192 ON THE BRITISH ANTIQUITIES OF WARWICKSHIRE. 



Now, viewing this as a specimen^ which it certainly is, of a Ro- 

 man burial place, we may observe that, in their common mode of 

 interring the dead, they deposited, by the side of the body, broken 

 platters or paterep, cups and bowls, containing the libations and ob- 

 lations of the funeral sacrifice ; we may remark, too, the absence of 

 arms and ornaments, for the few articles that pertain to the latter 

 description do but evince an exception to the general practice. 



There is an evident distinction to be drawn between the funeral 

 customs of the Romans and those of the Romanized or later Bri- 

 tons ; for though when the Romans conquered this country they in- 

 troduced amongst the natives the arts of civilization, the latter never 

 appear to have been so entirely blended with their conquerors as to 

 have changed all their national usages ; and this is more particu- 

 larly observable when any of their burial places fali under our no- 

 tice, for we then find that they continued to inter the dead with 

 their arms and personal decorations. Yet we discern between them 

 and the ancient Britons by the kind of accompaniments placed in 

 the grave ; for in the one case we rarely find any other articles 

 than weapons of bone, flint, stone, or brass, and beads ; but after the 

 Roman invasion these primitive relics were discarded, and we find 

 numerous articles of iron, a metal which, though not originally in- 

 troduced by the Romans, was at least little known in this country 

 before their arrival. These consist chiefly of swords, spear-heads, 

 and the bosses of shields, knives, arrow-heads, and buckles, and or- 

 naments of brass, such as fibulae, both of the cross and circular 

 shape, clasps, tweezers, and rings, and beads of amber, glass, and 

 baked earth. 



The burial place belonging to the Roman-British settlement at 

 Cestersover, was discovered some years ago, about a mile from the 

 site of that settlement on the Wattiing-street road, between Bens- 

 ford Bridge and the turnpike road leading from Rugby to Lutter- 

 worth, which crosses it. This part of the road was under repair, 

 and the labourers employed on it disturbed a number of human 

 skeletons, which lay buried in the centre, and on the sides of the 

 road, at the distance of only eighteen inches or two feet below the 

 surface; with these skeletons were found deposited a variety of 

 warlike articles, appendages of dress, and female ornaments, the 

 umbos or bosses of shields, spear-heads, varying in size, and from 

 six to fifteen inches in length, with the wood of the shafts still ex- 

 isting in the sockets ; also, knives and buckles of iron, and hooked 

 instruments, which are supposed to have been used for curling the 

 hair. With the female interments, and those of children, were 



