Hadrian's Wall - Vindolanda Walkthrough - using "Medieval Engineers" software

Vindolanda Roman fort sat just behind Hadrian's Wall, and was occupied from the late 1st century until well after the Roman Empire had faded away. It's a remarkable place with a long and remarkable history. It's also one of the best-excavated & best-understood Roman forts & towns anywhere. Using the Medieval Engineers software, and 85 years of archaeological reports, I have put together a reconstruction of the fort and town as it would have been about AD 235. Every building I placed in the town (and most in the fort itself) are known from actual archaeology.
To see more -- and to download and walk through the world yourself -- please visit my Vindolanda page on the Steam website: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles.... Also visit www.vindolanda.com to see what's happening on-site now and follow the excavations.
Music from Maciej Kulesza - "Nothing's Left" on www.jamendo.com
And a big shout-out & thank-you to Steam users and Medieval Engineers modders Montmorency, Jugbot, and Yurand2000, whose terrain and block items really add to the realism of any build.

[@davinryanaaron]

I wish all historic sites would create animations like this, even if some of the details are "best guess". It helps to imagine what it would have looked like when in use.

[@WhoCaresWinsAgain]

Excellent video I love Vindolanda, I first visited in the 1970’s with my parents when we lived in Brampton. I now live in Lazonby and spent a very happy 2 weeks digging Vindolanda last year. Returned to Vindolanda again with my wife two weeks ago to be amazed at how much has been uncovered and discovered even in the last year alone. Anyone that has not been and has a slight interest in Roman history must visit and be amazed at the wonderful museum. Best site in my opinion along the whole wall. 👍👍👍

[@jaspercooper1741]

Really enjoyed this video. Me and my mother dig at Vindolanda ever year. I’m sending her this video to watch. Thank you 😊

[@Stori3d_Past]

Thank you much for the note! I'm jealous. It has been far too long now since I have had a chance to dig at Vindolanda, I'm hoping it won't be much longer.

[@jamesellsworth9673]

Wonderful video. The bits and pieces one can see at Vindolanda today don't begin to convey the magnitude of Roman era achievement in Britain.

[@Stori3d_Past]

Well said. It's very difficult to see foundations in the ground and really "feel" what a site would have been like when it was a living, breathing place.

[@CatonaWall175]

Very interesting.Thank you.

[@mavisemberson8737]

Just a thought about soldiers barracks . I seem to remember that the soldiers cooked their own food. They had braziers made of bronze I think. The main food was the bread from the bread ovens but a brazier in a hut with several soldiers quartered in them would be warm .though perhaps not a good idea to use charcoal in an unventilated place,

[@sikViduser]

In spite of the fact that the models you build are in low poly, albeit very well made, they still manage to transport me to those vistas. I can almost hear the hustle and bustle, smell the bread ovens and feel as though I'm walking those grounds myself. Thanks for sharing

[@braddo7270]

Im British and see hadrians wall a lot, but never seen it rendered like this... its crazy, looks like skyrim. Love the story of hadrian too, with antinous.

[@brandonyates7990]

Great job really interesting.

[@Stori3d_Past]

Thanks a lot, I appreciate that!

[@stumccabe]

Enjoyed, but a slight criticism - the interiors, especially for high ranking people would surely have been plastered and decorated and been more elegant and luxurious.

[@Stori3d_Past]

You're right & there's been some really great recent scholarship on some of the painted plaster walls elsewhere that have been excavated. The issue here was just that none of those assets were in the game software so everything "Roman" had to be modded into the game one piece at a time. If you see my later Pompeii videos, I had been able to spend more time on livening up those interiors.

[@mavisemberson8737]

Exactly! I was able to mend and restore Roman plaster from similar sites in a museum . Officers quarters often have remnants of the plaster in pieces near the foundations.

[@Reelion]

I stumbled upon your video after visiting Vindolanda for the first time and was so happy to hear about this project! Sad to hear that the build is not supported anymore and doesn't work on the new version of Medieval Engineers :( Thanks a lot for the video with a glimpse into it!

[@nicholasphelps3872]

I used to question whether there was medieval wattle and daub in the Roman Empire until I saw the House of Opus in Herculeum which was buried by Vesuvius.

[@lauragagne8235]

this is incredible. I love it.

[@Stori3d_Past]

Laura Gagne Thanks much! They've been a lot of fun to do

[@lauragagne8235]

I hope you don't mind if I share it with my class.

[@Stori3d_Past]

Not at all. I would be thrilled!

[@cyndiknapp4904]

Excellent presentation.

[@speshul7525]

Love your video. Your videos are better than going to a class with a boring professor, who knows nothing

[@brianbitmap]

Brilliant!

[@bluebuttonsproductions2029]

You deserve more subscribers! =)

[@Stori3d_Past]

Haha, thanks much! I definitely need to start putting out more frequent content to help get the subscriber numbers up.

[@cindymossor1993]

Steph&Andy I Agree👍

[@cristinabarberis4279]

Amazing job

[@Meganec3810]

I need to go to northern England now thank you!!

[@stevenprofit83]

And if anyone visits there’s a great pub ( the twice brewed inn) not far away what does good food and good choice of single malt whiskeys 👌

[@set1896]

indeed, that was me 2 weeks ago staying the next door hostel and ordering dinner from the inn as part of my hadrian's wall hike.

[@stevenprofit83]

I stayed at the campsite over the road from the pub well 100mtrs down the road and couldn’t fault the place them steps up the cliff face first thing in the morning when you join back onto Hadrian’s wall are a wake up call aswell😂

[@set1896]

​@@stevenprofit83 nice, was a great, mental, physical and educational experience!

[@royfearn4345]

Interesting but visually fanciful!

[@adamg3938]

Amazing

[@RJsermon]

AWESOME

[@lawrieflowers8314]

Very impressive and very interesting! However, I can’t help thinking that living in virtually unheated stone buildings, especially with the climate up in the North of England, can’t have been much fun for the majority of the occupants there. It would be just bearable today with modern hi-tech clothing, so how they managed to endure it is a bit of a puzzle…

[@Stori3d_Past]

One thing I wish I had been able to show off better was the hearths and probably also the braziers. There was probably always a fire going somewhere inside, or if not inside then a fire outside and stone or copper vats inside -- braziers -- to hold red-hot coals brought inside to give off their heat. It was probably a smoky environment with itchy noses & watery eyes & sooty cheeks. And I bet could be pretty miserable on the worst days. But livable.

[@lawrieflowers8314]

@@Stori3d_Past Yes, they would have had fires somewhere, but I wonder about the fuel they used? Presumably it wasn’t coal, so that leaves wood. Apart from the great labour involved in cutting, transporting, splitting, then storing it to season for at least a year etc. they would have quickly denuded the countryside around them, which anyway looks rather bleak & bare.

[@Stori3d_Past]

@@lawrieflowers8314 I think this is part of where the famous Roman logistics comes in. In addition to a granary shipping system (one of the huge forts on the east coast was at one point *all* granaries!), they must have been shipping other things like fuel. Because you're right, there weren't a ton of trees even 2000 years ago. They probably also used local peaty earth, and horse dung. A part-cavalry fort like Vindolanda would have had 120 cavalry horses (plus pack animals), producing multiple tons of dung every day.

[@michelemandrioli4720]

I hope they had latrines for the horses, too.

[@Mastertechnomusic]

great

[@Stori3d_Past]

Thank you!

[@aka99]

awsome. imagine this video in an assasins creed discovery tour. would be freaking nice

[@plinkbottle]

Don't see any tall chimneys on those buildings, How did they keep warm

[@Stori3d_Past]

A very good question, and not easy to answer. In my reconstruction, I placed small hearths basically in the edge of the doorway of each individual barrack block. There is evidence from excavation of hearths there, meaning that the smoke probably wafted out the open door. Domestic fireplaces with nice chimney flues were apparently not really done during this era, so it does beg the question of where a house got its heat & what did they do with all the smoke. Especially since the roofs seem to have been either tile or thin stones, meaning there was no porous thatch to let the smoke out. In Pompeii they've found braziers and hot boxes -- basically just metal containers where very hot coals could be put in as a kind of portable heater. It may be that on Hadrian's Wall they did the same.

[@plinkbottle]

@@Stori3d_Past We did that on trains in fairly recent times as I have experienced them. It was like a car muffler full of concrete and put into carriages as a foot warmer.

[@stevejohnson6111]

As with most/all these ancient Roman places in Britain, what happened to all the buildings? Were they all plundered for later medieval building work. I suppose like all buildings, if they're just left unoccupied and not maintained they eventually collapse then your left with all that useful material

[@Stori3d_Past]

It's a question I've asked myself and experts many times. There was *so much* stone used in all of these forts, and walls and barracks, and villas, etc. And so little left standing. I think really, the problem was using southern construction techniques in a harsh & wintry northern climate. I do think that many of them just fell apart after too many frosty winters, and tumbled over. Some were definitely recycled into other old buildings like churches (there's one about 45 minutes south of Hadrian's Wall called "Escomb" built in AD700 almost entirely from stone taken from a ruined nearby Roman fort). Probably most of the old stones went into field walls, or if they were made of limestone blocks they were burned down to quicklime for mortar or fertilizer. A lot of farms on Hadrian's Wall have old inscribed stones built into them, so probably much of the rest of the stonework came from the Wall & forts too.

[@mecouc]

Field boundaries in the area are marked by dry stone walls. I reckon most of these are built with Roman stone. They all look neatly rectangular blocks, whereas these farm walls are normally made of any old shaped stone you can find.

[@mavisemberson8737]

A lot of timber building was unrecognised in previous excavations the excavators being convinced that Romans built only in stone or brick. See York Roman camp. Someone has wondered if old remains of timber cleared away years ago were not a Church. Churches are likely but their foundations are not of stone and earlier excavations missed them. BTW Was there no brick at Vindolanda?

[@yippee8570]

[@Archaeos0up]

Interesting video - but you need to get on top of your pronunciation. In particular, the Romans did not have a 'soft' C. Principia should be pronounced 'Prinkipia'. There are also a few decorative elements here which stray into the realm of the middle ages but altogether very good! I would love to work with you one day on recreating the story of a site!?

[@Stori3d_Past]

Hello! Thanks much for the visit and the note! Yes, the "sss" C was a conscious choice -- and a double-edged one. Just like I know Cicero was "Kikero," but he's so ingrained in common culture as "Sisero" it sounds jarring to say it properly. By the same vein, I think we should pronounce the site "Windolanda," but I'd be laughed at if I did! I'm working hard to add to the software's ability to re-create properly Roman-era buildings and accessories. Since I uploaded this video, I've created a full mod of low-pitched roofing, which gives the buildings a better period look. The next big mod will be amphorae and decorations like pila and 3rd C auxiliary shields. And so on. Lots to do, but I'm hoping to really up the game. I appreciate your suggestion a lot, and yes, absolutely I would love to work with you on a recreation. I'm very bullish on what this latest technology can do to bring sites back to life.

[@Archaeos0up]

Bullish is good :D

[@lisashears1399]

I think you have done a great job. Always someone who thinks they can do better. Great job. Thank you for such an great video xx

[@Archaeos0up]

@@lisashears1399 Oh definitely couldn't do better. It's brilliant :D

[@Julia90005]

прівет кемошнікі 2 англ группа щастя здоровя діточок побільше целую ваша любімая староста і ілья кокпил

[@l.n.9462]

People should rebuild ruins such as these

[@wilmetteentwistle9242]

I like the attention to detail but, I don't think Romans would allow weeds to grow against buildings or between cobblestone.

[@mavisemberson8737]

Many of the troops would likely not be Romans and in the township their "wives " would not have been Roman but local women. It is not a Roman settlement layout.

[@royfearn4345]

Not weeds, maybe, but herbs?