Roman shrine discovered next to Leicester Cathedral
Archaeologists believe they've discovered a Roman shrine buried next to Leicester Cathedral.
An excavation project began at the site a year and a half ago by a team at the University of Leicester Archaeological Service (ULAS).
The team say the dig has given them a "remarkable amount of archaeological information" that is helping "tell the story of...Leicester."
Since Christmas, the team say they've been excavating an area beneath Leicester Cathedral, focusing on Roman archaeology.
During the dig, they found a cellar to a Roman building where they recovered the base of an altar stone - which they believe suggests the room was a shrine or a cult room in the Roman period.
Archaeologists at ULAS said: "The cellar is a well-made semi-subterranean structure with painted stone walls and a concrete floor. Today, that floor is over 3m below the ground, and it would have been around a meter below the contemporary Roman ground surface.
"The sunken room was probably built in the 2nd century AD and was accessed in the south-west corner via an external passageway. This had timber walls and a flagstone floor. The cellar was deliberately dismantled and infilled, probably in the late 3rd or 4th century, and within the space, lying broken and face down amidst the rubble, we found the base to an altar stone.
"It is carved from local Dane Hills sandstone, quarried 1 mile west of the site near Western Park, and measures 25cm by 15cm. There are decorative mouldings on three sides and the back is plain, showing that it would have been placed against a wall. Originally, it would have stood higher than it was wide, perhaps around 60cm tall, but it is broken mid-shaft and the upper part of the pedestal and the capital are missing.
'This was a room linked with the worship of a god or gods,' archaeologists say.
Mathew Morris, Project Officer at ULAS who led the excavations, believes the room could've been a place of worship: “Given the combination of a subterranean structure with painted walls and the altar we have found, one interpretation, which seemed to grow in strength as we excavated more, could be that this was a room linked with the worship of a god or gods. What we're likely looking at here is a private place of worship, either a family shrine or a cult room where a small group of individuals shared in private worship.
“Underground chambers like this have often been linked with fertility and mystery cults and the worship of gods such as Mithras, Cybele, Bacchus, Dionysius and the Egyptian goddess Isis.
"Sadly, no evidence of an inscription survived on our altar, but it would have been the primary site for sacrifice and offerings to the gods, and a key part of their religious ceremonies."
The discovery of a Roman altar at Leicester Cathedral would be the first of its kind to be found in the city.
Mathew Morris went on to say the discovery could mean a popular local folk tale is true: "For centuries there has been a tradition that a Roman temple once stood on the site of the present Cathedral. This folk tale gained wide acceptance in the late 19th century when a Roman building was discovered during the rebuilding of the church tower.
"The origins of this story have always been unclear but given that we’ve found a potential Roman shrine, along with burials deliberately interred into the top of it after it was demolished, and then the church and its burial ground on top of that, are we seeing a memory of this site being special in the Roman period that has survived to the present day? We may never know, but the next stage of the project, the analysis of the burials, will help us find more answers."