ROMANO-BRITISH SUFFOLK 



urns of white ware, a lump of red earth, and many shards or cinerary urns. 

 Near, and probably originally within the largest of the glass vessels, was a 

 white glass lachrymatory, one of those small perfume bottles sometimes buried 

 amongst the ashes in the cinerary urns. In both cemeteries just mentioned 

 the two methods of burial seem to have been practised, thus indicating a 

 comparatively late date in the Roman period. To complete this list of 

 cemeteries the one already noted in the Stonham parishes may be called to 

 mind. 



Another indication of dwelling-places or their near vicinity is to be seen 

 in the hoards of coins which have been disclosed from time to time. Either 

 these must have been buried plunder or the treasure of an individual who 

 had deposited it in some spot within his observation. Such hoards of Roman 

 coins have been turned up in various places in Suffolk. One of bronze coins 

 is recorded to have been discovered in Ickworth,'" and another of the same 

 metal at Lakenheath." A small collection of British coins was found at 

 Santon Downham ^^ in the year 1870. It is named here because it included 

 two second brass of the Emperor Claudius. An important find was made in 

 the year 1874 at Lavenham,'' in a field near Lavenham Lodge, where a 

 labourer ploughing turned up from about a foot underground a rude earthen 

 vessel, filled with silver denarii, 197 in number ; 187 of these were saved. 

 The earliest in date, as far as could be ascertained, were three of Mark 

 Antony (b.c. 44-30), the latest twenty-eight of Trajan (a.d. 98-1 17). A still 

 larger hoard of upwards of 900 silver pieces was discovered when a new 

 turnpike road was being made through the parish of Benacre in 1786.'* It is 

 said that none of these were earlier in date than Vespasian (a.d. 69-79). Not 

 far from the site of the interment at Mildenhall,'^ previously mentioned, were 

 found in 1833 two vessels of clay and the remains of a third containing coins 

 rusted into a mass. A much earlier find was made, viz. in 1764, of ' a pot 

 full of Roman coins of the Lower Empire' at Stowlangtoft.'* Again, in 1870, 

 at Sutton, another deposit, of two urns containing coins of the period of 

 Constantine (a.d. 307—337), was turned up; and later, in 1874, a labourer 

 ploughing a field on land called Dix's Charity land at Icklingham " discovered 

 a hoard of silver pieces numbering in all probability about 400. Those 

 which were preserved and examined showed a range of date from Constantine I 

 (a.d. 307-337) to Honorius (a.d. 395-423). 



Regarding only the value of the metal, the most remarkable of these 

 Suffolk hoards was that discovered near Eye,'* on Clint Farm, in 1781. 

 This consisted of several hundred gold coins (600 it was said) in good 

 preservation, inclosed in a leaden cist, ranging in date from Valentinian 

 (a.d. 364—375) to Honorius (a.d. 395—423). There appears to have been an 

 interment close by the site of this find, as was also the case near that made at 

 Mildenhall. In both instances the treasure may have been deposited in 

 burial-places attached to private houses. Finally, the mention of a hoard 

 of the latest period, not an unimportant one, may close this list of finds 



'» Camden, Brit. (ed. Gough), 1789, Add. ii, 81. " Joum. Brit. Arch. Assoc. 1880, xxxvi, 104. 



" Arch. Jourrt. 1870, xxvii, 92 et seq. " Proc. Suff. Inst. Arch. 1874, iv, 414 et seq. 



" Gent. Mag. cvi, pt. i (1786), 472-3. " Archaeokgia, 1839, xv, App. 609. 



^ Camden, Brit. (ed. Gough), 1789 (Add.), ii, 81. " Proc. Suff. Inst. Arch. 1874, iv, 282 etseq. 

 " IpstLicbjoum. 19 May 1781 ; Camden, Brit. (ed. Gough), (Add.) 1789, ii, 90 ; Gillingwater, Hist. 

 of Lowestoft, 1790, p. 38 n. 



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