Rutland's Roman mosaic unlike anything else in UK, expert says
You'd have to go to Sicily to find anything like it
Rutland's recent archaeological discoveries have really been putting England's smallest county on the map lately, but are we underestimating the value of the Roman Villa find?
An expert in Roman history, and archaeologist who worked on both the Roman Villa excavations, says he's never seen anything like the mosaic they found in his career spanning half a century.
Peter Liddle worked alongside Leicester University in unearthing the piece of history:
"There is nothing like this locally, and nothing like this actually in the rest of Britain. This story is told of mosaics in other parts of the Roman Empire, but not in Britain. So you have to go to Sicily to find another mosaic a bit like this", he said.
"You just wouldn't expect to see this. I've been working in local archaeology for 50 years I've seen a few mosaic pavements but nothing of the quality and importance of this one."
Peter added that after seeing new details of the other rooms within the Roman Villa, plans are in place for a third excavation in the coming months.
"At least one of them had a mosaic in there. Not quite of the quality of the one in the main room, but nonetheless and interesting one - and we want to see a little more of that just to get an idea of the whole pattern of it."