A Changing Fort

A Changing Fort. . , A Changing Fort , During its 280-year life, many changes were made in the fort, no more so than to building XV. Over the years, it served as a workshop, a barracks, a stable, and a storehouse before a small bathhouse (balneae) was placed at its eastern end. , The bathhouse was built in the fourth century AD over the demolished end of a long, two-storey storehouse. The walls of the storehouse, from the end of the third century AD, are still visible. Its purpose was possibly to keep food collected from the local population as a tax (the annona militaris) to support the army. , The bathhouse had just two rooms; a changing room containing a cold plunge bath, and a warm room with a hot plunge. The raised cement (opus signinum) floor of the warm room - now gone- was supported on stone pillars to allow hot air from a furnace to circulate underneath. , Such a small bathhouse could only have served a few people. Baths are rarely found inside forts and its presence suggests that security outside had become a serious issue. , Felix says … , The walls in front of you are part of a small bathhouse. We like a nice scrub, but most of us go outside to a bigger bathhouse in the vicus. , ( photo caption ) , Above: The bathhouse, as it may have looked about AD 370. Reconstruction by Peter Urmston