16.
Objects and ideas: Roman influences at Tara and beyond
IAN ARMIT
Beyond the empire’s edge
Despite the lack of any documented military presence,
Roman objects are found in Ireland from the late first or
early second century AD onwards. Although the overall
numbers are fairly small, the general scarcity of
indigenous Iron Age objects makes the presence of these
exotic imports all the more striking (Bateson 1973;
1976; Freeman 2001). Roman material in Ireland has
tended to be discussed more or less exclusively in terms
of Ireland itself. Explanations for its occurrence have
usually been quite particular to the Irish context: raiders,
traders, refugees, displaced Irish princes etc. I would like
in this paper to propose that we start to think of Roman
objects in Ireland as part of a broader arc of cultural
exchange that extends around the northern fringes of
the Roman Empire in the first few centuries AD,
incorporating Wales, northern England, Scotland and
Scandinavia as well as Ireland.The issues surrounding the
reception and transformation of Roman objects and
ideas by indigenous communities are similar in each of
these areas, and each has the potential to shed light on
the broader range of cultural meetings that characterise
these turbulent centuries. Although my comments in this
regard will be limited to a few brief comparisons with
southern Scotland, much deeper comparative analysis of
these regions should be a priority for future research.
Tara and the Romans
The most important concentration of Roman material
occurs in east central Ireland. Here we have, for example,
the votive assemblage from Newgrange (Carson and
O’Kelly 1977), inhumation burials with Romano-
British grave-goods from Lambay Island (Raftery 1994,
200–3) and the key collection from the promontory fort
288
at Drumanagh, still unpublished and inaccessible. It is in
the context of this important regional group that we
should seek to understand the material from Tara.
The material from Seán Ó Ríordáin’s excavations
comprises a fairly eclectic mix of objects, accumulated
over several centuries of (perhaps episodic) interaction
with the Roman world, from the second–fourth
centuries AD. Some were manufactured in the Roman
provinces; others may have been locally produced but
were nonetheless influenced by Roman forms. Together
they constitute the largest published assemblage of
Roman material from Ireland.
It is useful to begin by outlining some characteristics
of the collection as a whole, which is a little obscured in
the published report by the separate treatments of the
pottery (Evans 2008), glass (Bourke 2008), ‘small finds’
(Allason-Jones 2008), barrel padlock (Velzian Donaghy
2008) and coin hoard (Grogan 2008b). Bringing these
elements together reveals that the assemblage from Tara
is actually highly unusual in its composition; different
elements seem to tell us different (perhaps contradictory)
things and this is reflected in the divergent
interpretations provided by those examining different
parts of the collection (e.g. Evans 2008; Allason-Jones
2008).
Feasting and drinking: the pottery and glass
Ó Ríordáin’s work produced a small collection of 24
pottery sherds representing fragments of at least eight
vessels, although it appears that other sherds have gone
astray in the period between excavation and final analysis
(Evans 2008), and still more unstratified examples are
unexamined in detail (Velzian Donaghy and Grogan
2008). The bulk of the sherds were recovered from the
phase 4 habitation area, with a few from phase 4 ditch 1.
Fragments from at least five high-quality Roman glass
drinking vessels (Bourke 2008) were also recovered, with
 OBJECTS AND
more candidates among the unstratified material (Velzian
Donaghy and Grogan 2008). Roman glass probably also
formed the raw material for a number of glass beads, and
bead-making debris suggests that some of these could
have been produced at Tara itself (Allason-Jones 2008,
111). Even if broken glass was specifically imported as
cullet, it seems highly probable that any glass vessels
broken on the site itself would also have been reused in
this way. Thus it is not unreasonable to suppose that the
surviving fragments from Roman glass may be a rather
minimal reflection of what was once there.
The pottery evidence suggests contacts across the
Irish Sea that extended from at least the mid-second
century to the early–mid-fourth century AD. The
material was most likely obtained from communities in
coastal regions between south Lancashire and Anglesey
(Evans 2008, 124). Yet the Tara assemblage is a strikingly
unusual one. It includes Samian ware, along with
oxidised and colour-coated vessels, yet completely lacks
any of the usual greywares or blackwares that dominate
Romano-British assemblages across the water (Evans
2008). With a preponderance of drinking vessels, this
appears to be a ‘status-display assemblage’, but one that
does not mirror the acquisition habits of Romano-
British communities in neighbouring regions. In
combination with the accompanying glass vessels it
suggests a strong focus on high-quality, eye-catching
objects intended for feasting or, more specifically,
drinking.
This type of assemblage parallels what we see on
Roman Iron Age sites in Atlantic Scotland, where
indigenous communities selected particular high-status
items which accorded with pre-existing cultural
practices (e.g. Armit 2003, 116). Where we see closer
interaction with Rome, however, at the major
indigenous centre of Traprain Law in south-east
Scotland (Armit et al. 2006), the presence and condition
of certain coarse wares have been argued to suggest the
importation of exotic foodstuffs, perhaps ‘gourmet
products’, with the contents rather than the vessels being
the more important item (Hunter 2009). Compared to
Traprain Law, the pattern of adoption of Roman pottery
and glassware seen at Tara may thus suggest a rather
limited degree of cultural borrowing.
Although the pottery was highly fragmentary, there
IDEAS: ROMAN INFLUENCES AT TARA AND BEYOND
were multiple sherds from some vessels, suggesting that
they were broken in situ. Evans (2008, 124) suggests that
they may represent the ‘remains of funerary meals/toasts
with the vessels discarded on the surface’. The
implication of this interpretation is that Roman pottery
(and probably also glass) was used at Tara in quite specific
burial contexts, where the display and breakage of exotic
vessels added to the ritual drama of the funerary
performance. As yet, however, we cannot provide a
chronological link between this material and any of the
excavated burials.
The selective acquisition of exotic drinking
paraphernalia from the Roman and Greek world has a
lengthy pedigree among the barbarian communities of
the European Iron Age, stretching back at least to the
Hallstatt D period (e.g. Dietler 1990; Arnold 2001). In
this context, the Roman pottery and glass assemblages
from Tara should not be wholly surprising. Yet, once we
consider other elements of the assemblage, problems start
to arise.
Mundane manufactures? The metalwork and stone
As well as the pottery and glass, Ó Ríordáin’s excavations
also produced modest collections of copper alloy and
iron, representing around 22 and 50 objects respectively
(though the fragmentary nature of many objects makes
such figures unavoidably vague). The copper-alloy
objects included a penannular brooch and other brooch
fragments, an earring and a miscellany of pin and ring
fragments, some of which clearly derive from larger
composite objects. The iron objects include some
possible fragments of scabbard mounts as well as a
miscellany of small rings, rods, studs, pins and fragments
of plate. Perhaps most important for present purposes,
however, is a small collection of iron nails, at least eleven
of which were identified, all from the phase 4 habitation
area (Allason-Jones 2008, 109–10). The nails are
generally small, with a maximum length of around
140mm, but were nonetheless presumably employed in
the construction of buildings or substantial timber
fittings. Other carpentry equipment suggestive of
Romano-British technology included two joiner’s dogs
(for holding pieces of wood together) from the
neighbouring Ráith na Ríg, one unstratified (Allason-
Jones 2008, 110) and one from pre-bank deposits
289
 TARA—FROM THE PAST TO THE FUTURE
(Roche 2002, 23). As an aside, this object and other
aspects of the iron assemblage from the pre-bank
deposits are quite difficult to reconcile with the early
radiocarbon dates from Ráith na Ríg. They probably
suggest that the latest part of the date range, in the early
first century BC (ibid., 57), is more indicative of the date
of construction; even then they represent a precocious
set of carpentry techniques compared to what one
would expect in most of Britain at that period, and are
much more reflective of what we see from the oppida of
central and western Europe from the late second century
BC onwards.
Despite being probably the single most common
metal objects on Roman sites in Britain, iron nails are ‘all
but absent on Iron Age settlements’ (Haselgrove et al.
2001, 21). Even on major pre-Roman Iron Age sites like
Maiden Castle and Danebury, where excavation has
been particularly extensive, iron nails are barely
represented (Hunter 1998, 366).The routine recycling of
scrap will doubtless have played a part, but it is
nonetheless clear that iron nails were not part of the
general repertoire of joinery techniques for most of the
pre-Roman Iron Age.
In Scotland, iron nails first appear in any numbers on
sites with strong links to the Roman world. At Traprain
Law, for example, the appearance of nails in the early
centuries AD may relate to the development of new
subrectangular building forms, though the dating of the
latter remains frustratingly ambiguous (Hunter 2009).
Does the presence of iron nails in the phase 4 habitation
phase of the Rath of the Synods thus signal the
construction of a new timber building built in a style
wholly alien to the indigenous traditions of the Irish
Iron Age? The construction of a novel form of building
is of course hardly out of keeping with the generally
conspicuous character of activity in the Irish royal sites
of the period. The ‘40m structure’ and earlier figure-of-
eight structures at Navan (Waterman 1997), Knockaulin
(Johnston and Wailes 2007) and Tara itself (Grogan
2008a) were all ambitious, substantial and distinctive
buildings. Does phase 4 at the Rath of the Synods then
witness the construction of an exotic, impressive
structure built using new forms of equipment, novel
joinery skills and perhaps even imported labour?
Ó Ríordáin’s work also produced a number of
290
unusual metal objects that, although they would raise few
eyebrows in a Romano-British context in England or
Wales, are striking in the context of Iron Age Ireland.
These include a lead seal showing what appears to be a
parrot with a document in its beak: in a Romano-British
context this would usually be interpreted as an individual
possession, probably for use in sealing documents
(Allason-Jones 2008, 109). The same broad category of
apparently ‘out of place’ items includes a set of copper-
alloy dividers (ibid., 108) and a barrel padlock. The latter
would have functioned either to secure shackles or
perhaps to lock a door or chest (Velzian Donaghy 2008).
Either way it suggests a concern with security and
exclusion. A few stone objects are also worth mentioning
here, most notably a circular flat pebble with iron staining
around its edge suggestive of a former iron frame; this may
have been a palette for mixing ointments or pigments
(Allason-Jones 2008, 112).
One thing that emerges quite clearly is that there is
nothing particularly to suggest the physical presence of
the Roman military at the Rath of the Synods. Indeed,
Lindsay Allason-Jones observes that the material
comprises ‘merely items that people would have used
about their homes’, lacking any evidence of precious
metals or overtly votive objects, and pointing to the
presence of ‘a settled, limited-income domestic group’
(2008, 107). While this would be a fair characterisation
had this group of material been found on a Romano-
British site in England or Wales, it is much harder to
reconcile with the situation in Ireland. Here Roman
material is much rarer and an assemblage of this size is
quite exceptional. It is also difficult to conjure a scenario
in which a middling-status band of Romano-British
farmers would find themselves squatting in the centre of
one of Iron Age Ireland’s prime religious centres. The
interpretation is also at odds with Evans’s
characterisation of the ceramic and glass vessels as a
highly selective, ‘status-display assemblage’. Clearly there
is a problem in understanding the composition of this
assemblage, but before addressing this directly I want to
consider one final group of objects.
A coin conundrum
Although Ó Ríordáin did not find any Roman coins
during his excavations at the Rath of the Synods, the
 OBJECTS AND
British-Israelite excavations of 1899–1902 had
previously produced a small hoard of fifteen copper
coins of Constantius I. Despite earlier claims to the
contrary, these can now be accepted as a genuine find
(Grogan 2008b).The date range of the coins would most
likely place their deposition in the latter part of
Constantius’s reign (AD 306–37) or fairly soon
thereafter. Other copper coins of Constantius I have
been recovered at Freestone Hill, Co. Kilkenny, and
Ireland’s Eye, off the coast of County Dublin (Bateson
1973, 46–7).
The low intrinsic value of these coins rules out their
interpretation as bribes or subsidies to quieten the
barbarians, as has been argued for the rich silver denarii
hoards of the late second century, such as those recently
discovered at Birnie in north-east Scotland (Hunter
2007, 29–31). The occurrence of the Tara coins in a
single hoard, however, and the apparent absence of any
other stray coins, conflicts with the pattern of casual
losses over an extended period suggested by the late
Roman, low-denomination coin assemblages from
several Scottish sites. The coin evidence from Traprain
Law, for example, has been taken to suggest habitual
trading contacts over an extended period (Sekulla 1982).
At Tara, by contrast, we have no evidence of trading, and
yet we have the seemingly deliberate burial of a tiny
hoard of Roman small change, the meaning and ‘value’
of these coins seemingly transformed in their new
setting.
Exiles, raiders and refugees?
Tara presents us with an apparently discordant body of
Roman material. The pottery and glass vessels suggest
the acquisition of specific items for high-status drinking
rituals. The iron nails suggest the presence of Roman or
Romano-British craftsmen, or at least the importation of
carpentry skills, to create one or more prestigious
buildings within the Rath of the Synods.The bulk of the
metalwork, however, suggests a habitual and routine use
of Roman tools and dress accessories, yet there is
nothing to suggest Romanised approaches to food
preparation or consumption. How, then, can we
reconcile these jarring elements? Or, considering the
IDEAS: ROMAN INFLUENCES AT TARA AND BEYOND
time depth of the various Roman finds, are we simply
conflating a long but episodic series of encounters with
the Roman world, each with its own flavour and
significance?
When we compare the Roman material from Tara
with the wider body of Roman material from Ireland,
the issues do not become any simpler. There are few
substantial assemblages, and none with the character and
composition of the Tara material.The Roman finds from
Newgrange, with their significant numbers of high-
value coins and other prestigious objects, including an
already ancient torc with a Latin inscription, are exactly
what might be expected from repeated votive
depositions on a religious site. Indeed, votive deposition
may account for a substantial proportion of the Roman
finds from Ireland; for example, the well-known oculist’s
stamp from Golden is now thought to have been
associated with what was probably a holy well or healing
site (Daffy 2002; see also Kelly 2002). Ironically perhaps,
given the apparent centrality of Tara in the religious life
of Iron Age Ireland, the Roman material from the Rath
of the Synods is perhaps the least obviously votive
assemblage of Roman material yet published from an
Irish site.
What, then, does this Roman material mean in
human terms? Did the inhabitants of Tara include people
born, brought up or perhaps educated in Roman
Britain, or even further afield? Many of the
interpretations previously advanced to explain the
occurrence of Roman finds rely on the movement of
small groups of people from Britain to Ireland.
Favourites include:
(1) refugees, perhaps defeated Brigantians from
northern England, bearing the material trappings of
a semi-Romanised culture, as is sometimes suggested
for the Lambay burials;
(2) Roman or Romano-British traders seeking out
untapped markets, as suggested by references in
Tacitus (Agricola, 24) and Ptolemy (Geography, 1.11)
relating to the late first and early second centuries
AD: Ireland may well, for example, have been a rich
source of slaves, as well as commodities such as hides
and hunting dogs;
291
 TARA—FROM THE PAST TO THE FUTURE
(3) or perhaps returning exiles, campaigning across
Ireland with the active or tacit backing of Rome, as
Richard Warner has suggested for the late first
century AD (1995).
Other variations are listed by Bateson (1973, 29–30). As
far as I am aware, nobody has yet developed a case for the
fostering of young Irish princes in Rome as hostages or
obsides, as Creighton (2000) has proposed for southern
English tribes in the late first century BC and early first
century AD. This would be far from unthinkable, given
the likelihood that certain Irish groups would have used
alliances with Rome for their own political gain, and
client kingdoms may well have developed at certain
times and places. The well-known reference in Tacitus
(Agricola, 24) to the harbouring of an exiled Irish prince
by Agricola during his northern campaigns may even be
a pointer in this direction.
Whatever we make of the particular arguments
around each of these hypothetical scenarios, there is little
doubt that some such individuals, buffeted by the
specific historic circumstances of the first few centuries
AD, did indeed cross the Irish Sea and carried with them
objects and ideas that we would now identify as Roman
or Roman-influenced. None of these hypotheses,
however, can really account for the scope, range and
chronological variation of Roman material in Ireland.
Most seek to explain specific assemblages. None really
takes account of all the many facets of Roman influence
in its broadest sense, which would ultimately include
language developments and the origins of Christianity.
Like these ‘big ideas’, the smaller ideas wrapped up in the
use of Roman objects seeped into the fabric of Irish life,
ultimately ceasing to be Roman at all.
Across the sea
I have suggested elsewhere that the adoption of Roman
material was implicated in the creation and maintenance
of new social identities in Late Iron Age Ireland, much as
La Tène material culture had been a few centuries earlier
(Armit 2007). Items such as toilet instruments, which are
moderately numerous in Ireland (though conspicuously
absent from the Rath of the Synods), suggest important
292
changes in attitudes to the body and personal identity
over these centuries, similar to those seen a little earlier
in southern England (Hill 1997). Roman material
culture afforded certain Irish élites the means to
distinguish themselves from their neighbours and
embodied social difference. Exotic modes of dress and
personal display, carrying associations with what would
have remained a distant and (for most) poorly
understood cultural presence, provided new ways of
manifesting and experiencing power. The Roman
objects at places like Tara reflect not a borrowed or
imported lifestyle but a newly created one, with Rome,
or some imagined version of Rome, as one of its many
components. Indeed, it may be inappropriate to think in
terms of ‘lifestyles’ at all. Tara was a special place, where
people most likely behaved, dressed, spoke and thought
rather differently from the way they did outside. It was a
place of performance, where roles and personae were
adopted, a place where people became more formalised
versions of themselves. Physical and intellectual imports
from the Roman world may have become part of what
Tara was all about without necessarily bleeding too far
into the daily lives of the Iron Age population.
Much of the emphasis at Tara seems to have been on
the creation of new buildings on an already ancient site,
and on conspicuous drinking rites enlivened with shiny
new pots and glasses. Although the trappings were novel,
these displays maintained continuity with the Tara of
earlier centuries. In doing so, they bring us to a final
inconsistency in the character of Late Iron Age Tara: why
should it be at one of the most ancient and venerated
places in Ireland that such a constellation of new and
distinctive material should appear? If Tara was a place
where conceptual bridges were built to the past, a place
of tradition and continuity, then why should this be the
place where we find so many apparently alien objects
and ideas?
Perhaps the answer may lie in the role of Tara as a
place where worlds meet: the worlds of the living and
the ancestors, the gods and mortals, the present and the
past. Tara was concerned with cosmological power, and
the rites practised there mediated between the
supernatural and the here and now. In a great many
societies around the world, travels to distant places and
objects retrieved from far away (both geographically and
 OBJECTS AND
culturally) were imbued with spiritual significance
(Helms 1988). In this sense, Roman objects may have
carried their own cosmological power and added a
further dimension to the rites practised at Iron Age Tara.
Mediation with a distant world across the sea may not
yet have become as important as mediation with the
supernatural, but both played their part in the
construction of Late Iron Age authority at Tara.
Acknowledgements
I would very much like to thank Muiris O’Sullivan and
Kim Rice for inviting me to the Tara Symposium and
the workshop that preceded it. Comments on earlier
drafts were kindly provided by Phil MacDonald and
Catriona Armit, though responsibility for the ideas
expressed remains with the author.
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