The Unknown Warrior by Richard Osgood

semi-sharp weapons. Various indications suggest that the human and animal bones lay for a time on the surface’ (Schlüter, 1999: 135–6). What is certain is that the site at Kalkriese was the location of a fairly important military engagement involving the Roman army – there are sufficient finds of Roman militaria and of human remains to demonstrate this. The majority of those who have examined the material are also firmly of the belief that all the evidence points to this being the major site of the Varusschlacht .
    UNKNOWN WARRIOR 3
    The remains of one of the victims at Kalkriese
    This skull, found with other bones, may well represent one of the men of the lost XVII, XVIII, or XIX Legions. The fact that it was associated with a jumble of other bones also indicates that the man’s remains had been left exposed to the elements for some time following his death prior to deposition in a pit. The interment may have occurred when Germanicus visited the site of the battle.
    It is impossible to tell whether this male, who had suffered a sword cut, was an officer or a standard infantryman – all suffered a similar fate. As such, this is a perfect example of an ‘unknown soldier’ found during the course of an archaeological excavation; although we can infer a great deal about the events that surrounded his death from the stratigraphy (even without recourse to the classical texts), we shall never know his name, or even his unit.
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    That same year the Frisii, a nation beyond the Rhine, cast off peace, more because of our rapacity than from their impatience of subjection … The soldiers appointed to collect the tribute were seized and gibbeted. Olennius anticipated their fury by flight, and found refuge in a fortress, named Flevum, where a by no means contemptible force of Romans and allies kept guard over the shores of the ocean …
    (Tacitus, Annals , iv , 72)
    The fort at Velsen I ( Flevum ) was the only one downstream from the Roman base at Vechten in the Netherlands and was thus of considerable strategic importance. In AD 28 it was attacked by the Frisians. It was held with some difficulty – detritus on the site, including a series of lead slingshots, attests to this. Excavations revealed a series of wells within the fortifications, several of which were found to contain human remains. One, in particular, was of interest, given that it held a virtually complete skeleton of a robust c. 25-year-old man, c. 1.90m in height, and with a dagger and sheath (Morel and Bosman, 1989: 167). The articulated body was supposedly found in a supine position (Constandse-Westermann, 1982: 139). Constandse-Westermann ( ibid. : 158) examined the possibility that this man was of Mediterranean or more local origin – something to which his equipment did not give any enlightenment, and concluded that he was probably the body of a ‘native, serving in the Roman army’ mainly from an examination of comparative statures of known contemporary Roman skeletal assemblages.
    The man’s skull had a crack in the right frontal/parietal area and some chipped-off bone splinters, which might have been caused by a blow of ante-or post-mortal origin (Constandse-Westermann, 1982: 141, 146–7). This ‘wound’ might have rendered the victim unconscious – leading to subsequent drowning in the well – had it occurred prior to death and if it was not fatal. The pathology is certainly not enough for us to state whether the man had been killed in combat or in an accident, murdered, or simply expired from disease or illness – the ‘wound’ being a post-mortem event.
    The well shaft in which the body was found was lined with a series of barrels with staves of spruce and silver fir. These might perhaps have held wine. Below the body, and present in the well prior to its decommissioning, were possible parts of the well-head equipment and bucket (Morel and Bosman, 1989: