Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 9.djvu/251

Rh Stamp," in the British Museum. Four of these curious little objects of the Roman age are there preserved, but the localities where they were found had not been recorded. On looking over an old catalogue of impressions of seals, &c., in the writing of Sir Hans Sloane, Mr. Franks noticed the following entry:—"Impressions of letters carved on the three sides of ash-coloured marble found at Verulam, given me by Mr. Kettle, of St. Alban's." This note reminded him of such a stamp, amongst other Sloane antiquities; and Mr. Franks succeeded in identifying them. They proved to be impressions of one of the oculists' stamps now existing in the Museum, namely the same which was exhibited by Gough to the Society of Antiquaries in 1788, and engraved, Archæologia, vol. ix. p. 227. It is noticed by M. Duchalais as "Lapis Incertus, 11," and by Professor Simpson, "Monthly Medical Journal," March, 1851, p. 245. The history of this interesting relic has thus been ascertained, and it is proved to be identical with the stamp mentioned as found at St. Albans, ("Gent. Mag.," vol. 48, p. 510) no description being there given. It bears three inscriptions, one of them supplying the name of the oculist, Lucius Julius Juvenis, another without any name, and the third giving the name of a different oculist, F. 'Secundus. The first two inscriptions are well cut; the third is very rudely executed. On examining the stone, the edges of the two first inscriptions, which are contiguous, are found to be neatly sloped off, the slope starting from about the opposite corner; the two other sides, on the contrary, arc very abruptly sloped, and the places for the inscriptions are wider. From this it would seem that the stone was originally four times its present size, and that the inscriptions have been cut in half. The accompanying representation will give an idea of what they must have been:—

The italics indicating the missing portions.

Since the above was written Mr. Franks has received some information which sets the question of the locality in which the stamp was found completely at rest. It appears from the Minutes of the Society of Antiquaries, that on Nov. 1, 1739, Mr. Kettle, of St. Albans, sent to the Society impressions of this very oculist's stamp, and that on the 6th March the stone itself was exhibited as lately found near St. Albans. Mr. Franks therefore proposes calling the stone Lapis Verolamiensis.

Mr. communicated the following particulars relating to a fragment of sculpture, probably part of a sepulchral effigy, being the head of a warrior, in armour of mail. It was found, in 1826, in digging the foundations of a house in the Circus, Exeter, and has been since preserved by the owner of the house, Mr. Gidley, the town clerk. Bedford Circus occupies the site of the dissolved Dominican convent, supposed to have been founded by William Briwere, Bishop of Exeter, in the reign of Henry III. Within its walls several persons of distinction were buried,