Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 8.djvu/257

 TIIK ARCHAEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE. 1S9 as it shows the attention hestowed hy Roman artificers to prevent tlie appearance of haldness and poverty. " The same kind of ornament will be found on other objects here discovered, and is significant as showing that those specimens, so like the modern escutcheon with which key-holes are concealed, are in reality Roman, and may in all probability have been used for a like purpose by the Ancients, tiiough as far as I am aware nothing of the kind has been noticed before. We cannot appeal to any examples of these objects in situ, so that the original intention remains a question of considerable obscurity. There have been found various other relics of bronze, fragments of ornaments, <kc., and with these a I'ing of lead ; other pieces of this metal were found, but what was their design or date we have no means of ascertaining. that I send it on the present occasion with those of a dissimilar kind. It was brought by a workman who assured me that the orifice of the centre had a metal pin in it, which he foolishly was at great pains to remove ; it might possibly have been some kind of knob or handle. " Another singular relic, a large ring, is sent with this, though found with another of a similar kind in some other part of the camp, simply because it is made of a like substance. As to the nature of the material, I am at a loss to determine : it does not seem to be wood, as I had at first imagined ; it is perhaps a composition of vegetable and earthy matter, modelled some- what after the manner of certain objects of papier mdche. I have not yet made an analysis of this, which I hope to do soon ; in the mean time I shall be glad of any notes as to the uses and composition of these articles. This ring is massive ; one side rather thicker than the other : its diameter 3i inches ; it may have served as an armlet, or fastening of the mantle.^ " With respect to the place were these relics were found, it may be further remarked, that the excavation into which the mixed Roman rubbish was scattered, appears to have been first used by the Romans as a place from whence to obtain gravel, since gravel of a tine quality occurred there for some depth, and a quantity had been evidently removed at some former period. The remains of walls may have been those of dwellings of an early kind, which afterwards became disused, and the space was then made use of as a laystall or rubbish heap. This is confirmed by the position of the pottery, as although no article was found entire, yet diligent search enabled us to find most of the fragments, just as though a partially broken crock had been thrown away, and had become still more damaged by the fall. " We may thus account for the heterogeneous mass of Roman matters, in which the articles of domestic use and those of personal adornment had been swept away by negligence. The coins may have met the same fate, and as these are mostly the smaller brass (no silver ones having been found) this circumstance tends much to confirm this view of the subject. " At all events, the finding of so many curious relics in so circumscribed a j space should give us great encouragement in following out the excavations we hope soon to be enabled to recommence. To this end the Institute should ■ be made aware that we have permissiun to break ground and to carry on I * A riDg, precisely similar in fashion and size, found at Lincoln, and formed of shale, apparently, or jet of coarse (juality, is in Mr. Trollope's Museum. VOL VIll. C C
 * ' Amongst the objects not formed of metal, there was one so peculiar,