ROMANO-BRITISH NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



of a single ' villa,' but potsherds are easily diffused in the course of culti- 

 vation, and are not by themselves adequate evidence to prove the extent 

 of buildings. The name Brinavis is even more unsatisfactory. It occurs 

 in the lists of the Ravenna Geographer, in a context w^hich gives no clue 

 to its actual position ; thence it was borrowed by Bertram, when forging 

 the Itineraries of ' Richard of Cirencester,' and located vaguely in the 

 Midlands ; it rests therefore on the worst authority.' 



(26) Thenford. Here there appears to have been a ' villa ' half a 

 mile east of the village in fields called Flaxlands and Stonegreen, on the 

 top of a slope which falls away steeply westwards and immediately south 

 of the walled garden belonging to Thenford House. The recorded 

 remains comprise foundations, hypocausts, tessellated pavements, tiles, 

 bricks and several coins — a denarius of Vespasian and copper of Tetricus 

 and the Constantine period. The surface of the site is still strewn with 

 bits of brick and pottery, and an old labourer in Thenford told me that 

 he had ploughed along the top of a pavement and found one or two 

 ' fireplaces.' An urn with ashes was dug up long ago in the church- 

 yard, but I do not know whether it is Roman. Remains have also been 

 found at Seabridge, to the west of Thenford, on the edge of Middleton 

 Cheney parish, near the barn called Cold Harbour — skeletons, a cup, and 

 according to local tradition some armour ; but I see no reason for class- 

 ing these as Roman. ^ None of these sites have been explored. 



(27) King's Sutton. Here at a spot called Blacklands, on rising 

 ground half a mile north of the village, a considerable patch of soil is 

 unusually dark in colour, and foundations, pottery, including a curious 

 colander, knife and other objects in iron, and coins of the second, third 

 and fourth centuries — the last being the commonest — have been noted 

 by various writers. The site has never been explored. Roman coins of 

 270-330 A.D. have been found also in other parts of the parish.^ 



4. The Roads 



From our description of country towns and country we pass to the 

 roads which provided communications. This is the natural order of 

 subjects. It is not perhaps the usual order. In general English topo- 

 graphers have tended to emphasize the roads at the expense of the life 

 to which the roads subserved. The study of Roman Britain has now 

 and again been treated as though it were merely a study of roads and 

 of placenames connected therewith. The character of towns or villas 



* Ravenna Ceogr. 428, 429. It is extremely prob;ib!e that this, like most of the names in the 

 Ravenna lists, is corruptly spelt. 



^ Morton, p. ;2g (hence Bridges, i. 203, etc.) ; Baker, i. 717, who quite unnecess.irily thinks the 

 site too extended for a villa ; Beesley's Banbuty, pp. 31-2 ; F. Whellan, p. 498 ; a flanged tile in 

 Northampton Museum. 



* Morton, p. 531 (coins called Blackland pence); Baker, i. 703 ; Beesley's Banbuty, p. 33; 

 Numhmatic Soc. PiwuJinff, 'November 23, 1843; Proceedings of the Soe. of Ani'iquarks, ser. 2, i. 323, 

 ii. 75 ; "Journal of the Bridsh Archtcokgual AssoAation, xvii. 70 ; Worcester Congress of Arckttological Insti- 

 tute, Catalogue of Museum, p. 1 1 . Mr. Dagley of King's Sutton has about fifty coins, found mostly at 

 Blacklands — a denarius of Domitian, another of Hadrian, and copper of the second, third and especially 

 fourth centuries. Fragments of Roman pottery still lie about on the surfice of the site. 



201 



