ROMANO-BRITISH DERBYSHIRE 



Romans used the springs. His theory was confirmed long afterwards by 

 actual discoveries. These discoveries fall into two parts. About 1700, 

 and again about 1780, traces of buildings and baths were found close to 

 the springs and St. Anne's Crescent in the bottom of the valley. In 

 1787, and later, especially in 1903, other remains were found some two or 

 three hundred yards south or south-east of the springs on the top of a 

 low hill, near Silverlands (fig. 26). The former, doubtless, represent the 

 baths, and the latter some part of the village which grew up round them. 

 The baths are scantily known. Our records, strangely enough, 

 include only structural discoveries, and are silent as to smaller remains, 

 such as potsherds and coins. The story begins with Charles Leigh, the 



FIG. 26. BUXTON. 



physician, a frequent visitor to Buxton. He, writing about 1699 I7OO, 1 

 mentions : 



A Roman wall cemented with Red Roman plaister, close by St. Anne's Well [at 

 the south-west end of the Crescent], where we may see the Ruines of the ancient 

 Bath, its Dimensions and Length. The Plaister is red and hard as brick. ... I am 

 inclined to think (he curiously adds) that it was a mixture of lime and powder'd Tiles 

 cemented with Blood and Eggs. 



Leigh was a magniloquent writer, and it is not quite clear whether his 

 'plaistered wall' is the same as the 'ruines of the bath' or whether he alludes 



1 Nat. Hist, of Lane. Ches. and the Peal: (Oxford, 1700), iii. 42 : Leigh died in or after 1701, and 

 not (as is often stated) in 1671. Gibson, Adds, to Camden (1722), i. 593, repeats Leigh, being ignorant 

 that the remains had been destroyed in 1709. 



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