Turret 7b's low stone footings and a run of Wall survive on a Newcastle roadside, built from unusually large blocks
Open accessfree to visit at any reasonable time
Substantial ruinsruined, but plenty survives above ground
Beside the traffic on Newcastle’s West Road, the low footings of turret 7b and 65 metres of Hadrian’s Wall survive at Denton, one of the small watch-posts the Romans spaced in pairs along the Wall, each meant for a handful of soldiers on lookout. Its stones are noticeably bigger than those used in most other turrets, with a corner platform of stone, probably where a ladder once rose to the floor above. The soldiers who built it left their mark too — an abbreviated Latin inscription on a stone found in 1869 names them as men from the Second Legion Augusta’s first cohort, one of many such marker stones left along the Wall by the work gangs who raised it. Excavation in 1929 found the turret’s floor had been raised and relaid three times over its life, with hearths for cooking and warmth at every level but the last. Another short stretch of Wall lies 300 metres west, and Benwell’s Roman remains - Benwell Roman Temple and the Vallum Crossing beside it - are a mile and a half east.
