To build or not to build a wall

Greenhead, 9th August – Emperor Hadrian did not need Ryanair for his traveling. The man from Italica, close to nowadays Seville in the Roman province Hispania, visited Britannia in AD 122. Hadrian was fed up with the rebellions in Judea, Mauretania, Libya and - at the same time - in the north of Roman Britain. Therefore, he built a wall of 120km from Wallsend to the Solway Firth. He wanted the Picts to bump into something hard. The construction of the wall took six years. Hadrian did what he said. Unlike Walter Ulbricht, who said nobody had the intention to build a wall in Berlin and started the day after to build one. Unlike Donald Trump, who says he will build a wall and will never do.  Legions of archaeologists keep on discovering new things about the Roman way of life. Set in one of the most spectacular landscapes of Britain, the wall and its museums are worth a visit. I learnt that most of the legionnaires guarding the wall came from warmer Gaul and Hispania.  I suppose their running noses and wet feet would have been more bearable if they would have known their wall is now Unesco World Heritage.

Hadrian's Wall close to Birdoswald (KVV)

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