The Rise and Fall of Roman Britain

The Romans ruled Britain from 43 A.D.– 410 A.D. During those centuries, the Romans drew the island into a tight web of international trade and imperial political intrigue. But the island’s conquerors also introduced innovations that eventually transformed this Roman province.  

Historian Jennifer Paxton explores the complicated impact of Roman rule on Britain. She describes how the response of Britain’s Celtic-speaking tribes to the Roman challenge included a revolt in 61 A.D. led by the now-legendary Queen Boudicca of the Iceni, which nearly destroyed the newly founded Roman province. She discusses recent archaeological discoveries that shed new light on how the Romans shaped the economy of Britain by establishing Mediterranean-style agriculture, developing the mining resources of the southwest, and creating a network of roads and settlements that have shaped the British landscape to this day, including Londinium, the vital port on the River Thames.

Paxton explores the surprising key role Britain played in third- and fourth-century political upheavals that rocked the wider Roman world and brought on economic decline, civil unrest, and attacks by external enemies. She also describes new archaeological techniques that have illuminated this otherwise dark period, which saw both the arrival of Christianity in Britain and the start of the Germanic settlements that would eventually transform Roman Britain into Anglo-Saxon England.   

Paxton is clinical associate professor of history and director of the University Honors Program at The Catholic University of America.

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