The Regeneration of Bracknell has created a new phase in the lifespan of this ancient town. As the new Bracknell rises from the ashes into the modern era, we are offered the perfect opportunity to reflect on the creation of the town, and to ask ourselves – where did it all begin?

Bracknell Town as we know it today is less than 70 years old, though the area it is built upon has more than three millennia worth of history. The earliest evidence for Bracknell’s inhabitation lies in Easthampstead, and dates back to around 1200BC. Near Downshire Way there lies a round barrow, a man-made hill which would have been used in the Bronze Age as a burial site. Though we can not be certain if Bracknell was formally inhabited at this time, we can at least be sure that there existed some settlers in the vicinity.

It was not until the Iron Age that Bracknell begun to develop a community. The best evidence of this comes from various excavation sites, which show a number of different settlements in and around Bracknell. The largest and most influential of these was Caesar’s Camp, a hill fort located in Swinley Forest near Birch Hill.

The exact date of its creation is unknown, though it is believed to have been created between 500-300BC. The original inhabitants were most likely invaders from Gaul and Belgium, who were settling in large numbers throughout South-East England at this time. The name we have for Caesar’s Camp today is an anachronism, as the settlement actually had very little to do with Julius, or indeed any other Caesar. In fact it was a Victorian invention – before this era, it was known as Windmill Hill.

By around 300BC, Caesar’s Camp was in full operation. It boasted a mile-long dump rampart for defence, and a sturdy outer wall, making it quite a spectacular piece of ancient engineering. At around 17 acres, it was surprisingly large, and its construction would have therefore required a fair amount of manpower.

Though despite this, the hill fort at Caesar’s Camp was probably not used as a settlement. The ground beneath it was not suitable for farming, being sludgy in the winter and covered mostly with sandstone and gravel. Instead it was most likely used as a centre for villagers in the Bracknell Forest area – as a market, an assembly place, for cultural activities such as worship and burials, and as a fortress in case of attack.

Caesar’s Camp was the only hill fort in the whole of East Berkshire, and at least 15 miles away from its closest neighbour. This made inter-community trade difficult, and so self-sufficiency was vital to the ancient Bracknellians. It is therefore interesting to note that Caesar’s Camp succeeded in developing a rare and mature type of micro-economy, where each of its nearby settlements was responsible for producing one or two major products, which were then traded within the Camp. We know of at least six of these settlements, in and around Bracknell:

A small community at Jennet’s Park, Bracknell appears to have been adept at tanning hides and skins, and may have even been involved in the production of ceramics. Settlers in Fairclough Farm, Warfield, had access to fantastic farmland, and so would have been responsible for harvesting arable crops. And a particularly large settlement at Park Farm, Binfield, created a great wealth of pottery over several centuries, processed charcoal and textiles, and even had a small wheat farm.

Meanwhile at Riseley Farm in Swallowfield and Whitehall Farm in Arborfield there exists evidence of ancient metalworking, and at South Farm in Lightwater a much later community was known for providing iron instruments and pottery. It is likely that many more settlements would have existed in the flat plains surrounding Bracknell Forest, in places we are no longer able to excavate.

For many hundreds of years, the economy in Bracknell seems to have sustained itself, and there is no evidence that Bracknell was ever sacked – however, in the 1st Century AD, Bracknell fell under the rule of Cunobelin, king of the Catuvellauni tribe. A single silver coin of his head appears to have made its way from his capital in Colchester to Caesar’s Camp. And it was Cunobelin’s exiled son who, having fled to Rome, convinced the Emperor Caligula to launch the preliminary Roman invasion of Britain.

Though Caligula’s mission was a bit of a wash, a renewed conquest was begun by Emperor Claudius in AD43. Claudius gave control of the Roman military to Aulus Plautius, who successfully captured all of South-East Britain. Thus Bracknell fell into Roman hands – and the rest, so they say, is history.

We know that the site was never rebuilt by the Romans. Roman forts were strictly rectangular in shape, but Caesar’s Camp remains to this day in an oak leaf shape. It is therefore almost certain that Bracknell was abandoned following the invasion. A road from its south entrance connects Caesar’s Camp to the Devil’s Highway, the Roman Road stretching from Pontes (Staines) to Calleva Atrebatum (Silchester), though the hill fort itself was probably only used at this time for storage or as a resting beacon.

Though there is some evidence of later occupation at Caesar’s Camp, the majority of Berkshire’s citizens appear to have moved toward Wickham Bushes in Finchampstead, a site sitting directly upon the Devil’s Highway. As for the inhabitants of Bracknell, their valuable and specialised skills would have unfortunately made them desirable to the slave traders who had followed the Roman army to Britain – at any rate, we can never truly be sure, for the Celtic people of Iron Age Britain were infamous for never recording their history in text.

Bracknell in the Roman era therefore practically ceased to exist. In fact it was not until AD942 that Bracknell (or “Braccan Heal”) would once more appear in the chronicles – but for those hundreds of years prior to the Roman invasion, Bracknell exhibited a quite astounding culture and economy. Let us hope, in the wake of the Regeneration, that it can do so once again.