Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 1.djvu/271

Rh happy to have your opinion on the subject, and to know if similar objects have been found in England."

Mr. Redmond Anthony, of Piltown, Ireland, exhibited drawings of a bronze circular fibula, found near Carrick bay, co. Waterford; a white marble inkstand, found in the ruins of the seven churches, co. Wicklow; and an urn in baked clay, ornamented with two bands of hexagonal indentations, found near Clonmore, co. Kilkenny, all of which are now in the Piltown museum.

Mr. C. R. Smith exhibited a female head in freestone, discovered during recent excavations for houses adjoining the church of St. Matthew in Friday Street. This piece of sculpture had been used as a building stone in a wall about eight feet below the present surface. The work, of the time of Henry III., or Edward I., resembles that of the well known effigies of Eleanor; the head bears a trefoil crown; the face has apparently been painted in flesh-colour; the eye-brows and eye-lids are painted black, and the pupils of the eyes retain a dark-coloured composition. Coins of the early Edwards and of Henry III. were also found during these excavations together with earthen cups and other articles of the same period. At a more advanced depth many Roman remains were discovered, together with walls of houses and vestiges of a tessellated pavement.

Mr. Smith also exhibited a bronze enamelled Roman fibula of elegant shape, and a British brass coin recently found at Springhead, near Southfleet, Kent, in the garden of Mr. Sylvester, who had kindly forwarded them for examination. Mr. Smith remarked that the coin was of considerable interest, being an additional variety to the British series. The obverse (incuse) bears a horse, and between the legs the letters ; the reverse, (convex,) a wheat-ear dividing the letters, Camulodunum, which so frequently occur upon the coins of Cunobelin. Several British and a great number of Roman coins have heretofore been found with other Roman remains at Springhead. In the field adjoining Mr. Sylvester's property the foundations of Roman buildings are very extensive, and in dry summers the walls of numerous small houses or of a large villa, (probably the former,) are clearly defined by the parched herbage. Advantage might be taken of these indications for making excavations to investigate the remains, at a trifling cost, and with a certain prospect of success.

Mr. Wright gave an account of the opening of barrows in Bourne Park, near Canterbury, the seat of Lord Albert Conyngham.

"The hills running to the south of Bourne Park are covered with low barrows, which from their shape and contents, and a comparison with those found in other parts of Kent, appear to be the graves of the earlier Saxon settlers in this district. Three barrows within the park, on the top of the hill in front of the house, were opened on Wednesday the 24th of June, in presence of Lord Albert Conyngham, Sir Henry Dryden, Mr. Roach Smith, and myself. Several of them had previously been opened by his lordship, but the only article found in them was one boss of a shield; it would appear as though the nature of the soil (chalk) had here entirely destroyed the deposit.

"We first opened a large barrow, which appeared to have been rifled at some former period. Here, as in all Saxon barrows, the deposit is not in the mound itself, but in a rectangular grave dug into the chalk. At the top of the grave were found two portions of bones of the leg, and at the bottom a fragment of a skull (in the place where the head must originally have been placed), some teeth (which were at the foot of the grave), some other fragments of bones, a small piece of the blade of a sword, and an iron hook exactly resembling those on the