Roman floor

Yesterday we went over to Dorchester an old Roman town about 30 miles away. A pleasant little place with a thriving market with a decidedly rural bent to it, full of old agricultural tools and lots of plants for sale at a quarter of the London price.
We visited several hilly spots that were the remains of an amphitheatre and an impressive fort or castle. The most tangible was the remains of a villa which had been excavated with parts of its beautiful tiled ceramic floor still intact. It is astonishing to look at this and remember it was built around the 3 and 4th century AD. Thev work involved was phenomenal, from making the tiles, the firing, cutting , designing, preparing the ground and then executing the design, just astonishing.