ANGLO-SAXON REMAINS 



feet 6 inches wide, which contained hundreds of potsherds, bones of the 

 domesticated animals, and chippings and fragments of flint ; a few pieces 

 of coal, a coin of Antonia, mother of Claudius ; and a few other odd- 

 ments. The pottery was mostly Romano-British and Roman, but some 

 Saxon occurred near the surface. No whole vessel was found, and the 

 fragments had a cleanly broken appearance, thus contrasting with those 

 associated with the interments. Mr. Heron suggests that the ditch was 

 merely ' a convenient receptacle for the bones of these animals whose 

 flesh was cooked and eaten at the funeral feasts, as well as for various 

 other waste and refuse arising from the burial customs of our pagan 

 English ancestors.' But the absence of Saxon pottery except near the 

 surface, the fresh appearance of the Roman pottery, and the early period 

 of the coin (even if a barbaric copy) suggest a pre-Saxon age for the 

 ditch, unless indeed, as was probable, Roman pottery continued in 

 general use long after the occupation. 



This cemetery, therefore, affords an interesting point tTappui for 

 different types of burials, which are not found intermingled elsewhere in 

 the county. The particular association of these at Stapenhill points to 

 contemporaneity ; the general dissociation, to local differences. This 

 distribution suggests the presence in our district of communities practis- 

 ing different customs, and yet upon a friendly footing with one another. 

 This is consistent with the view that these were, in great measure 

 at least, Anglo-Saxon settlers who had brought with them the different 

 customs of their ancestral homes on the continent. All this in a general 

 way : we must not press the identity of period or of origin too far. 

 Some extended burials which have been found in the county may be 

 Romano-British. 



It is impossible to separate the interments inhumated, at least of 

 the Roman and the post-Roman periods by any hard and fast line, for 

 the presence of Roman objects is not determinative, seeing how numer- 

 ous they were at Stapenhill. This may seem to prove that the Romano- 

 British culture passed by gradual transition into the Anglo-Saxon, but 

 not necessarily so. Even if we suppose that the manufactures established 

 in the island by the Romans had disappeared with the legions, there is 

 little doubt that those established on the continent continued long after- 

 wards, and that their products were dispersed far and wide by commerce. 

 The general absence of characteristic Roman objects from the Peak 

 barrows of this era may be held to favour the theory of a break between 

 the two cultures ; or with equal propriety, these burial-places may be 

 regarded as so much later than the cemeteries of the southern part 

 of the county, that sufficient time had elapsed for Roman things 

 to fall out of use. The presence of spiral and other designs derived 

 from a Late-Celtic ancestry with some of the former, and their 

 absence from the latter, tend to corroborate the second surmise. These 

 designs occur on Saxon and Irish missals and gospels, and thus connect 

 these interments with Christian times ; and we can hardly withhold a 

 Christian source from the White-low gold cross and the silver crosses on 



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