at the end of Hadrian’s Wall
For the next week, give or take a day, my wife and I will be hobbling along the full 135km length of Hadrian’s Wall in northern England, pork pie in one hand and well-thumbed Ordnance Survey route map in the other.
As I’m sure you’ve already spotted, this raises 3 questions. Who was Hadrian? Why did he have a wall? Where is the wall? And why would I want to hike it? OK, that’s 4 questions.
First, the “who”. Hadrian was the Emperor of Rome from 117 to 138 AD. He seems to have been a bit of a bad boy, taking the throne by some back-handed trickery, and immediately offing any senators who disagreed with his accession.
To his credit, during his reign, he took great interest in his empire and travelled to the farthest-flung corners of his lands looking for easily defensible borders; not for him the expansionism (and massive expenses) that had driven previous emperors. He preferred to hold on to what Rome already had, and keep hold of it with as little military effort and cost as possible. He spent over half his imperial years on the road, which may also reflect his unhappy childless marriage and a desire to get as far away from her indoors as possible.
Now for the “why”. In 122 AD, one of his trips took him to northern Britannia (England.) In an effort to suppress a rebellion by the perfidious residents of the damp, foggy island, to control trade from the north, AND to reduce his overall defence costs, he ordered that a wall be built from what is now Newcastle on England’s northeast coast, to the closest point on the west coast, now known as Bowness on Solway. Which covers the “where”.
As to why I want to walk the wall? Why the hell not? Eight days of B&Bs, pubs, glorious northern English scenery, full English breakfasts and hopefully good weather. I meant to say eight days of culture and immersion in the history of ancient England but it came out wrong.
Normal urbancrows blather will be resumed when I’ve defeated the wall.