Topics > Northumberland > Civil Parishes in Northumberland > Haydon Civil Parish > Coesike West Roman temporary camps
Coesike West Roman temporary camps
Map showing the Scheduled Monument area of Coesike West Roman temporary camps to the north-west of Grindon Farm.
Scheduled Monument (#1010938): Coesike West Roman temporary camps 1 and 2
Click the headings below to expand (selected extracts from the Historic England scheduling)
The Coesike West Roman temporary camps survive well as upstanding monuments. The rarity of temporary camps, and in particular examples with upstanding remains, identifies them as nationally important.
The monument includes the Roman temporary camps known as Coesike West 1 and Coesike West 2. The camps survive as a series of earthworks visible on the ground. The largest of the Coesike West camps, Coesike West 1, contains within it the remains of the smaller camp, Coesike West 2.
Coesike West 1 is situated towards the east of a low spur, some 215m south of Hadrian's Wall vallum. The camp occupies commanding views to the east and west along the line of Hadrian's Wall, as well as south east into Tynedale and to the north. The camp is rhomboid in plan and encloses an area of 0.2ha. The defences are in a good state of preservation. The internal height of the rampart and the external scarp of the ditch are both 0.3m at their maximum. There are three gateways, each with external defences, in the north, east and west sides. The north and west external defences each consist of a bank, up to 0.3m high, and an outer ditch 0.15m in depth. The east external defence has been reduced to a low bank. Narrow ridge and furrow cultivation extended over the ramparts and into the interior, though this can only be discerned on aerial photographs. Later drainage channels cross the camp from north to south and have caused some disturbance to the defences.
Coesike West 2 lies in the interior of Coesike West 1 and is probably the earlier of the two camps as its western defences appear to be overlain by those of the larger one. Elsewhere the ramparts are a discontinuous outward facing scarp, measuring 0.3m in maximum height. No ditch is visible. Only one gateway can be tentatively identified. This is marked by a low mound less than 0.1m high, which is almost certainly the remains of an external defence. The camp may have been approximately square, measuring about 34m from crest to crest, and enclosing an area of about 0.1ha.
