Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 11.djvu/157

Rh by fire at some period. About 400 yards above the station, on the margin of the river, is a place called "the cannon-holes," where Oliver Cromwell is said to have planted his cannon when he destroyed the castle.

This Station is not destitute of its memorials and evidences of ancient occupation. Several Roman coins, rings, urns, millstones, pieces of "Samian" pottery both plain and figured, vases, tiles, bricks, glass, votive tablets, and inscribed altars have been found at different periods. About eight years since, a gold ring set with a brilliant in it, was found in the garden hedge of the Manor House, and taken possession of by the farmer's daughter. In the year 1840, a brass coin of Antoninus Pius was found about five or six feet beneath the surface. Several other coins were found at the bottom of a grave about twenty years ago. A stone, with a broad sword cut upon it, was dug out of the same grave, and now forms part of the door of one of the offices of the Rectory House. In the same grave was also found part of an old grate, which the blacksmith pronounced to be made of the best iron that ever passed under his hammer. I have also a silver coin of the Emperor Nerva. Many other coins have been found at different periods, but they have not been preserved. I recently found a piece of yellow-coloured pottery, about six inches long, having apparently been part of the handle of an amphora. Such fragments have, I understand, been rarely found in Britain.

Camden says that he saw a stone in the churchyard, made use of for a gravestone, with this inscription—

LEG. II. AVG. FECIT.

Horsley thinks that he afterwards saw the same stone in Naworth Garden. May we not infer from this stone that the second legion was engaged in the erection of this station?

Horsley mentions an inscribed stone which was found at the bottom of a grave, but which was set upright on edge at the head of a grave when he visited the station. He considered it to have been an honorary monument erected to Hadrian by the Legio Sccunda Augusta and the Legio Vicesima. The stone was much defaced, but the following reading has been proposed—