Archaeologists Digging up a Construction Site Just Found a Lost Roman Fortress

3 min readqHere’s what you’ll learn when you read this story:Archaeologists uncovered details about an early Roman fortified camp in Switzerland ahead of a residential building project. The team expanded on a previous find of a V-shaped ditch to discover a defensive wall that was likely constructed in the early first century C.E. Artifacts discovered at the site indicate one district of the camp was a dedicated workshop area.Roman artisans baked bread alongside blacksmiths working at a forge within a first-century C.E. fortified military camp recently discovered in Switzerland. Ahead of construction of a planned residential community in Windisch, a team of 20 archaeologists spent 11 months sifting through a 43,000-square-foot site, uncovering remnants of a legionaries’ fort and tools of ancient trades.In a translated statement, the Canton of Aargau detailed the excavation—which was led by the Cantonal Archaeology Department and funded by a grant. The team’s findings offer a clear picture of the original camp’s footprint, along with evidence of daily life inside the Roman fort.Archaeologists already figured the site was worth exploring. More than 90 years ago, researchers found a V-shaped ditch they believed was part of a military camp within Königsfelden Park. The new excavation at Zürcherstrasse expands on that knowledge, showing the camp’s southern timber-and-earth wall alongside the V-shaped ditch. The ditch ran about 230 feet south of the military camp’s wall and turned northwest just outside the excavation area.While the material recovered so far makes it tricky to precisely date the wall’s construction, experts believe it went up during the early reign of Emperor Tiberius, possibly shortly after 14 C.E. Thanks to the vegetation growth patterns on the wall, they believe that after construction the people abandoned it, before repairs brought the wall back into action by the fourth century.The wall represents a prominent example of a Roman military camp at Vindonissa, but further excavations revealed details of life inside the walls. Beneath a more recent Roman road in the western part of the site, archaeologists uncovered a building about 30 feet wide and at least 100 feet long that had rooms and antechambers. Experts believe the site offered barracks for the legionaries, some of history’s first professional soldiers.To the east, just inside the wall, excavations revealed the remains of an oven for baking bread. Next door sat an even older building, likely from the settlement’s pre-fort era. A blacksmith’s field forge sat inside it. Taken together, the two discoveries show that a workshop district likely existed just inside the fort’s defensive walls. Artifacts around the area—and outside the walls—revealed blacksmithing implements and leatherworking tools, and the team also found the base stone of a Roman hand mill. Earlier this year, they discovered a shockingly well-preserved loaf of Roman bread.The layers of debris sitting just outside the camp contained coins dating from the Roman Republic to Late Antiquity, along with plenty of tools that belonged to both soldiers and civilians. In addition to the items pivotal for the workshops, archaeologists dug up two handles fitting Roman surgical scalpels and a gold aureus minted during the reign of Emperor Tiberius. There was a touch of elegance to the site too, with a carnelian gem depicting Victoria, the goddess of victory, found outside the walls.With excavations finished, construction crews plan to build the residential community, aptly dubbed Via Romana.Tim Newcomb is a journalist based in the Pacific Northwest. He covers stadiums, sneakers, gear, infrastructure, and more for a variety of publications, including Popular Mechanics. His favorite interviews have included sit-downs with Roger Federer in Switzerland, Kobe Bryant in Los Angeles, and Tinker Hatfield in Portland.