Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 5.djvu/37



making excavations for the purpose of laying the foundations of the new Coal Exchange for the city of London, the workmen have met with some remains of Roman constructions of an interesting kind, which I have examined with some care, as far as practicable, but unfortunately, a much larger portion is unexplored from the impossibility of extending the excavations under the adjoining vast piles of warehouses and which belong to a different property. The parts laid bare are evidently portions of a more extensive edifice, which constituted either a private residence of a wealthy Roman, who had his own baths, or, which seems far more probable, formed a small public establishment of baths, equivalent though on a smaller scale to the thermae of ancient Rome, and very similar to such as have been excavated at Pompeii.

The scite of the excavations is on the north side of Lower Thames Street, opposite to the iron gates of entrance to the Custom House quay, at the end next Billingsgate, and behind the position of the old Coal Exchange recently demolished, to the south of Cross-lane, and between St. Mary's Hill on the west, and St. Dunstan's Hill and Idol-lane on the east, midway between old London Bridge and the Tower, thus nearly in the centre of Roman London. The remains exposed to view are situate on the extreme east of the large area now