THE ANTONINE WALL

Happy the man who far from business ploughs again his ancestral lands. Horace ‘Epodes’

Up here, along the old Roman way, from Bo’ness (Borrowstoneness or Bridgeness) on the Firth of Forth to Old Kilpatrick and Bishopton on the Firth of Clyde, the 17 extant forts of Antoninus Pius’ rampart string a 40km hilly cincture from east to west, across Scotland's narrowest point. The Antonine 'Wall', actually a wide deep ditch with an earthen rampart behind it), was accompanied along its length by a metalled road known as The Military Way. This was all abandoned by the Romans after only 20 years but many sections have remained visible until the present day. Even where the rampart has been flattened the silted up ditch still survives. The following pictures represent just a few of the forts and extant grounds within arm's reach of Glasgow.

On the way to Falkirk, Seabegs Wood still boasts the earthen rampart as seen here, and some wonderful trees. At the top where a fortlet used to stand there is another exceptional view of the Kilsyth Hills and the Campsies.

Looking west across the Kelvin Valley towards the gentle hump of Craigmaddie Muir with the Campsies to the right and the Kilptaricks eking out behind on the left. The Firth & Forth Canal and the town of Twechar are down towards the immediate left, out of picture.

Despite many thinking that Old Kilpatrick (on the north side of the river) is the western terminus of the Antonine Wall it is actually here aside Ingliston Stud Farm in Bishopton. Nothing remains of the Roman fort except the view and the hill. Here we are on a cool blue day in September looking north to the volanic plug of Dumbarton Rock, and behind to the Sphinx-like silhouette of Ben Lomond at the beginning of Highland range.

From above Old Kilpatrick on the Kilpatrick Braes looking east along the ophidian River Clyde. Opposite Bishopton on the other side of the river we are inter-castri so to speak, standing between Old Kilpatrick (Ferrydyke) and Duntocher. Both of these Roman camps contained forts with Duntocher benefitting from the addition of a fortlet too.

Not far from here was the Roman fort at Duntocher (near the top of Peel Glen Road) as well as a large camp nearby in what is now Bearsden. This picture looks south from Cochno Hill in the Kilpatrick Hills to 'where vast Tintoc heaves his bulk on high, his shoulders bearing clouds his head the sky' as Hugh Mcdonald says in Rambles Round Glasgow in the 1850s. Tinto Hill, at the start of the Scottish Lowlands, is that almost pyramidal shape beyond the city in the left centre background. This picture from the Kilpatricks (effectively the foothills of the Highlands) perfectly captures the midland valley basin that Glasgow lies in before the land rises once again into the Scottish Lowlands.