Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

During a series of extensive rescue excavations, ahead of development in Dover’s town centre undertaken by Kent Archaeological Rescue Unit a building, a substantial Roman building consisting of 6 main rooms was uncovered lying on an east-west axis. This structure is today known as the ‘Painted House’ due to the vast quantity of painted wall plaster which was located, largely in situ, in association with it. The uncovered remains remain open to the public for viewing. Room 2, which was the best preserved of all of the excavated rooms, had a hypocaust heating system underlying an opus signinum floor. This heating system, which would have been fed by an external stoke hole, supplying heat to a set of channels beneath the floor and into vertical wall ducts. (location accurate to the nearest 2m based on available information)

Monument Types

• HYPOCAUST (Roman - 200 AD to 270 AD)

Full description

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(summarised from publication)

During a series of extensive rescue excavations, ahead of development in Dover’s town centre undertaken by Kent Archaeological Rescue Unit a building, a substantial Roman building consisting of 6 main rooms was uncovered lying on an east-west axis. This structure is today known as the ‘Painted House’ due to the vast quantity of painted wall plaster which was located, largely in situ, in association with it. The uncovered remains remain open to the public for viewing. Room 2, which was the best preserved of all of the excavated rooms, had a hypocaust heating system underlying an opus signinum floor. This heating system, which would have been fed by an external stoke hole, supplying heat to a set of channels beneath the floor and into vertical wall ducts.

The basic arrangement of the hypocaust beneath room two was an external stoke hole, which was situated against the southern wall of the room, fed a large southern central flue, this lead to a chamber beneath the middle of the floor measuring 1.8m by 1.8m. Within this chamber five pillars, of an original seven, survive each consisting of 13 tiles. This differs to the chamber in room one which contains only four pilae, it is likely that the central chamber in room two was built too large and the extra pillars were constructed to compensate for this. From this central chamber 7 channels radiated to each of the four corners of the rom and the centre of the sides, they measured 24-30cm in width and 64cm in height, while the central southern flue leading to the stoke hole was larger. These channels had been constructed in deep cuts made in the underlying deposits and natural brick earth and were lined with mortared chalk blocks and capped with corbelled arches. The hot air would have then passed from these channels into vertical wall ducts which consisted of box flue tiles built into the walls. The best preserved example of the inbuilt flue tiles within the walling is apparent in room two; here one example survives to a height of 1.45m above the floor and consisted of four and a half Box flue tiles. It is likely that these would have originally run up to the roof level. (1)

<1> Philp, B, 1989, The Roman House with Bacchic Murals at Dover (Monograph). SKE24004.

Sources and further reading

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