Iuxta morem Romanorum : the role of the cementarii in an architecture of spolia

Benedict Biscop imported specialist workmen, cementarii , from Gaul for his monastery at Wearmouth, who built ‘in the Roman manner’ ( iuxta morem Romanorum ). Biscop's specialists have been previously understood as ‘stonemasons’, and their arrival seen as the introduction of sophisticated masonry construction techniques into Insular architecture. Our exploration of the meaning of the word cementarii suggests, however, that the skill of these workmen lay in rendering and plastering masonry walls built of scavenged and reused stone. We suggest that these cementarii were, in fact, masters of an ‘architecture of spolia’ , for which archaeological evidence has been found across the former western Empire; their skill lay in the creation of an architectural style, in which imaginatively reused Roman architectural detail stood out against broad panels of rendered and plastered rough masonry.