How Southwark was the Beverly Hills of Londinium

Archaeologists have pieced together thousands of ancient fragments that suggest that Southwark was once the "Beverly Hills of Roman London".

The South London borough has "always been seen as the scruffier, rough-around-the-edges" part of the capital, said The Times, but this "extraordinary" new finding suggests that its backstory is "a little grander than originally thought".

Shattered plaster

The fragments of painted plaster were discovered during excavation work and collected into 120 boxes. It was only when a team of archaeologists started fitting together the plaster shards – in what they called "the world's most difficult jigsaw puzzle" – that they realised they had discovered a group of 2,000-year-old wall paintings. They feature "beautiful drawings of birds, fruit and flowers", said The Independent. One fragment depicts what was first thought to be a bunch of grapes but archaeobotanists now believe it's actually a plant that grows more locally: mistletoe. Other fragments include details of musical instruments and "unusual graffiti" of the ancient Greek alphabet.

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It is, said The Times, one of the largest collections of painted frescoes ever found in the capital, and most likely graced a "luxurious suburban" villa beyond the "hustle and bustle" of what was then the main city. Alternatively, the paintings could have decorated a "mansio" – a type of inn or hotel for travelling government officials. Either way, the walls the frescoes were painted on were built soon after the Romans founded Londinium in 43AD.

Several of the pieced-together panels are bright yellow, a rare colour in British Roman artefacts, suggesting that the artist took inspiration from decorations in other parts of the Roman world, including Pompeii.

But the actual identity of the artist remains a mystery, said the BBC. One fragment is scored with the Latin word fecit, which means "has made this", but the piece that fitted next to it, and would have borne the artist's name, hasn't been found.

Londinium's footprint

The discovery is already updating experts' knowledge of Londinium. The settlement's "main footprint" was north of the river in what has become the City of London, but this find suggests that the Romans were "committed to more than just that square mile", said The Times.

It's really adding to "our understanding of what life was like in the area, relatively early on in the Roman period", Andrew Henderson-Schwartz of the Museum of London Archaeology told the paper.

And there's "still much to discover" from the fresco fragments, which will continue to help archaeologists "reconstruct the story" of the UK's "rich Roman history", said the BBC.