old Contemptibles”), was sent, in mid August 1914, to France, in support of the French Army, to counter the German threat and between then and the end of the War each side would try and annihilate the other. The film “Oh! What a Lovely War” and the TV series “Blackadder Goes Forth” showed with satire and pathos the utter lunacy of the...

Parliament Square is often viewed as a sanctuary of British constitutional history. Framed by the Palace of Westminster and the Abbey, it serves as a visual record of the 20th century’s geopolitical shifts.

Looking across Parliament Square (The Heritage Portal)

However, for a visitor with a South African perspective, the square offers a more specific narrative. Standing among these twelve statues (not all 20th century), one realises that the careers and philosophies of several of these figures were fundamentally shaped by their experiences in Southern Africa. This survey explores the historical links between Parliament Square and South Africa, reflecting on how the region served as a catalyst for some of the century’s most influential leaders.

Jan Christian Smuts (1870–1950)

The statue of Smuts, positioned on the north side of the square, represents the most direct link to South Africa. Sculpted by Sir Jacob Epstein and unveiled on November 7, 1956, it depicts the Field Marshal in his military uniform, leaning forward in a characteristic stride. Smuts’s presence in the square reflects his dual identity as a South African Prime Minister and a British Field Marshal. He remains a central figure in international history due to his work in the Imperial War Cabinet and his role in the formation of...

In November 2025, King Charles III visited Fortnum & Mason in Piccadilly to officially open the landmark store's most significant structural change in a generation: a bespoke double helix staircase. Designed by Ben Pentreath Studio, the structure is an elegant intervention to improve movement between levels especially during peak times.

The double helix staircase from above (The Heritage Portal)

Fortnum & Mason is an upmarkert department store in the heart of London that was established in 1707. The iconic building we see today emerged from a major conversion in the 1920s.

During a visit several years ago in the lead-up to Christmas, I remember the previous staircase being beautiful but difficult to navigate. The sheer volume of shoppers led to a major chokepoint. With hundreds of thousands of visitors each December, the Fortnum's team were wise to look for a new solution and to launch it before the Christmas rush.

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From my window at the Old Coach House on the Bathurst Estate in Cirencester, I have a daily view of a huge green wall or at least a hint of it. It’s a prominent boundary for Cirencester Park, the seat of the Bathurst family, and a feature that draws the crowds. It is a key stop on walking tours of the town and has been featured in dozens of articles over the years.

The view from my window. To the right of the photo is the 'green wall'

Since moving to Cirencester, I've had the chance to learn more about this remarkable hedge, which turns out to be a significant landmark, recognised beyond Cirencester. It holds the record for being the world's tallest yew hedge, a detail confirmed by Guinness World Records. Planted in 1720 by the first Earl Bathurst, it is a considerable structure, measuring approximately 13.1 metres in height, 155.5 metres in length, and 4.5 metres in width.

The record-breaking hedge

The house itself is a Grade II listed building. The first Earl Bathurst, who inherited the...

As many readers know, I love a blue plaque - and Cirencester, where I now live, has dozens of them. Recently, one plaque in particular caught my eye as I ambled about town. It claims that a man who studied here is "credited with saving more lives than any person in history." That’s a bold claim, and I wanted to find out more.

The modest building that once housed Cirencester Grammar School, it turns out, is where Edward Jenner was educated between 1757 and 1764. As many of us may remember from school, Jenner was the pioneer who developed the world’s first vaccine - for smallpox.

The Old School House (The Heritage Portal)

Born in Berkeley, Gloucestershire, in 1749, Jenner attended the grammar school as a boarding student during his teenage years. According to the plaque, the school operated from a medieval hall from around 1554 until 1880, with records dating back to 1242. During his time in Cirencester, Jenner developed interests that would later shape his scientific approach to medical observation.

After medical training in London, he returned to Gloucestershire and established his...

This year Britain celebrates “Rail 200”, the bicentennial of the Stockton and Darlington Railway, which had its opening on the 27th September 1825. It was not the first public railway, that honour was bestowed on the Surrey Iron Railway of 1803 (horse drawn & goods only), but it was the first to envisage and employ steam loco-motion (the Iron Horse). As engineered by George Stephenson, it was laid out with steam engines in mind, thus the curves were more gradual and the gradients more level than was the norm for horse drawn tramways. Its immediate success would lead to further railways being proposed, built and operated, which would culminate in a revolution not only in transportation, but also in the way we live.

Concurrent with the growth in railways during the second quarter of the nineteenth century was the establishment of a weekly journal which included several illustrations to accompany the written articles. The periodical in question was the “Illustrated London News” (ILN). It had its first issue on Saturday the 14th May 1842, with the main feature covering the Fancy Dress Ball at Buckingham Palace, held by the young Queen Victoria.

For the price of sixpence (6d) the reader got sixteen pages containing forty-eight columns of news along with thirty-two “woodcuts” (large & small). It is well to remember that photography was still in its infancy and would not come to the fore until circa 1850 and thus prior to then a “woodcut” (a relief printing technique) was the preferred...

When the popular board game, “Monopoly”, was introduced to Britain in 1935 by John Wadddington Ltd. of Leeds (Yorkshire), Marylebone (pronounced Mahr-le-buhn) was one of the four London railway termini chosen. The others were Fenchurch Street, Kings Cross and Liverpool Street. Those four stations just so happened to be owned by the same railway company, the London & North Eastern Railway (LNER), thus there was no room on the board for the main line stations of the other “Big Four” railway companies, namely Paddington (GWR), Euston (LMS) and Waterloo (Southern). Monopoly was not only a success in Britain, but also throughout the British Empire and the board game retained the street and station names of London, the capital city. Through playing “Monopoly”, many thousands of people across the globe became familiar with London’s place names and many a visitor would seek out a “Square” from the board game. I could well imagine the disappointment a visitor would have had on seeing Marylebone Station for the first time, as it was unpretentious and somewhat small, having only four platforms and its facade was said to look rather like a branch public library in a Manchester suburb.

Marylebone was the last railway terminus to be opened in London, with its first “Down” passenger train leaving for Sheffield and Manchester, on the 15th March 1899. The station and the extensive goods yard were built to serve the Great Central Railway (GCR) at the southern end of the London Extension of the former Manchester, Sheffield &...

The British Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rachel Reeves, made the speech “How the UK will Kickstart Growth”, on the 29th January 2025, at the Siemens Healthineers, Eynsham, Oxfordshire. In the speech, one of the cornerstones of her policy for economic growth was the “Ox Cam Arc”, a corridor joining Oxford and Cambridge by way of Bicester, Bletchley, Milton Keynes and Bedford. In her speech she states:

Oxford and Cambridge offer huge potential for our nation’s growth prospects. Only 66 miles apart, these cities are home to two of the best universities in the world and the area is a hub for globally renowned science and technology firms. This area has the potential to be Europe’s Silicon Valley. To make this a reality, we need a systematic approach to attract businesses to come here and to grow here.

Pivotal to the success of the Government’s policy for sustained economic growth is the improvement of transport links between the two university cities. At present, to travel by train would involve a journey that would start at Oxford Station on a GWR service to London, Paddington (45 minutes). Once there, a change is made to the Elizabeth Line for the second leg under central London to Liverpool Street (12 minutes) where another change is made to a Greater Anglia service to Cambridge (75 minutes). If due allowance is made for walking between platforms and waiting for trains to leave, a journey could take 3 hours.

Should you wish to drive it would require travelling first up the A34...