In the Charente Maritime area of France just outside Barzan you’ll find a small museum and Roman dig. The site was originally discovered in 1975 when aerial photographs of the area revealed a Roman port town in the village called Le Fâ. The site is believed to be the city of Novioregum, although this is yet to be verified.

This is still a working dig, as there is much of the city yet to be unearthed, and when we visited there were what appeared to be a bunch of university students working on the dig (although that might be stereotyping archaeological types). Apart from the main tower, the major unearthing has been the Roman Baths, which take up most of the area open to the public.

However, before you reach the excavated areas there is a small museum, which begins in the same area as the reception desk.

Firstly the prices, adults are € 4 and children € 2, students with valid student cards pay the child price as well. The day we went the staff spoke reasonably good English, and they have copies of the information for the dig areas translated into English. The museum information unfortunately was only in French, so we missed out a little there, although between 8 of us we managed to cobble together enough French to make sense of everything.

Within the shop/reception there is an introduction to the museum and the site, which has an interactive display showing the eras involved. The display consisted of pressing buttons on the panel to light up the different bits of information.

Moving on you’ll find yourself in the Method of Archaeology, which is exactly as it sounds information about how they approached the dig, and displays of the equipment they use, even down to the toothbrush! This room also has examples of items found which date right back to Bronze Age.

The next room holds some of the examples of architecture. The examples include a Corinthian cornice from the Augustus to Aurelian era (27B.C. to 275A.D). There are also examples of stone work that includes large leaves in the decoration, which was no longer popular during the Augustan era in Rome, but continued to be popular up to the Flavian period in the Aquitaine area.

After the architectural room you’ll move onto a room which has a large mock up of the city in the centre. Again this display is interactive, there are buttons with the names of each area, which when pressed highlight the area on the map/mock up. However, they were only highlighted with a tiny bulb, so depending on which side of the map you were standing, you can’t necessarily see the light (there are identical buttons on both sides). So it actually looks like it’s not working, but someone on the other side can see the area highlighted.

Onward and you have the opportunity to exit the museum and view the dig, but there are still two small rooms in the museum. Firstly the commerce room, which has a collection of coins. Five different currencies have been identified, four of which were Gaullish so they were produced before the Romans arrived, and the fifth currency was produced by Tiberius (although I doubt he actually did the work himself!). Because there are these five currencies it helps to date the different layers as they are revealed.

The final room is a depiction of daily life in the roman era, it has wall mounted information and pictures.

Reversing slightly and we headed off outside. Immediately you are faced by quite a large tower. This bit was a little confusing, because the woman who took our money at the entrance said this was called the windmill, however the map calls it a temple. At first glance it looks like the woman at the reception was correct because it appears to be just a circular stone building. It’s only when you walk down the steps and see the tower from the front you notice there’s more of the building starting to show underneath. Then at the front there’s an information panel showing the building as it would have been originally, and the circular tower is just a small part of the entire thing. At this point we decided that it was indeed a temple, not a windmill. The of course looking back, the tower had been depicted in the mock up in room 3 of the museum, and it was obviously not a windmill. I can only assume the woman got mixed up with her English.

As you walk down toward the baths, you’ll notice a long straight path, part way along the path there’s a clear Perspex image. The image depicts the road as it would have looked at the time, complete with trees and images of people walking along. When you stand directly in front, the image lines up with the path to help you imagine the scene.

Turning to the right there is a row of wooden sheds, a couple of these hold more architectural pieces, and a couple have mosaic pieces. At first we were astounded at how well the mosaics had been preserved, until we realised that the museum run day trips from schools and part of the trip includes recreating a mosaic. The hut at the end is also used by the schools and has a small classroom for presentations, plus they allow the children to try digging for treasures.

Heading back left again, you’ll pass by an area that is still under excavation, the day we visited it was completely covered in black plastic sheets so I can’t tell you what was under there. Then you’ll reach the main part of the dig, the Roman baths.

There are several different sections in the baths, and each area is explained fully in the information you receive when you pay. There are hot rooms and cold rooms, both of which the Romans used for different treatments. There are of course the rooms only available to those of a certain group, for example the circular room was used by sportsmen, and there was a room for scholars. The area where the water was heated is also intact. At the side of the baths there’s a 3D model of the building as it would have been when it was whole. There are a few steps that have been put in place to help people navigate the entire site, but anyone with mobility problems would still be able to view it all from above, rather than step into the rooms.

They have a programme of events throughout the year, with different theatre groups, unfortunately there was nothing happening when we went to visit.

I would say you’d have to have an interest in archaeology and/or history in order to enjoy this site, because apart from the couple of interactive bits, it is basically a place to view and read up on history. There were 8 of us in our group, one of whom studied archaeology at university, and a couple of us who just like history in general, so we enjoyed the visit. The others were a little bored, and were basically just wandering aimlessly around, and as the site doesn’t have a cafe there was nothing else for them to do whilst they were waiting. My two kids have just learnt about Romans at school, so they were excited initially, and determined to outdo each other with their knowledge of the Romans and of the items in the museum. However, they raced around the baths area, having a quick glance at everything and soon decided just to go off to the grassy area at the side to play tig.

I found it fascinating, but then I tend to find the thought of standing in the same place that the Romans did 100’s of years ago a little surreal (I know lots of people do that every day, but I live in a town that was only built in the Victorian era, so it doesn’t have much history). I did like the little extras they’d included, like the Perspex image to help you imagine the scene, and the mock up inside the museum which also helps you put the site in context.

The site is a work in progress, and I can imagine over the years they will add to the whole experience, and I would hope they’ll add a cafe, because once you are outside there is no shade at all, and the day we went it was extremely hot. So I would recommend taking some water with you on sip on the way around.