Camulodunum Camulodunum Camulodunum (; ), the Ancient Roman name for what is now Colchester in Essex, was an important town in Roman Britain, and the first capital of the province. It is claimed to be the oldest town in Britain. Originally the site of the Brythonic-Celtic oppidum of Camulodunon (meaning "stronghold of Camulos"), capital of the Trinovantes and later the Catuvellauni tribes, it was first mentioned by name on coinage minted by the chieftain Tasciovanus sometime between 20 and 10 BC. The Roman town began life as a Roman Legionary base constructed in the AD 40s on the site of the
Traditional English pronunciation of Latin the purpose of determining vowel length; that is, the syllable preceding the ending is considered the penult. This last pronunciation of "-os" is the expected one; however, in the masculine accusative plural, where the ending is historically -ōs, the academic prescription was the pronunciation . Such an ending is not found in English loan words or proper names. Latin as traditionally pronounced by English speakers is part of the living history of spoken Latin through medieval French into English. Three stages of development of A-L can thus be distinguished: Latin from the period when its orthography and grammar became standardized