Page:Roman Manchester (1900) by Charles Roeder.djvu/14

6 to make this paper more attractive and worthy of acceptance. To present a complete clear account of Roman Manchester I have put all the previous strands together and incorporated Whitaker's and Watkin's data. Whitaker's account had carefully to be restudied, and all his sites to be identified, to make them intelligible and available for a reconstruction of a plan. I shall now immediately proceed to the description of the station.

The northern and southern walls measured respectively 175 yards, and the western and eastern walls 140 yards, covering thus an area of 5 acres and 10 perches or 24,500 square yards.

The eastern wall, in 1765, stood still 6 feet to 7 feet in height, and was lowered to 3 yards to 4 feet 80 yards away from its northern termination, where the Porta prætoria was placed. The latter was still visible in 1810. It was here that, according to Dr. Holme the centurial walling-stone (Coh. I. Fris. Quintiani Pedes XXIIIII.), measuring 15 inches by 11 inches, of millstone grit, was found. It is of interest to note that the centurial stone of the Frisian Cohort at Melandra was discovered very near the east angle. Probably it was, therefore, inserted in Manchester at or over the gateway. Dr. Holme mentioned that along with it, at the same point, coins of Trajan (98-117) and Hadrian (117-138) were found. Unfortunately, he does not state the exact