Exhibitions and Artefacts

National Roman Legion Museum

Learn what made the Romans such a formidable force and how life wouldn't be the same without them.

Study the oldest recorded piece of writing in Wales, found in a well on the Museum site.

Witness one of the largest gemstone collections found anywhere in the Roman Empire. These precious, intricately carved gems were discovered beneath the fortress baths remains, lost by bathers between AD 80 and AD 230.

National Roman Legion Museum

Peer into the amazing contents of the Bathstone Coffin to find the bones of a 2nd/early 3rd century man, buried with a small glass perfume ointment bottle and a shale cup.

As well as many individual highlights, there is plenty of authentic

Roman pottery and other utensils on show in the gallery, including an iron frying pan sporting a folding handle to fit inside a soldier's pack.
National Roman Legion Museum

The reconstructed Barrack Room shows what the fortress barrack blocks (see

Roman Ruins) might have looked like inside, giving a sense of the living conditions for the Roman soldiers.

At weekends and school holidays (please call for exact dates), children can step back in time in a full-sized barrack room and try on replica armour and experience the life of a Roman soldier!