Chester and ‘Rotten Romans’, with Scotland the Brave

Welcome back to the adventures of Scotland The Brave in Great Britain. He explored London, Stonehenge and Bath, Plymouth, Glastonbury, Cardiff and Ludlow.  Now our bold traveller and his Guardians continue to Chester.

Along the way, they saw more lovely green countryside, much of it damp from recent rain. Rain is something that any small teddy bear from Australia enjoys seeing – from the comfort of the dry, warm coach, of course.

Borders: And here is another wonder: the road they followed crossed back and forth from the paddocks of sheep of one country, England, to the paddocks of sheep of another country, Wales. Fancy that, two whole countries in one afternoon drive! Apart from the road signs saying so, Scotty couldn’t tell the difference. Did the sheep know?

Chester is a smidgen on the English side of the invisible border that Scotty couldn’t see. The original name, Castro Deva, means “military camp on the River Dee.” The fort was home to the Twentieth Legion (Valeria Victrix).  The Romans put the legion there to control the land of the Celtic Cornovii. The fact that the Cornovii were there first did not impress the Romans who were in the rotten business of Conquering.

As well as their conquering, and then holding down the conquests, and sometimes losing the conquests, and having to reconquer the conquests, the Roman troops built stuff. They built roads and walls and forts and buildings and baths. The walls in the picture above are actually medieval but the ruins below them are Roman. They are part of the original walls and buildings of the fort.

Scotty had learned when he was in the city of Bath, that the Romans would pause their conquering long enough to take baths. Here in Chester too they built baths. They even heated the floors and the water. The remains of the baths are still here today.

Near the baths are the remains of a Roman cemetery too. The people of Chester nowadays have made a very pleasant garden from it all.

Not so pleasant and shown in the pics below is one of the good reasons to call Romans ‘rotten’. (Apologies to Horrible Histories.) These show the remains of the Roman amphitheatre in Chester.

This was the biggest amphitheater in Britain and perhaps held 7000 spectators for the often gruesome games. There is the sand of the dreaded ‘arena’ where many animals and sometimes people were sent to die.

Some of the ‘entertainment’ would have included cock fighting and bull baiting. There was classical boxing, wrestling and, most importantly, gladiatorial combat. Scotty is delighted to report to you that the arena is no longer used for anything except looking at.

Romans still roam about in the streets of Chester today, but these are not the conquering sort, thank goodness. They are pretend Romans wearing quite authentic looking gear. These fine chaps escort cohorts of school children around the town to show them how the Romans lived and did things. The only actual soldiers that Scotty saw were toy ones guarding liquorice.

In the next episode Scotty rides a steam train in the Lake District and then takes a cruise on Lake Windermere. Don’t miss that one! (Click on the FOLLOW buttons so as to not miss anything.

BOOKS with Scotland in them (our Scotty, that is)

Scotty is the star of a very special book called When A Brave Bear Fights Cancer: A Get Well Soon Gift by Carola Schmidt. In the book, Scotty a little bear who gets a bad sickness called cancer. He’s worried and often scared because cancer is scary.  But the doctors and nurses and other patients help him. The book is to help kids feel much more brave when they are getting treatment. It’s available in paperback and Kindle. Look for the brave little bear wearing trews on the cover.

Scotty in books by Mawson

You can also see Scotty in all the books by Mawson. One is called It’s A Bright World To Feel Lost In (in that one he delivers the post) and another is She Ran Away From Love (he delivers the post again.) In Dreamy Days and Random Naps you can see him being a king and also a superb guitarist. Don’t miss that one! This is what the books look like:

Mawson’s Guardian says: You can find Mawson’s books on this Link here, and on his Writer-Bear Page on Amazon.

You have wandered into Mawson Bear’s web-den. Mawson is a Ponderer of Baffling Things (between naps) and the Writer-Bear of It’s A Bright World To Feel Lost In  and She Ran Away From Love.

‘This little story made me well up. A lovely, poignant story with delightful illustrations.’ Jackie Law, Amazon Top 500 reviewer, about It’s A Bright World To Feel Lost in.

The book brings back such nostalagic memories that it made it comforting, like a  old security blanket.’  FNM Book reviews about Bright World.