Cilurnum

Coordinates: 55°01′34″N 2°08′20″W / 55.026°N 2.139°W / 55.026; -2.139

Cilurnum or Cilurvum was a fort on Hadrian's Wall mentioned in the Notitia Dignitatum. It is now identified with the fort found at Chesters (also known as Walwick Chesters to distinguish it from other sites named Chesters in the vicinity) near the village of Walwick, Northumberland, England. It was built in 123 AD, just after the wall's completion.

Cilurnum is considered to be the best preserved Roman cavalry fort along Hadrian's Wall. The site is now preserved by English Heritage as Chester's Roman Fort. There is a museum on the site, housing finds from the fort and elsewhere along the wall.

Construction

The site guarded a bridge, Chesters Bridge, carrying the Military Way Roman road behind the wall across the River North Tyne. Massive abutments survive of this bridge across the river from the fort. Cilurnum was a cavalry fort at its foundation, for retaliatory raids into barbarian areas north of the wall, then given over to infantry later. Hadrian himself encouraged the "Cult of Disciplina" amongst legions stationed at the wall, and an early inscription on an altar dedicated to Disciplina, found in 1978, indicates the earliest known military presence was a wing of cavalry, ala Augusta ob virtutem appellata ("named Augusta because of its valour"). Inscriptions have also been found showing the First Cohort of Dalmatians, from present-day Bosnia-Herzegovina(Yugoslavia), and the First Cohort of Vangiones from Upper Rhineland in Germany were also stationed here.

Chesters (Humshaugh)

Chesters is an 18th century country mansion situated adjacent to Hadrian's Wall and the Roman fort of Cilurnum at Humshaugh, Northumberland, England. It is a Grade II* listed building.

The house was built for John Errington of Walwick Grange in about 1771 with three storeys and four bays but was much improved and extended by architect Norman Shaw in 1891. The 1891 work included five two-storeyed three-bay wings and a stable block. The stable block is separately Grade II* listed.

Of the five wings, three were diagonal, creating suntrap flanks for the south and west fronts. Shaw's remodelling of Chesters kindled the popularity of the Butterfly plan in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The estate was acquired by Nathaniel Clayton (Town Clerk of Newcastle upon Tyne 1785–1822) in 1796. His son John Clayton who succeeded him as Town Clerk in 1822 was a keen antiquarian and excavated the ruins of the Roman fort of Cilurnam adjacent to the house. He made a large collection of Roman artefacts, which is now displayed at Chesters Museum.