Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 8.djvu/258

 ]90 PROCEEDINGS AT MEETINGS OF extensive examinatious, wLich will be done so soon as the small requisite fund we are collecting for the purpose shall have been sufficiently augmented, to enable us to carry out these interesting researches with effect." We hope on a future occasion to give representations of some other varied relics of antiquity lately brought to light at Cirencester, through Professor Buckman's well directed researches. Mr. Greville J. Chester communicated the discovery of several curious bronze relics, of the Roman period, some of which were exhibited to the meeting. They were recently found at Sutton Courtney, in Berkshire, near Abingdon, and consist of a bronze strigil, a small bronze bell, and fragments of bronze chain, composed of links of various sizes. This part of the countv of Berkshire has produced a remarkable variety of ancieut remains at different periods, and many of these relics have been collected bv Mr. Jesse King, of Appleford, who kindly contributed a large series of objects of antiquity, British and Roman, exhibited in the museum formed during the meeting of the Institute at Oxford. The strigil is formed of verv thin metal, coated with a patina of fine colour, but unfortunately the extremity of the hollow part of this implement has been broken off, the metal being excessively fragile, and it is impossible to say positively what might have been its form in its complete state. It is of very good work- manship, and some incised ornaments, designed with elegance, appear upon the handle, although much encrusted witn <xrugo.^ There are several examples of the form of the strigil in the British Museum, but it does not appear to have been frequently found in our country with Roman remains. This may indeed be mentioned as a singular circumstance, since so manj' discoveries of Roman baths and sudatories have been made in various parts of England. Battely, in describing one found at Recidver, in Kent, of which a representation may be seen in his " Antiquitates Rutupinte," p. 115, speaks of it as the only one discovered, to his knowledge, in Britain.' A pair of bronze strigils formed part of the remarkable collection of objects of bronze, glass and pottery, one of the most interesting discoveries of Roman relics ever made in our country, namely, the sepulchral deposit brought to light in 1835 by the late Mr. Gage Rokewode, in one of the Bartlow Hills,. Cambridgeshire. It is feared that these strigils perished in the conflagration of Lord Maynard's house in Essex : they were found deposited with a frame of a folding chair, of iron, probably a seat destined for use in the bath, and a little vessel of earthenware, or unguentary. These two strigils, of which representations are given in Mr. Rokewode's Memoir in the " Archseologia," vol. xxvi., were I precisely similar, in size and form ; and it might be conjectured from thisj that strigils were used, like brushes for the bath, in pairs ; the handles were formed, as those of some continental specimens, with a very narrow opening, too contracted fur the fingers to be passed through it, but as if intended to receive a band, the use of which, Mr. Rokewode observes, might be to suspend the strigil to the wrist, when not actually in use. It is seen thus suspended on one of the Canino vases. The strigil exhibited to the Society by Mr. Chester is so much damaged that it is not possible to assert that the ligula, or hollowed part, was recurved, usually its form ; it pro- ' This strigil may now be seen in ihe Library, at Trinity College, Cambridge, with a few reUca from Reeulver. ;
 * The fragment, as now seen, measures in length, about Cj in.