ANGLO-SAXON REMAINS 



fittings.* About the same time Rev. J. P. Bartlett made some interest- 

 ing discoveries in the same locaHty.'' Some sceattas^ were found lying 

 on the right of a skeleton with several bronze ornaments, a large ring, 

 decayed wood, and a substance resembling leather, that may once have 

 been a purse. These coins are the earliest native Anglo-Saxon pieces in 

 this country, but are not considered to date before the year 600. They 

 are rarely found in graves ; while these, with certain gold coins mentioned 

 elsewhere, point to the seventh century as the date of some Kentish 

 interments, it may well be argued that most of the burials belong to 

 the sixth. 



Mr. Bartlett also found a bronze hairpin (see fig. 5) of unusual form, 

 the stem being flat and proportionately broad, and the head cruciform.* 

 Considering the occurrence of sceattas^ on this site we may 

 be more disposed than usual to regard this as a Christian 

 relic. Sir Thomas Mantell's discoveries were made before 

 the necessity of accurate record was recognized, but three 

 buckles" from this site are preserved in the national collec- 

 tion with beads and a pendant of Maximinus that came from 

 the same grave-mound ; also parts of two iron swords of the 

 usual pattern. 



Little need be said about the excavations carried out 

 during the Congress of the British Archaeological Associa- 

 tion ' at Canterbury in 1 844, when eight separate grave- 

 mounds, 2 to 3 feet in height, were found to contain spears 

 and shield-bosses or beads, but nothing of special interest 

 came to light. 



The next site to be noticed lies about three miles due 

 east on the other side of the Roman road. In the year 1772 

 Faussett^ examined four dozen barrows, 160 paces due east 

 of the burying-place at Sibertswold, but belonging to the 

 parish of Barfreston. The grave-mounds were mostly above 

 the medium size, and arranged with some uniformity in 

 rows running north-east and south-west. There seems to 

 have been no exceptional orientations on this site, and all 

 the' twenty-one coffins found had ' passed the fire.' In thir- 

 teen coffinless graves were no relics of any importance : g ^'°' p 

 indeed, the whole group yielded but little to the excavator. Breach Down 

 The richest grave was that of a woman, and contained a (!)■ 



garnet pendant crossed obliquely by a band of gold, a silver earring 

 with the usual coloured glass bead, and at the feet two green glass phials. 

 A similar garnet pendant was recovered from another woman's grave, in 



Arch. Journ. i. 379 (earlier excavations), p. 271. 



' Proc. Soc. Antiq. Land. 1st 

 6, 7 (child's buckles). 



3 Coll. Ant. i. p. 7, pi. vi. figs. 11-15 

 ♦ Pagan S<2A-on(/ofn, pi. xl. fig. 2,and Jou 

 « Coll. Ant. i. 7, pi. vi. figs. 11-15. 

 ' Canterbury vol. pp. 91-5, 108. 



137 ; Pagan Sa.xondom, pi. xxxvi. figs. 2, 3 ; and pi. xxviii. figs. 



3rit. Arch. Assoc. i.'jij. It is now in the British Museum. 

 • Pag. Sa.v. pi. xxviii. figs. 2, 3, 5. 

 ' Inv. 5.-/>. pp. I35-+3- 



349 



