7. what was england like before the empire? roman...
TRANSCRIPT
Key Term Definition Grave goods Items buried with a body.
High status Rich, well educated and well connected. e.g. Lord Alan Sugar
Q
Name a Black Tudor that we studied.
___________________________________ Describe their story ___________________ ___________________________________
___________________________________
Name a Black Georgian that we studied.
___________________________________ Describe their story ___________________ ___________________________________
___________________________________
Put the time periods listed below in the
correct order along the timeline: A. Roman Britain
B. Anglo-Saxon England C. Medieval England D. Iron-Age Britain
Put the events listed below in the correct
order along the timeline: A. Columbus ‘discovers’ the Americas
B. Francis Drake sails around the world C. Battle of Hastings D. Elizabeth I gives the East India
Company a Royal Charter
Enoch Powell – Claim Two
‘The English can revert [return] to being the people we were before
the ships of Elizabethan and Stuart England set off to forge the first
British Emprie in the Americas.’
Circle the image which best shows what Enoch Powell believed pre-colonial (before the
Empire) England was like.
Last lesson we uncovered evidence that suggested Dark Ages England (England before
the Empire), wasn’t quite what Enoch Powell thought it was like.
This means we need to go further back in time to find out what Roman Britain was like. This
will help us to keep testing Enoch Powell’s second claim.
7. What was England like before the Empire? Roman Britain
500 1 500 1000 1500 2000
BC AD AD AD AD AD 1000 1200 1300 1400 1500 1600
1000 AD AD AD AD
AD
This is the Ivory Bangle Lady.
Her skeleton was found by archaeologists in
Sycamore Terrace in York in 1901. Testing
proved that she lived in York in roughly 380
AD (Roman Britain).
Recently, a new scientific technique called radioisotope
analysis (the bones are tested) has proved that either she, or her family
were immigrants to Britain.
Forensic science has also meant we’ve been able to reconstruct her face –
we can stare into the eyes of the Ivory Bangle lady!
However, historians and archaeologists have suspected since 1984 that the
Ivory Bangle Lady was an immigrant. They worked this out by studying
clues in her grave goods (items a skeleton is buried with).
Analyse the grave goods over the next 2 pages. Can you work out:
A. Whether the Ivory Bangle Lady was rich or poor?
B. Where the Ivory Bangle Lady, or her family, might have come from originally (where
they migrated from)?
Clue 1: The
Ivory Bangle
Lady was buried
inside a carved,
stone
sarcophagus
(coffin) similar to
the pictures.
Clue 2: The Ivory Bangle Lady
was buried with several items,
including:
- A blue glass jug
- A glass mirror
Glass was expensive in the Roman
World so these are high status
objects.
A burial with
grave goods.
Blue glass jug Glass mirror
Clue 3: The Ivory Bangle
lady was buried with lots
of jewellery. She would
have been wearing most
of it when she was
buried.
Clue 4: The Ivory Bangle Lady was buried with two
bangles (bracelets).
The black bangle in the picture is made from a stone
called Jet. Jet can be dug up from the ground not far
from York. It was a fashionable (and expensive) stone
that the Romans made jewellery from.
The pale (white) bangle in the picture is made from
ivory. Ivory is made from the tusks of elephants.
It is not known whether the Ivory Bangle Lady was the first to own the
ivory bangle, or whether it was a family heirloom, past down when family
members died.
Clue 5: Look again at
the reconstruction of the
Ivory Bangle Lady’s face.
The radioisotope analysis
suggested that she was
mixed race.
One of her parents was
white.
One of her parents was
black.
Silver locket (necklace)
Glass beads
Glass earrings
You were asked to work out:
A. Whether the Ivory Bangle Lady was rich or poor?
B. Where the Ivory Bangle Lady, or her family, might have come from originally (where
they migrated from)?
What are your conclusions about the Ivory Bangle Lady?
You must use at least 2 pieces of evidence (facts) to back up each of your answers
(from her grave goods on the last page).
Use the map to help you with question B.
A. I think the Ivory Bangle lady was _____________________________________________
My evidence for this is ________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
B. ___________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
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Archaeologists have discovered that the Ivory Bangle Lady, or her ancestors, were
indeed from Africa.
More specifically, it has been proved that the Ivory Bangle
Lady, or her ancestors were from sub-Saharan Africa (from a
country below the Sahara Desert).
Along with the Ivory Bangle Lady, archaeologists
found roughly 200 Roman skeletons buried near
Sycamore Terrace in York. Radioisotope analysis has
proved that 12% of the skeletons found were
immigrants from Africa, mostly North Africa.
More evidence of African migrants to Roman Britain was found in 1934, in a
village called Beaumont in Cumbria (coloured red on the map). A stone was
found underneath an old cottage that was being demolished (knocked down).
There was an inscription (writing) on the stone in Latin (the language spoken
by the Romans). It said that a unit (small army) ‘of Aurelian Moors’ had been
based at the nearby Roman fortress of Aballava.
The Aurelian Moors were a group of soldiers from
North Africa, probably Libya, Tunisia or Algeria.
Two Roman Emperors were named on the stone –
Valerian and Gallienus. This evidence means we can
work out the rough date the stone was made –
somewhere between 253 and 258 AD. This means
that Africans were definitely living in Britain at that
time.
The fortress at Aballava
was part of Hadrian’s
Wall, a 6 metre high wall
that stretched 84 miles
across the boarder
between England and
Scotland. There was a
fortress every mile along
the wall. Most historians believe that the soldiers who
manned the fortresses were from North Africa, or the
Middle East, countries such as Syria, Iraq or Iran.
There is also evidence of immigrants from modern day
France, Italy, Spain and other European nations living
in Roman Britain – it was a very diverse place.
This isn’t really a surprise. Rome (in modern Italy)
controlled a huge Empire in Europe, Africa and Asia.
North Africa
Sub-Saharan
Africa
Complete task A (this page) or task B (next page)
1. What part of Africa was the Ivory Bangle Lady from?
Circle the area on the map.
2. What percentage of the 200 skeleton found in York were
immigrants from Africa?
_____________________________________________
C How many of the 200 skeletons found in York were
immigrants from Africa?
Write the number, not a percentage. __________________
_____________________________________________
_____________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
3. What city in the north of England were the Ivory Bangle Lady, and the other 200
skeletons found? Circle one.
4. Where in the north of England was the stone with Latin inscribed (written on it) found?
5. What was the unit of soldiers based at Roman fortress at Aballava called?
6. Where were the soldiers from originally? Try to name 3 places. ___________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
7. When was the stone made? Between ________________ and ________________
8. How many miles long was Hadrian’s Wall?
9. What two countries does Hadrian’s Wall separate? _____________________________
10. Where else did people migrate to Roman Britain from? Try to name at least 4 places.
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
11. Why might this evidence prove Enoch Powell was wrong? _________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
North Africa
Sub-Saharan
Africa
York Cumbria London
Preston in
Lancashire
Leeds in
Yorkshire
Beaumont
in Cumbria
Aurelian
Jaws
Aurelian
Moors
Aurelian
Boers
84 miles 87 miles 74 miles
C) Here, Olusoga links back to his
claim that Enoch Powell’s claims
in his speeches were incorrect.
1. How long before the Empire
(‘years of distant wandering’) did
the Beachy Head Lady live in
Britain?
2. How does his evidence prove
Powell was incorrect? __________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
3. What makes Olusoga’s evidence
so powerful here? _____________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
1) Here, Olusoga explains how
evidence has proved the Ivory
Bangle Lady was wealthy
1. Is it possible that the Ivory
Bangle Lady was Christian?
2. What evidence is there for this?
____________________________
____________________________
3. What do you think ‘high social
status’ might mean?
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
B. Black & British– David Olusoga
The now famous Ivory Bangle Lady is perhaps the most
significant individual to have emerged in York. On one of the
shards of her bones had been carved the inscription SOROR
AVE VIVAS IN DEO, which translates as ‘Hail sister, may you
live in God’, and suggests that she may have been a
Christian. In her sarcophagus were a number of luxury grave
goods: some blue glass beads, silver and bronze lockets,
two yellow glass earrings, two marbled glass beads, a small
round glass mirror and a blue glass perfume bottle. The
presence of these objects suggests that she was a woman of
high social status, from the upper strata of Roman York.
Another equally remarkable discovery was recently made in the seaside
town of Eastbourne, on the south coast of England. In 2012 local
archaeologists began to work their way through a collection of skeletons
excavated between 1900 and 1990. One skeleton was stored in a box
labelled ‘Beachy Head’. The remains were those of a young woman,
around five feet tall and probably in her early twenties. The
archaeologists arranged for forensic facial reconstruction to be carried out
by Professor Caroline Wilkinson, a leading figure in the field. Professor
Wilkinson was able to tell, merely by looking at the skull, that the skull of
the Beachy Head Lady was that of a sub-Saharan African. Radiocarbon
dating [test to discover the age of bones] placed the lady as having lived
around AD 125-245 and the results of the radioisotope analysis confirmed
she had spent much of her childhood in the south east of England.
The Beachy Head Lady was therefore a second-or third-century Afro-
Roman who had been brought up in the south of England and had either
been born in that region or was brought there very young possibly from
Africa. Over a millennium before the British people began their ‘years of
distant wandering’ and empire-building the Beachy Head Lady – the first
black Briton known to us – had lived and died in rural East Sussex, by the
English Channel coast with its white cliffs and green rolling hills.
Upper Strata
YES NO
100
years
500
years
1000
years Forensic facial
reconstruction
of the Beachy
Head Lady
White cliffs
near
Eastbourne
2) Here, Olusoga explains another
discovery.
1. What evidence has proved the
Beachy Head Lady was from sub-
Saharan Africa? _______________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
2. Why did Lionel Fitzherbert
Turpin migrate to Britain?
Enoch Powell – Claim Two
‘The English can revert [return] to being the people we were before the
ships of Elizabethan and Stuart England set off to forge the first British
Emprie in the Americas.’
Circle the image which best shows what Enoch Powell believed pre-colonial (before the
Empire) England was like.
What evidence from today’s lesson might go against Enoch Powell? Make a list.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
How far do you agree with Enoch Powell’s second claim (claim two)?
A. Circle a number 0-10 (10 = 100% agree)
B. Circle a word from the table below that you think best fits the number your circled.
C. Explain on the writing lines why you circled that number – use the word you circled in
your explanation.
How far do you agree?
Wholly
Entirely
Predominantly
Largely
Partially
Somewhat
Oppose
Dispute
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C Have we also found evidence to disprove Enoch Powell’s third claim?
Analyse Extract 3. Then circle the box which best summarises what Enoch Powell’s third
claim.
Extract 3: ‘For reasons which they could not comprehend the indigenous population found
themselves made strangers in their own country, their homes and neighbourhoods changed
beyond all recognition.’
What evidence might go against Enoch Powell? Think about all our lessons
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
How far do you agree with Enoch Powell’s second claim (claim two)?
A. Circle a number 0-10 (10 = 100% agree)
B. Circle a word from the table below that you think best fits the number your circled.
C. Explain on the writing lines why you circled that number – use the word you circled in
your explanation.
How far do you agree?
Wholly
Entirely
Predominantly
Largely
Partially
Somewhat
Oppose
Dispute
In the 1960s,
migration changed
nothing about the lives
of English people.
In the 1960s,
migration changed the
lives of English people,
but they understood,
and welcomed the
change.
In the 1960s,
migration changed the
lives of English people
and they did not know
why things had
changed.
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