The History of Semitic People in Britain (it goes back further than you might think ...)

From the Guardian

At the lovely Wigtown book festival a week or so ago, I shared a stage with Robin Yassin-Kassab. The subject was blogging – Robin, a novelist, is a co-editor of Pulse and also keeps his own blog, Qunfuz, largely about Middle-Eastern affairs. At one point, though, the session began to veer rather off topic – we discovered we both had an interest in Hadrian's Wall, and, specifically, the multiculturalism of the Romans who lived at this, the northernmost limit of the Roman empire. (Philip Parker, whose book on the empire's borders was recently published to acclaim, was sitting in the second row, so we really could have had got into the subject ... another time perhaps!)

Last week, Robin posted this fascinating piece about his family's trip to the Roman wall. Finding traces of Syrian people who'd lived here long ago, must have been very moving and strange for Robin's family (Robin is Anglo-Syrian, his wife is Syrian and they live not far from the wall). I too walked Hadrian's wall this summer, and was also gripped by the idea of the wilds and Cumbria and Northumberland being inhabited by such a huge range of peoples. At Housesteads, the troops were Tungrians from modern Belgium, who set up a temple with magnificent sculptures to Mithras, a god whose men-only cult, beloved of the military, originated in Persia. Great Chesters, further west, was manned by Belgians, then Raetians from the German-Austrian border, then Asturians from north-west Spain. At Magna, there was a troop of Hamians, who set up an altar to their native god, Syria. They had come from one extreme edge of empire to another; eventually they were replaced by Dalmatians, from Croatia. At Arbeia, Iraqi bargemen from the Tigris patrolled the Tyne. At Carlisle, there were Algerians.

There's evidence that these men, particularly those posted in Britain later in the empire, were more than briefly stationed on the wall. Robin, for instance, was intrigued by the story of one Barathes, a Syrian, who erected a tombstone to his British freedwoman, Regina, with a touching inscription in Latin and in Aramaic (which is still spoken in parts of Syria today). Men like Barathes fell in love here, put down roots here, died here – quite possibly, had children here. For me, these details provide fascinating historical correctives to those who like to tell simple, crude stories about Britain's history of immigration; they make complex narratives and disrupt the sometimes naive way the British choose to tell stories about themselves. As Robin writes, "Everywhere there are secret histories and strange ancestries to be uncovered, if only you sniff about enough." Meanwhile, the idea of Iraqis from the Basra region posted on the Tyne always gives me cause for a wry smile.