The Balkerne Gate is one of the best-preserved sections of the Roman wall in Colchester and the oldest surviving Roman gateway in Britain (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)
Patrick Comerford
During our visit to Colchester earlier this week, I walked alongside parts of the Roman wall, which is the earliest and the best-preserved Roman town wall in Britain. The walls were once almost 6 metres high, with six gates, and the length of the circuit of the entire wall is 2,800 metres (1¾ miles).
Only two of the six gates survive above ground today, but the locations of the other four are marked by metal plaques and strips in the pavement, and three further gates were added to the wall in the mediaeval period.
The Romans began building the wall between 65 CE and 80 CE after the destruction of the town during the revolt by Boudicca, Queen of the Iceni. When she rebelled against Roman rule, one of her first acts was to destroy Colchester, then the Roman town of Camulodunum and capital of the new Roman colony of Britannia.
The Roman legions of Camulodunum were away on campaign, and Boudicca was almost unopposed. After moving on to sack St Albans and London, she was eventually defeated, but the ease with which she had taken Colchester alarmed the Roman authorities. They set about building a wall around Camulodunum to defend the town and its inhabitants against further attacks and as a statement of Roman power.
The Romans began building the wall around 70 CE and finished it around 90 CE. It took about 40,000 tonnes of building material and was built by legionaries and local Britons. The area that is now Essex had no good quality building stone, so the wall was built of fired clay bricks, flint and septaria, a brittle stone brought from the coast near Walton-on-the-Naze and Harwich. The wall was built over a foundation trench 3 metres wide and 1.2 metres deep, and that was filled with layers of brick and mortar.
The clay for bricks was dug locally. Much of Essex was heavily forested at the time, supplying wood for firing the clay to make bricks. The lime for making mortar came from Kent. The Romans also used material left behind by Boudicca’s army.
The Romans began building the wall in Colchester after the destruction of the town by Boudicca (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)
Above ground, the wall consisted of: inner and outer faces built of courses of clay bricks and stone blocks, ‘dressed’ to a roughly square shape, and an inner core of rubble and mortar. In many places, the outer and inner faces were removed after the Roman period and used in new building projects in the town so that only the rubble core remains. However, the outer face survives near Balkerne Gate.
The wall was freestanding when it was first built. After about 100 years, an internal bank was added to strengthen the wall, and can still be seen in Castle Park, close to Duncan’s Gate. The wall included a series of rectangular towers and drains. None of the towers survive above ground, but the bases of several towers have been seen in archaeological excavations.
In the Roman period, the wall had six gates located at regular intervals. Of these only two survive above ground today: Balkerne Gate and Duncan’s Gate. The area around the Balkerne Gate is one of the best-preserved sections of the Roman wall and the oldest surviving Roman gateway in Britain. It was the original main entrance to Camulodunum and the gate for the main road leading towards London. It had two large archways for wheeled vehicles and two smaller ones for people on foot.
The gate was transformed into a Triumphal Arch between 50 and 60 CE to celebrate the conquest of Britannia by the Emperor Claudius. When the wall was built, the archway was incorporated into the structure. Later, the main gateway was moved further south to the Head Gate, at the junction of Headgate and Southway. Today, only the southern pedestrian archway and guardroom survive, representing less than a quarter of the original gateway. One side of the gate opening is now filled by the aptly-named pub, the Hole in the Wall.
One side of the opening of the the Balkerne Gateis now filled by the Hole in the Wall (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)
Just south of Southway, by the police station, are the foundations of the oldest known Romano-Christian church, built beside a graveyard outside the wall.
Duncan’s Gate is a small postern gate named after Dr PM Duncan, a former Mayor of Colchester and the 19th century amateur archaeologist who led one of the earliest excavations at the site in 1853. As well as the remains of the single entrance, some fallen masonry was part of the archway over the gate. This gate was conserved and left visible following further excavations in the 1920s.
North Gate provided access to the river Colne and the northern suburbs of Colchester. The original Roman design is thought to have been a single archway with an overhead walkway. North Gate remained in use for many centuries and was only demolished in 1823.
The East Gate was built in the Roman period to provide access to the town’s port on the river Colne. The gate was rebuilt in the mediaeval period but was badly damaged in the Siege of Colchester in 1648 and collapsed three years later.
Saint Botolph’s Gate was originally a Roman gate used to reach the cemeteries outside the town wall. It was also on the processional route between the Temple of Claudius and the Circus, or chariot-racing track. The gate was demolished in 1814.
Head Gate became the main gate for the road to London when Balkerne Gate was blocked in the late Roman period. Head Gate was built as a double-arched gateway and its foundations have been found in recent years. In mediaeval times it was rebuilt as a single, wide gateway. Head Gate was demolished by 1766.
There is a Roman drain beside Saint James’ Church on East Hill, sections of the wall can be seen at the north edge of Castle Park, and other sections of the wall are visible from the raised section at the north end of the Upper Park, behind the castle.
At the end of the Roman period, the town wall was abandoned around 400 CE and, along with the rest of the town, it fell into disrepair. Rebuilding may have begun in the 10th century when the Anglo-Saxon King Edward the Elder strengthened the wall after he expelled the Vikings from Colchester in 917.
One of he surviving bastions or small projecting round towers in Priory Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)
The Normans made further repairs to the town wall after 1066 as they strengthened their hold on Colchester. Three further gates were added to the wall during the medieval period, ca 1400.
Scheregate, built in the mediaeval period, takes its unusual name from the Anglo-Saxon word sceard, meaning a gap or notch. It gave people a short cut through the town wall to Saint John’s Abbey to the south. As in the mediaeval period the gateway still has shops to either side.
Saint Mary’s Steps, near Balkerne Hill, were created in the 15th century when a Roman drain was enlarged to create a small pedestrian gate or postern. Nearby is the base of an internal rectangular tower of Roman date. The name of the gate comes from Saint Mary at the Walls Church, now the Colchester Arts Centre.
Scheregate and Saint Mary’s Steps are still in use, but there are no surviving traces of Rye Gate.
Roman bricks are built into the arches and walls of the ruins of Saint Botolph’s Priory (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)
At Priory Street, the wall follows the curve of the street, past the ruins of Saint Botolph’s Priory, where Roman bricks are built into the ruined priory arches and walls.
The main evidence for the mediaeval period is seen in the surviving bastions, or small projecting round towers in Priory Street and Vineyard Street. Four of the original eight bastions remain above ground today. They were built into the thickness of the wall at the time of the Peasants’ Revolt in 1380. Saint John’s Abbey gatehouse nearby was built after the abbey was attacked by the rebels, and the town authorities feared further outbreaks of violence.
This section of wall was heavily damaged by artillery fire during the Siege of Colchester in the Civil War in 1648, and was repaired with profuse use of red brick. At the end of the siege, Parliament decided to demolish part of the wall in Priory Street to prevent it from being used for defensive purposes in the future.
When the wall lost its significance it ceased to be regularly maintained. Houses were built up against the wall, passages and cellars were cut through and into it nd stone was removed for new building projects. A large section of the wall along Balkerne Hill fell into the road in 1795.
Regular repairs and maintenance of the wall began again in the 1940s and have continued, so that today the Roman wall in Colchester is the earliest and the best-preserved Roman town wall in Britain.
The Roman wall in Colchester is the earliest and best-preserved Roman town wall in Britain (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)
15 January 2025
Daily prayer in Christmas 2024-2025:
22, Wednesday 15 January 2025
Jesus heals Saint Peter’s Mother-in-Law … a stained-glass window in Saint John the Baptist Church, Blisworth, Northamptonshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)
Patrick Comerford
The 40-day season of Christmas continues until Candlemas or the Feast of the Presentation (2 February). This week began with the First Sunday of Epiphany (Epiphany I, 12 January 2025), with readings that focus on the Baptism of Christ.
Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:
1, today’s Gospel reading;
2, a short reflection;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;
4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.
Jesus Heals Simon Peter's Mother-in-Law … a panel in a window in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)
Mark 1: 29-39 (NRSVA):
29 As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. 30 Now Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once. 31 He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.
32 That evening, at sunset, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons. 33 And the whole city was gathered around the door. 34 And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.
35 In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed. 36 And Simon and his companions hunted for him. 37 When they found him, they said to him, ‘Everyone is searching for you.’ 38 He answered, ‘Let us go on to the neighbouring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do.’ 39 And he went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.
Jesus heals Saint Peter’s Mother-in-Law … a stained-glass window in Saint John the Baptist Church, Blisworth, Northamptonshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)
Today’s Reflection:
This morning’s Gospel reading at the Eucharist (Mark 1: 29-39) is the story of Christ healing Simon Peter’s mother-in-law.
There are four parts in this morning’s Gospel reading:
1, Jesus heals Simon Peter’s mother-in-law (verses 29-31);
2, Jesus heals many other people, including people with diseases and people who are exorcised of demons (verses 32-34);
3, Jesus retreats to a deserted place to prayer but is ‘hunted’ out by Simon and his companions (verses 35-38);
4, Jesus returns to preaching in the synagogues in Galilee (verse 39).
Most people Jesus meets in the Gospel stories are unnamed, so that many of the women he heals are not named too. Indeed, in the healing stories told of men, only Lazarus and Malchus are named. But the high priest’s servant Malchus is only named by John (John 18: 10), and not in the synoptic gospels. Mark refers to blind Bartimaeus, but this is a reference only to his father’s name and not the name of the blind man himself (see Mark 10: 46).
In all the Gospel stories in which Jesus heals women, the women too are anonymous. In this morning’s Gospel reading, even Simon Peter’s mother-in-law remains unnamed, and she is identified only by her relationship to Simon Peter. Indeed, there is no reference at all to her daughter, Simon Peter’s wife.
All three synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, tell this healing story (see Matthew 8: 14-15; Mark 1: 29-31; Luke 4: 38-40). Matthew says Jesus ‘touched’ the woman's hand, Mark say he ‘grasped’ it, and in Luke he simply ‘rebuked the fever’. Mark says the house was the home of Simon and Andrew, who both interceded with Jesus for the woman. Luke alone says she had a high fever.
The healing of Simon Peter’s mother-in-law is the first story of physical healing in Saint Luke’s Gospel, and it follows immediately after the first story of spiritual healing, of an unnamed man in the synagogue in Capernaum. In Saint Mark’s Gospel, this story follows immediately after the calling of the first disciples, Andrew, Peter, James and John. In all three synoptic Gospels, the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law and of a demon-possessed man trigger a wave of sick and possessed people being brought to Jesus.
Mother-in-law jokes illustrated many seaside postcards and were part of the stock-in-trade of comedians in the 1960s and well into the 1970s. Those mothers-in-law were never named, and the jokes served to emphasise the domestic role – perhaps servile role – of women in homes and families in those days.
But mothers-in-law were also mothers, grandmothers, aunts, sisters, wives, nieces and daughters; they had careers, hopes and ambitions, fears, illnesses, and sufferings; they had love and emotions; and they had names … none of which were acknowledged in those postcards or comic sketches.
Those attitudes were reinforced by many of the ways in which I have heard men in the past interpret this morning’s reading. Yet a closer reading of this story shows that it does not reinforce a woman’s place as being servile or secondary, the ‘complementarian’ view offered by some commentators who claim they are ‘conservative evangelicals.’
It is not a story about a woman taking a late Saturday morning weekend sleep-in on her bed, and then getting up ‘to make the tea’.
The verb for serving, διακονέω (diakoneo), used in verse 31 in reference to this woman means to wait, attend upon, serve, or to be an attendant or assistant. Later, in Acts and other places in the New Testament, it means to minister to, relieve, assist, or supply with the necessaries of life, or provide the means of living, to do the work of the διάκονος or deacon (see I Timothy 3: 10, 13; I Peter 4: 11), even to be in charge or to administer (see II Corinthians 3: 3, 8: 19-20; I Peter 1: 12, 4: 10).
The word describing this woman’s service also describes the angels who minister to Jesus after he is tempted in the wilderness (Mark 1: 13; Matthew 4: 11), the work of his female disciples (Luke 8: 1-3), and describes Martha of Bethany when she serves while her sister Mary sits at Jesus’s feet and learns, before Jesus specifically affirms Mary’s choice (Luke 10: 38-42).
Most significantly, this word describes Jesus himself, when he explains to his disciples that ‘whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many’ (see Mark 10: 43-45).
Being healed is not just about personal relief but also about being restored to a place where one can serve and contribute to the community. The Book of Common Prayer describes God as the one ‘whose service is perfect freedom,’ and this is modelled by Peter’s mother-in-law. Her response to Jesus healing her is a model not just for women but for all Christian service.
In the kingdom, serving is not women’s work, it is everybody’s work.
James Tissot ‘The Healing of Peter’s Mother-in-law’ (La guérison de la belle-mère de Pierre), 1886-1894 (Brooklyn Museum)
Today’s Prayers (Wednesday 15 January 2025):
The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church’, the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘A Bag of Flour’. This theme was introduced on Sunday with a Programme Update by Rachel Weller, Communications Officer, USPG.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (Wednesday 15 January 2025) invites us to pray:
Lord, we pray that people like Yusuf may have safe and equitable access to critical aid like food and water.
The Collect:
Eternal Father,
who at the baptism of Jesus
revealed him to be your Son,
anointing him with the Holy Spirit:
grant to us, who are born again by water and the Spirit,
that we may be faithful to our calling as your adopted children;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post-Communion Prayer:
Lord of all time and eternity,
you opened the heavens and revealed yourself as Father
in the baptism of Jesus your beloved Son:
by the power of your Spirit
complete the heavenly work of our rebirth
through the waters of the new creation;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Additional Collect:
Heavenly Father,
at the Jordan you revealed Jesus as your Son:
may we recognize him as our Lord
and know ourselves to be your beloved children;
through Jesus Christ our Saviour.
Yesterday’s Reflection
Continued Tomorrow
Christ Healing Peter’s Mother-in-Law … a fresco in Visoki Dečani Monastery, a Serbian Orthodox monastery in Kosovo and Metohija, 12 km south of Pec (© Copyright: Blago Fund, Inc)
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
Patrick Comerford
The 40-day season of Christmas continues until Candlemas or the Feast of the Presentation (2 February). This week began with the First Sunday of Epiphany (Epiphany I, 12 January 2025), with readings that focus on the Baptism of Christ.
Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:
1, today’s Gospel reading;
2, a short reflection;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;
4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.
Jesus Heals Simon Peter's Mother-in-Law … a panel in a window in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)
Mark 1: 29-39 (NRSVA):
29 As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. 30 Now Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once. 31 He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.
32 That evening, at sunset, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons. 33 And the whole city was gathered around the door. 34 And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.
35 In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed. 36 And Simon and his companions hunted for him. 37 When they found him, they said to him, ‘Everyone is searching for you.’ 38 He answered, ‘Let us go on to the neighbouring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do.’ 39 And he went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.
Jesus heals Saint Peter’s Mother-in-Law … a stained-glass window in Saint John the Baptist Church, Blisworth, Northamptonshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)
Today’s Reflection:
This morning’s Gospel reading at the Eucharist (Mark 1: 29-39) is the story of Christ healing Simon Peter’s mother-in-law.
There are four parts in this morning’s Gospel reading:
1, Jesus heals Simon Peter’s mother-in-law (verses 29-31);
2, Jesus heals many other people, including people with diseases and people who are exorcised of demons (verses 32-34);
3, Jesus retreats to a deserted place to prayer but is ‘hunted’ out by Simon and his companions (verses 35-38);
4, Jesus returns to preaching in the synagogues in Galilee (verse 39).
Most people Jesus meets in the Gospel stories are unnamed, so that many of the women he heals are not named too. Indeed, in the healing stories told of men, only Lazarus and Malchus are named. But the high priest’s servant Malchus is only named by John (John 18: 10), and not in the synoptic gospels. Mark refers to blind Bartimaeus, but this is a reference only to his father’s name and not the name of the blind man himself (see Mark 10: 46).
In all the Gospel stories in which Jesus heals women, the women too are anonymous. In this morning’s Gospel reading, even Simon Peter’s mother-in-law remains unnamed, and she is identified only by her relationship to Simon Peter. Indeed, there is no reference at all to her daughter, Simon Peter’s wife.
All three synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, tell this healing story (see Matthew 8: 14-15; Mark 1: 29-31; Luke 4: 38-40). Matthew says Jesus ‘touched’ the woman's hand, Mark say he ‘grasped’ it, and in Luke he simply ‘rebuked the fever’. Mark says the house was the home of Simon and Andrew, who both interceded with Jesus for the woman. Luke alone says she had a high fever.
The healing of Simon Peter’s mother-in-law is the first story of physical healing in Saint Luke’s Gospel, and it follows immediately after the first story of spiritual healing, of an unnamed man in the synagogue in Capernaum. In Saint Mark’s Gospel, this story follows immediately after the calling of the first disciples, Andrew, Peter, James and John. In all three synoptic Gospels, the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law and of a demon-possessed man trigger a wave of sick and possessed people being brought to Jesus.
Mother-in-law jokes illustrated many seaside postcards and were part of the stock-in-trade of comedians in the 1960s and well into the 1970s. Those mothers-in-law were never named, and the jokes served to emphasise the domestic role – perhaps servile role – of women in homes and families in those days.
But mothers-in-law were also mothers, grandmothers, aunts, sisters, wives, nieces and daughters; they had careers, hopes and ambitions, fears, illnesses, and sufferings; they had love and emotions; and they had names … none of which were acknowledged in those postcards or comic sketches.
Those attitudes were reinforced by many of the ways in which I have heard men in the past interpret this morning’s reading. Yet a closer reading of this story shows that it does not reinforce a woman’s place as being servile or secondary, the ‘complementarian’ view offered by some commentators who claim they are ‘conservative evangelicals.’
It is not a story about a woman taking a late Saturday morning weekend sleep-in on her bed, and then getting up ‘to make the tea’.
The verb for serving, διακονέω (diakoneo), used in verse 31 in reference to this woman means to wait, attend upon, serve, or to be an attendant or assistant. Later, in Acts and other places in the New Testament, it means to minister to, relieve, assist, or supply with the necessaries of life, or provide the means of living, to do the work of the διάκονος or deacon (see I Timothy 3: 10, 13; I Peter 4: 11), even to be in charge or to administer (see II Corinthians 3: 3, 8: 19-20; I Peter 1: 12, 4: 10).
The word describing this woman’s service also describes the angels who minister to Jesus after he is tempted in the wilderness (Mark 1: 13; Matthew 4: 11), the work of his female disciples (Luke 8: 1-3), and describes Martha of Bethany when she serves while her sister Mary sits at Jesus’s feet and learns, before Jesus specifically affirms Mary’s choice (Luke 10: 38-42).
Most significantly, this word describes Jesus himself, when he explains to his disciples that ‘whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many’ (see Mark 10: 43-45).
Being healed is not just about personal relief but also about being restored to a place where one can serve and contribute to the community. The Book of Common Prayer describes God as the one ‘whose service is perfect freedom,’ and this is modelled by Peter’s mother-in-law. Her response to Jesus healing her is a model not just for women but for all Christian service.
In the kingdom, serving is not women’s work, it is everybody’s work.
James Tissot ‘The Healing of Peter’s Mother-in-law’ (La guérison de la belle-mère de Pierre), 1886-1894 (Brooklyn Museum)
Today’s Prayers (Wednesday 15 January 2025):
The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church’, the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘A Bag of Flour’. This theme was introduced on Sunday with a Programme Update by Rachel Weller, Communications Officer, USPG.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (Wednesday 15 January 2025) invites us to pray:
Lord, we pray that people like Yusuf may have safe and equitable access to critical aid like food and water.
The Collect:
Eternal Father,
who at the baptism of Jesus
revealed him to be your Son,
anointing him with the Holy Spirit:
grant to us, who are born again by water and the Spirit,
that we may be faithful to our calling as your adopted children;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post-Communion Prayer:
Lord of all time and eternity,
you opened the heavens and revealed yourself as Father
in the baptism of Jesus your beloved Son:
by the power of your Spirit
complete the heavenly work of our rebirth
through the waters of the new creation;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Additional Collect:
Heavenly Father,
at the Jordan you revealed Jesus as your Son:
may we recognize him as our Lord
and know ourselves to be your beloved children;
through Jesus Christ our Saviour.
Yesterday’s Reflection
Continued Tomorrow
Christ Healing Peter’s Mother-in-Law … a fresco in Visoki Dečani Monastery, a Serbian Orthodox monastery in Kosovo and Metohija, 12 km south of Pec (© Copyright: Blago Fund, Inc)
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
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