Old Photograph Roman Silver Traprain Law Scotland

Old photograph of Roman Silver from Traprain Law located four miles East of Haddington, East Lothian, Scotland. Traprain Law is a hill with a site of an oppidum or hill fort. The hill was already a place of burial by around 1500 BC, and showed evidence of occupation and signs of ramparts after 1000 BC. The ramparts were rebuilt and re-aligned many times in the following centuries. Excavations have shown it was occupied in the Late Iron Age from about AD 40 through the last quarter of the 2nd century, about the time that the Antonine Wall was manned. Following the Roman withdrawal to the line of Hadrian's Wall it was occupied from about 220 almost uninterruptedly until about 400 when an impressive new rampart was built, then within a few decades the site was abandoned. In the 1st century the Romans recorded the Votadini as a British tribe in the area, and Traprain Law is generally thought to have been one of their major settlements; named Curia by Ptolomy. They emerged as a kingdom under the Brythonic version of their name Gododdin and Traprain Law is thought to have been their capital before moving to Din Eidyn, site of Edinburgh Castle.



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