Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 5.djvu/52

40 upon close examination they were all of them found to be clearly of medieval make.

No peculiar features indicative of the date of their manu- facture were discoverable beyond the imperfect traces of the ornamental patterns on the paving tiles: if these can be relied on, they may be regarded as the productions of the end of the thirteenth, or the beginning of the fourteenth century.

The foregoing facts appear to shew with certainty that the fragments of thin bricks, so often found in the walls of churches and other middle-age buildings, are not necessarily remnants of Roman structures, and therefore that (in some districts at least) inferences drawn from circumstances of this kind as to the site of Roman stations or towns, are liable to be erroneous.