Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 4.djvu/86

74 were found remains of a human skeleton. No decisive evidence has been brought to shew at what period the Salinæ in this part of England were first known; they were granted to the church of Worcester, A.D. 816, by Kenulph, king of Mercia. Through the adjoining parish of Doderhill (Duderhull, t. Conqu.) the upper salt-way is supposed to have passed, and its course may, possibly, be marked by the local names Ridgeway Field, Upper Street and Upper Street Sling, &c., in that parish. The urn resembles, in form, one found with Roman remains near Bagshot.

The fictile vessel here represented, apparently of late Roman fabric, was lately discovered in digging the foundations of a cottage at Holton, in Oxfordshire, on the property of Mrs. Biscoe, in whose possession it now is. The site on which it was found afforded proof that the spot had been occupied by a succession of edifices from a remote period down to the sixteenth century, some tiles of that date being found in the surface above the place of deposit of the urn. The shape of this object is not uncommon, and many similar examples are preserved in the museum at York. Holton is distant about two miles from the Roman villa at Wheatley, described in the second volume of the Archæological Journal.

Mr. Hawkins, through M. Pfister, communicated a curious horn-purse of the Carlovingian age, now in his possession. In the month of March, 1811, some workmen employed in breaking stones for building materials, from a rock on which are situated the ruins of the castle of Grüneck, near the small town of Ilanz, in Switzerland, discovered under a stone two horns of remarkable shape, of one of which a representation is annexed. Both were filled with denarii, struck at different times during a period of forty-one years, viz. from A.D. 875 to 916. This vessel is formed of the horn of an elk or large stag. The apertures at each end were closed with silver, probably ornamented in the same style as the horn; the third, opening at the top, had a silver lid. M. Pfister remarked that even supposing it had been found empty there would be little difficulty in assigning this interesting object to the period to which it belongs, the design carved upon it being a satisfactory mark of its early date. Like others of similar character, this horn may be considered