Free. During normal opening times.

A new interactive exhibition and innovative creative-writing project, Voices from the Wall, explores shared histories and experiences between Britain and Romania, which began nearly two millennia ago with the building of Hadrian’s Wall and continues today.

“This exhibition explores through history, stories and archaeology the lives of the Dacian soldiers who helped to build Hadrian’s Wall and the fascinating parallels with the lives of Romanians living in the north of England today,” said writer and historian Bronwen Riley, project curator/creator.

“All creativity is a form of empathy and Voices from the Wall is just that,” said British-based Romanian writer Ioana Morpurgo, who worked on the project alongside Bronwen, together with film-maker Cristian Havrincea. “What I love best is the starting metaphor, the Dacians involved in constructing one of the most fascinating cultural emblems in Britain – Hadrian’s Wall. The living stories and their shared humanity replace the stone and the mortar.”

There are now around 1 million Romanians living in the UK - most arriving in Britain in the past 20 years. But the earliest group of ‘Romanians’ to live and work here arrived more than 1900 years ago, as part of the Roman army, and Dacian soldiers were stationed on Hadrian’s Wall for centuries.

Alongside the exhibition are a number of books chosen from the Portico’s collection that explores how both Hadrian’s Wall and Romania was observed by nineteenth century writers and travellers.