Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 8.djvu/552

424 the meeting, communicated by his Grace the , during the recent meeting of the Institute at Bristol. The stone exists at Stowford, in the hundred of Lifton: it measures about 5 feet in length. The word incised upon it was explained by Mr. Westwood as being a personal name, either or. The form of the characters would fix the date as the fifth century. Mr. Westwood remarked that this inscription is of the same period as that bearing the name—, at Yealmpton, Devon, of which a rubbing had been sent to the Institute.

By the .—Crania found during recent excavations at Little Wilbraham, Cambridgeshire, at the spot where the curious Saxon remains described by Mr. Deck were discovered. (See page 172, ante.) Mr. Neville's researches there had proved most successful, and weapons, fibulæ, heads, and other ornaments in great variety had been added to his interesting museum at Audley End. The crania, presented by Mr. Deck to the British Museum, had excited attention on account of their remarkable conformation, and these subsequently brought to light in the same cemetery were produced for comparison.

By .—Portions of two iron swords, with a spear-head of remarkable form and length, found during the previous month at Nottingham, with two skulls and other human remains, at a depth of three feet, in a field adjoining the new baths and wash-houses, outside the town. The spear-head had been affixed to a wooden haft by a brass pin, passing through the socket. Also, a Norman spur, a long-necked rowelled spur of the fifteenth century, and a piece of chain, found in making the public walks near Nottingham. The swords (see woodcuts) have been considered as earlier than Norman times. This supposition seems to be corroborated by comparing the form of the flat pomel, and especially the broken example, with some representations of Saxon swords, as in the MS. of Cædmon's paraphrase, in the Bodleian, written about A.D. 1000. ( Archæologia, xxiv., plates 74, 81; and the sword held by Canute, Strutt's Horda, pl. 28). In these earlier swords it will be observed that knob or counterpoise, in later times formed of one round piece, called from its form a pomel, was of semicircular form, and frequently composed (as is this broken specimen) of two portions, a short cross-bar, and a second piece escalloped, somewhat resembling the knuckles of the hand. There are two very curious swords of this type, found in the Thames, in Mr. Roach Smith's Museum, and a remarkable example, found with iron spears of great length (21 inches) in a log canoe near Horsey, is figured by Mr. Artis, in his Durobrivæ,