- Chapter Eight -
of achieving citizenship. De facto and de jure, they became the new curial class
and, as Jones (1991 b: 1 19) has emphasized, rapidly became integrated into the
Roman system, acting as the link between the majority of the population and
the empire, in such a way as to maintain the traditions of an older social order whilst
also collaborating in and focusing the creation of the new. Such competition and
conspicuous displays of status were not just confined to public buildings and
amenities in the cities, however; they also found an outlet in the adoption of the villa
in the countryside, and in time they percolated down throughout society in other
material ways. All this means that towns and villas, two key features in the process
of romanization, grew out of the competitive instincts of the existing native elites
and their desire to conform, rather than being symbols of radical change in
themselves.
The traditional view of most urban development in Britain has usually empha-
sized its military origins (Webster 1966), coupled with some form of deliberate
official encouragement by central government; this relied very largely on Tacitus
(Agricola 21), underpinned by Rivet's (1977) assertion that virtually all civitas capitals
(let alone the coloniae) could be shown to have had a military presence at or very
near to their sites. Official designation is thus implied as the key to the subsequent
development of the cities, involving a mixture of official help and encouragement and
local participation and patronage. Cirencester has long served as a model for this
process, with at least one phase of military activity acting as an economic magnet for
a civilian vicus which was sufficiently well developed to survive the army's departure
and so take on the new administrative role assigned by central government (Wac her
1974: 30 - 2 ).
Such explanations have a powerful appeal for those areas which were uncentralized
in the later Iron Age, hence perhaps their applicability in the cases of Wroxeter
and Exeter; but where there was a well-developed infrastructure on the eve of the
conquest, fort location must be viewed in the context of pre-existing settlement
networks and centres of power (Cunliffe 1976; Millett 1984). Thus in the south-east
alone, significant levels of continuity can be identified at sites like Canterbury,
Verulamium, Silchester, Winchester and Leicester, not forgetting the colonia at
Colchester, all lying on or near an existing iron-age predecessor; incidentally,
the same is true of many small towns like Braughing and Baldock (Burnham 1986).
Where a military presence is known (with the exception of Colchester), it is both short-
lived and peripheral to the main focus, suggesting at best a secondary role in a wider
process. Even at sites like Cirencester, the sequence is likely to be more complex,
the emphasis resting on the relocation of an existing focus from an inconvenient site
at Bagendon to one more suited to the needs of the developing road network.
This continuity of existing native centres within their respective tribal areas,
and their emergence as romanized cities, clearly emphasizes the way Rome sought
to work through and reinforce the status quo, of those already in power. It is for this
reason that the new cities became the focus for patronage, because they provided
the vehicle for continued competition and display within the new political order.
This process could even begin before official designation as a civitas centre, as the
evidence of early patronage and romanization at the native site of Silchester clearly
demonstrates, presumably within the client kingdom of Cogidubnus; indeed, the
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