A Roman Camp

No prizes offered for guessing that the name Caistor derives from Castrum, the Latin term for a fortress or camp.  There's no evidence of a fortress here so let's stick with camp, even if this wood carving suggests something very military.  

We've got little bits of Roman wall including this bit behind the parish church.  I know it looks like part of someone's rockery but I promise it is part of a Roman wall.  It has its own blue plaque to prove it!

A few years ago the local co-op built a new shop, or rather they converted a pub to create a shop.  When the pub carpark was excavated a Roman cemetery was discovered with forty six sets of human remains, including men, women and children,  They were dated to the fourth century.

Local tradition says that Simon the Zealot (one of the twelve apostles) was martyred here in AD61 on the orders of the Roman Procurator Catus Decianus.  However Beirut, Jerusalem and Turkey also lay claim to being the saint's place of death.  

So Caistor isn't just a pretty town!