Page:Roman Manchester (1900) by Charles Roeder.djvu/77

 probably the frigidarium, the sudatorium, and the præfurnium. The pedestal, which stood about 2 yards to the west of the first building, was evidently in its original site, being fixed on a regular base of red rock and clay, and Mr. Phelps suggests that on it the altar, dedicated to Fortuna Conservatrix by the centurion Lucius Senecianius Martius, of the Sixth Legion (which was stationed at York and came over to Britain about 121 with Hadrian), was placed. Such a conjecture is not very improbable when we recollect that the altar was found in 1612 in the bed of the Medlock, not far away from the position of these buildings, which were close to the edge of the river (only 25 yards away). It is easy to conceive that the altar, originally occupying the base, into whose measurements it marvellously fits, was thrown down from thence into the water at a later time. Mr. Phelps, on paying a special visit to the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, where it is now preserved, examined the altar very carefully, and found in the centre at the top a hole, sunk 2 inches deep, probably for the fixing a separate focus, which is gone, and may still be embedded in the Medlock not far away from the spot where the altar was found.

Another point has to be taken into consideration. We must infer from the plan that the sudatorium was built apparently on an anterior and older hypocaust, which either had been destroyed or rebuilt for some reason subsequently, for otherwise we cannot understand the meaning of the third floor with its duplicate series of pilæ, filled on all sides with loose earth, and rebuilt over with a thick flooring of cement. We know that Antoninus Pius (138–161) had some troubles with the Brigantes, and also that the Caledonians in the reign of Commodus (180–192) ravaged Lancashire, and we are inclined to think that the station may then have been closely beset and suffered