Piercebridge Roman Bridge.
The Roman road from York to the North of England crossed the river Tees at this point. Portions of masonary that where interprested as a Roman bridge were found in 1972 in advance of gravel quarrying. In order to be a bridge the river Tees must have moved it's course since this "bridge" was in use. Only the lowest element survive. A the base of the peers is a washway of large irregular flagstones, on these were built the peers which carried a timber roadway. Remains of a causeway and its revetment can be seen to the southern end of the site.
This interpretation however is not without it's problems. For example, the current river rises during winter to a very strong current of up to 8 feet deep. As can be seen below, the peer had post holes for the causeway only a foot above the river floor, surely a poor design for a bridge?
From the top of the remaining peer, an Iron strap - "Opus Revinctum" can be seen, also the stones, though irregular, are still tightly fitted together.
A model of Piercebridge bridge. The top bridge is the location of the original Roman bridge. The posts half way down show the location of a newly discovered and as yet unidentified "third" bridge at Piercebridge. At the bottom of the picture is the location for the second "bridge". Note also the river cutting, which Ray Selkirk suggest may be also of Roman origin.
The pavement of the spillway. This is another unexplained feature of the "bridge", If you are to build a bridge, why pave the riverbed?
Opus Revinctum
An interesting aspect of the broken masonry of the second bridge, is the methods of strengthening used by the Romans - Opus Revinctum is the bonding together of adjacent block of stone using iron straps, tethered to the rock by lead.
An iron strap has been removed here, revealing the lead tethers.
Another method of bonding stones was to poor lead into holes in butted stone faces, the stone above may be an example of this.
Was it a bridge or was it a dam?
Was it a bridge?
To interpret this structure as a bridge, one would have to accept some inconsistencies in the physical evidence; firstly, the bridge timbers are definately set too low. One foot off the river bed for a tidal river prone to seasonal flooding seems very odd. To say that the river at this place and at the time of building was particularly wide does not fit with the geography on the environs or the practicalities of bridge building. The paved riverbed is also an anomoly and indicates that human activity was present on this surface. The pavement carries on for the full width of the bridged area, as if any water present was not expected to be very deep.
Was it a dam and spillway?
This interpretation is also problematic, firstly, the timber slots for the dam "walkway" are too low also, if this construction were a dam then surely water levels would be expected to rise at this point also? This is perhaps a minor point, since the assumption of a dam means the water was in a conrtolled state, not uncontrolled as in the case of a bridge. The location of the spillway is also an issue. In this case the "spillway" starts before the dam. Normally, dams and wier, where such things exist have spillways downstream of the dam. Also there is no evidence of "sluice" workings that would be needed to control the water.
However, these issues do raise some an interesting point, this structure seems to have been built in an environment where water was under control - the bridge timbers cannot have been built with the idea of the Tees in flood in mind. Perhaps the question of if it is a dam is too narrow a focus? perhaps the question should be, is this part of a wider riverworks complex aimed at controlling and using the Tees for maximum benefit?
© Brigantes Nation 2002