At the beginning of this millennium, as the nation, led by any number of television producers, seems to ponder its history a little more closely, Colchester's role in early Britain looks increasingly pivotal. For, two thousand years ago, this most ancient of British towns was spanning the cross-over between pre-history and history just before the Romans came to stay. From the embryonic political organisation of that time would come a nationhood of sorts, after another millennium or so, anyway.

It was no accident that Claudius, when he finally invaded in AD 43, made his base at what is now Colchester because that wedge of land between the Colne and the Roman River was already a major Iron Age settlement. It wasn't a town as such - the Romans built the first towns in Britain - but ranged over ten square miles of flat pasture and woodland with groups of cultivated fields, all bound together by earth dykes. There would have been cattle, sheep, pigs, goat and deer, and in the fields - ditched to exclude grazing animals - wheat, barley, oats, peas and beans. Small clusters of round thatched houses and other structures would have dotted the area with greater concentrations at Gosbecks and at Sheepen to which shallow draught boats would come up the Colne, having probably loaded from sea going vessels moored in the stretch now between Fingringhoe and Wivenhoe.

Its name in its Romanised form, Camulodunum - stronghold (-dunum) of Camulos, the Celtic god of war - came from the earth dykes which protected it, 12 miles of them, the largest group of their kind and vintage in Britain. Their existence suggests conflict which is still only vaguely understood, partly because whoever was calling the shots in those days didn't write things down, depending instead on bards with good memories. But it was probably between the Trinovantes who at one time held most of modern Essex and the Catuvellauni broadly of Hertfordshire.

Both tribes already knew the Romans from Julius Caesar's second expedition of 54 BC. The story goes that the Trinovantes had appealed to Caesar to protect a certain Madubracius whose father had been murdered by one Cassivellaunus, probably a Catuvellaunian. Caesar duly found Cassivellaunus and captured his stronghold, taking hostages, an annual tribute to Rome and an undertaking to leave Madubracius and the Trinovantes alone.

But in the decades up to the Claudian invasion the area still seems to have been embraced by Catuvellaunian expansion, probably because by then it suited Rome. Trade had built up, particularly with the Catuvellauni whose aristrocrats liked imports from the empire. They paid for them in supplies important to the army and in gold, silver, slaves and hunting dogs, items of direct interest to Rome's rich and to the then emperor Augustus himself. He and his successor Tiberius did not intervene even when the Catuvellaunian king, Cunobelin, established his base at Camulodunum and came to control the lucrative trade route to the Rhine.

Cunobelin is the central figure after the turn of the millennium, though not much is known about the man himself. He was described by one Roman writer as King of the Britons and obviously had wide influence. He minted his first coins around AD 5 from Camulodunum.

The founding date of the settlement is also unclear although its name first appears on coins from around 20-15 BC. Most of the defensive dykes probably date from that last century BC, combining with the two rivers to form a three-sided defence. Caesar had earlier noted the Britons' use of chariots, each of which conveyed a warrior to battle and then withdrew until needed. There were thousands of them, a degree of usage which helps to explain the size and complexity of these earthworks, particularly if, as seems possible, Camulodunum was an intrusion into someone's territory. They each consisted of a V-shaped ditch with the spoil heaped up to make a simple bank behind it. The largest, the Lexden Dyke, had ditches 11' deep and a total unbroken slope of 25'. Today, several are footpaths in suburban Colchester.

Archaeologists say that Cunobelin's main settlement was at what is now Gosbecks. It was essentially a large farm with substantial industrial and commercial elements. Its relatively small population probably included the king's extended family, mercenaries, agricultural workers and craftsmen.

But three burial sites underline the wider status of Camulodunum. In a 1924 excavation, the Lexden tumulus yielded what is possibly the burial of the king, Addedomaros, thought to have been Trinovantian. Among many items, the most significant was a silver medallion with the head of Augustus cut from a Roman coin. The coin, struck between 18 and 16 BC, means the grave could be no earlier and suggests that the people involved were not antagonistic to Rome.

Another burial at Stanway probably in use from the 1st century BC to about AD60 had wooden mortuary chambers with two of the graves containing the remains of drinking vessels and pottery plates. But grand though the burials were, the internees were probably not kings or queens but mere high rankers in Cunobelin's circle.

At Gosbecks, another burial site could be that of Cunobelin himself. It is similar to another at St Albans in Catevellauni territory; both were rich in grave goods and both subsequently had a Roman temple built on them.

Two thousand years ago, British and Roman rule seems to have been dovetailing, but when Cunobelin's death in AD 40 or 41 AD triggered more inter-tribal conflict, it was to provide both an excuse and an opportunity for the Claudian invasion. Camulodunum was certainly already important enough for Claudius to want to join the invasion force at the Thames so that he could lead the capture in person. It quickly became the most important settlement in the country, if it was not already.

A few years later, Claudius started the construction of what he might have intended to be the first capital town of Britain but in AD60/61, that was destroyed in the little local difficulty with Boudica. That of course is another story.

Further reading: City of Victory by Philip Crummy, published by Colchester Archaeological Trust.

Reproduced by kind permission of John Worrall © 2002