Falco’s Britannia with Lindsey Davis

12 July 2021

Call for availability

6 days

From £2,545

Activity Level:

Summary

Exploring Roman Britain with Lindsey Davis

This tour offers you the chance to visit some of the most important sites in Roman Britain alongside both an award-winning novelist and a well-known archaeologist. Your Guide Lecturer, Denise Allen, who has just written a book on Roman Britain, will provide you with cutting-edge commentary on the sites, while Lindsey Davis will give insights into how she conceived her Falco and Albia series, both with main characters who have had formative experiences in Britannia. Immerse yourself in Roman Britain as they knew it.

Tour highlights:

Great Bath, part of the Roman Baths in Bath

Statue of Roman Emperor Trajan and remains of the London Wall

Visit two superb Roman villas on the Isle of Wight
Gain an interesting insight into everyday life in Roman London
Discover the intrigue of Roman Bath in the company of an expert Guide Lecturer
Explore the Roman palace at Fishbourne for its history and place in the Falco novels

Book Now

Today's Price
£2,545

Call for availability

Deposit: £500 Single supplement: £520

Keeping you safe on your next tour

FREE 'Travel Safe' kits for every traveller
COVID-19 insurance
Self-drive options
Enhanced Health and Safety audits
Distanced seating on coaches
'Get me home' service and private airport transfers
COVID protocols at our hotels, and aboard our cruise ships
Packed lunches and flexible dining options
Flexible balance payment date and COVID-friendly refund conditions
COVID-testing and medical training for tour staff
Constant monitoring and post-tour tracing

Meet your Experts

Dr Denise Allen

Guide Lecturer

Dr Denise Allen began her archaeological career in the 1970s as an excavator on many British sites. She studied Archaeology at Cardiff University, with a PhD on Roman Glass.

View full bio

Lindsey Davis

Guide Lecturer

Lindsey Davis is a novelist known for her Roman detective, Marcus Didius Falco and her ongoing series about his daughter, Flavia Albia. She has also written standalone books, some set in English Civil War, and novellas. Her work has been dramatized for radio and is being developed for TV.

View full bio

Your itinerary

Day 1 - London

Our day in London starts with a visit to the Museum of London where we view the objects left behind by the people of the Roman capital, including leather undergarments, a garum amphora and a wooden ladder. In the afternoon, we visit the Billingsgate Roman baths and the Mithraeum.

Hotel	Grange Beauchamp Hotel
Meals included	Lunch, Dinner

Day 2 - Welwyn - St. Albans

In the morning, we visit the Roman baths at Welwyn preserved just north of modern-day Welwyn Garden City. We proceed to the ancient city of Verulamium, where we visit the only theatre visible above ground in Britain. Our final visit of the day takes us to Verulamium Museum, which contains beautiful colourful mosaics, a hoard of gold coins and many everyday objects excavated from the Roman town.

Hotel	Grange Beauchamp Hotel
Meals included	All meals included

Day 3 - Butser - Fishbourne

We travel to Butser Ancient Farm, to explore a reconstructed Romano-British housing, before proceeding to Chichester, where we see vestiges of what had been the heartland of King Togidubnus. We end the day at Fishbourne, the backdrop of a Falco novel, and believed by many to be Togidubnus’ palace, the opulence of which is evidence by its extraordinary mosaics.

Hotel	Royal Maritime Club Hotel, Portsmouth
Meals included	All meals included

Day 4 - Isle of Wight

We cross the water to the Isle of Wight where we visit Brading Villa, which has an extraordinary array of figurative mosaics, including the intriguing depiction of a man with a cockerel head. We continue to Newport Villa, with a well-preserved bath complex and frescoed walls.

Hotel	Royal Maritime Club Hotel, Portsmouth
Meals included	All meals included

Day 5 - Portchester - Old Sarum

This morning we venture to Portchester Castle, built inside the best-preserved curtain wall of any Roman fort in Northern Europe. It was built in the late 3rd century as the most westerly of the Saxon Shore Forts, protecting cross channel trade and defending against piratical raids. We continue to Old Sarum to consider the transition from Iron Age hill fort to important hub on the Roman road system to Saxon cathedral.

Hotel	Abbey Hotel, Bath
Meals included	All meals included

Day 6 - Bath - London

The bathing complex in Bath, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is intriguing for conflating a bathing complex with a sacred spring to the goddess Sulis. Our final visit is closely linked to the first Falco novel, namely the mines at Charterhouse, whose extraction of silver and lead was important for the payment of Roman soldiers.