246 
A very perfect quern, or two flat circular stones for grinding corn by hand, 
was also found, and both the stones, 14 inches in diameter, with a wooden feeder 
which the Dean had made to show more clearly the exact mode of using it, are 
also to be seen in the Museum at the Free Library. 
I was taken myself, in 1842, by Mr. Richard Johnson, late Town Clerk of 
Hereford, to visit the exploration, and was present when he found the very interest- 
ing Roman oculist’s stamp which was afterwards figured and described in the 
Transactions of the British Archeological Association, by Mr. Roach Smith. We 
found, also, the same day, a bronze fibula, a considerable number of bone pins, 
like knitting needles, and the ground was strewn with tesserw and broken pottery. 
The quantity of cinders, ashes, and blackened bricks and stones was very remark- 
able, and so like an ashpit as to justify the remark of a labourer who was looking 
on with amazed wonder at our diligent search, ‘‘ Why you be got on a miskin.” 
Some portions of the foundations of the wall on the north-eastern side remained 
at thistime. It carried the footpath as described by Mr. Reynolds, and was faced, 
where the facing existed, with stones, arranged zigzag—herring-bone fashion—in 
arubbly mortar, which was not so hard and good as Roman mortar is generally 
found to be, a fact that favours the suppositon that it was built early and quickly 
of such materials as came to hand. Brambles and weeds grew in it luxuriantly. 
The sites of the gates of this town corresponded very nearly with the cardinal 
points. They are not now visible, but they are given in Dr. Stukely’s plan. 
The only inscriptions we found at Magna are on the Roman oculist’s stamp 
before alluded to, and a milestone. ‘‘ The small square pieces of stone,” says Mr. 
Thompson Watkins, in his excellent paper, ‘‘ Roman Herefordshire” (Archeological 
Journal, Vol. xxxiv. pp. 349-372), ‘‘is one of the well known medicine stamps of 
the Roman oculists.”’ It is inscribed on all four side as follows : 
(1) (2) 
T. VINDAC. ARIO T. VINDACIAR 
VISTI ANICET OVISTI NARD 
(3) (4) 
* VINDAC ARI T, VINDACARIO 
OVISTI CHLORON VISTI CE Sa 
The asterisks mark missing letters. On the upper surface of the stone is 
inscribed 
SENIOR 
on the lower side 
SEN. 
the latter doubtless the abbreviation of the former, both being probably made 
subsequently to the larger inscription, and referring to the owner’s name. All 
four of the sides, it will be seen, bear the words, T. VINDACI ARIOVISTI; to the first 
is added the name of the medicine, ANICET(VM); to the second another medicine, 
NARD(vM); to the third the name of the medicine, CHLORON; whilst in the fourth 
the name of the medicine has been obliterated. The English translation simply is 
that they are the Anicetum, Nardum, and the Chloron of Titus Vindacius Ario- 
vistus. The latter name, ‘‘ Ariovistus,” is German. 
