ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE. 38] 



In the spring of 1870, in the garden of a cottage on the 

 western side of the road ascending from Eveley corner to 

 Hogmoor, a number of bronze weapons, or parts of weapons 

 (Roman or Roman-British), were found under peat, free 

 from rust or oxidation. They consisted of twenty-seven frag- 

 ments of sword-blades, some of which, when put together, 

 made complete swords ; two fragments of sword-sheaths ; one 

 grooved socket for connecting a spear-head, or perhaps a 

 standard, with the shaft ; eighteen large and six small spear- 

 heads ; two spear-points ; three rings ; and two fragments of 

 uncertain use. Most of the sword-handles had bronze nails 

 (evidently intended to fasten the iron part of the handle to 

 some covering material) remaining perfect in their holes; and 

 in the cavities of several of the spear-heads the wooden points 

 which had been inserted to fix them in sockets connecting the 

 head with the shaft of the spear were still remaining. Some 

 of the edges of these weapons were hacked and notched in a 

 manner which could hardly have resulted from use ; and of 

 the sword-blades, some had been forcibly bent before being- 

 broken, proving that those who buried them had first taken 

 pains to render them useless. 



In the same cottage garden there have also since been 

 found, in a fragment of a small earthenware pot, nearly 100 

 copper coins, much defaced, chiefly of the elder Tetricus, but 

 including a few of his son, and of Gallienus and Victorinus. 



The next discovery was that of two large earthenware vases, 

 which, when perfect, must have contained considerably more 

 than 30,000 Roman and Roman-British coins, the number of 

 those which still remained in them when found, or which were 

 recovered by myself from the surrounding earth, having been 

 counted at 29,802. They were buried at a spot rather less 

 than halfway between Blackmoor House and Woolmer Pond, 

 where they were found, covered by about two feet of soil, on 

 the 30th of October, 1873, by some workmen employed in 

 trenching ground for a plantation. The upper parts of both 

 vases were much broken, probably by agricultural operations 

 at some distant date. The coins in them were closely caked 

 together, and completely filled what was left of the vase-. 



