ANGLO-SAXON REMAINS 



mounts, an iron axe and shield-boss of the usual form, and a bronze 

 bowl 1 6 inches in diameter. Roach Smith illustrated a buckle and 

 characteristic bird from this site,' and Akerman gives a coloured drawing 

 of a sword pommel with engraved runes.^ Further discoveries were 

 made in 1783, including a fine brooch' with T-shaped garnets, ivory 

 bosses, and gold filigree (as pi. i. fig. 14), while another grave with 

 the head south-west contained a shield-boss and spear, associated with 

 a vase of bottle-form. A coin of Justinian (a.d. 526) found in 1760 

 throws a certain light on the date of this cemetery." 



A valuable series of relics has been derived from a sand-pit at 

 Gilton, in the parish of Ash, on the south side of the Canterbury and 

 Sandwich road. Various excavations were made by Faussett° between the 

 years 1 760-1 763 in the upper levels of this pit, and the following may 

 serve as an analysis of the record made by himself, in which the 

 particulars are given of 106 graves, one by one. Each grave had 

 contained a single occupant, though in six cases there were signs that 

 in the digging of the grave a previous cremated burial had been 

 disturbed, and it is to the credit of the Anglo-Saxon that the broken 

 pieces of the cinerary urn were collected and suffered to remain in the 

 grave, the burnt bones being readily distinguishable from the later 

 interment. From the discovery of coins of Augustus and Tiberius 

 among the calcined bones in one such shattered urn (grave 50), it may 

 be inferred that the site had been used as a cemetery by the Romano- 

 British population during the first two or three centuries of our era ; 

 but the ware is more than once described as coarse, with finger-nail 

 decoration, recalling the cinerary vessels of the late Bronze Age. As a 

 rule the graves were orientated, the head being at the west end, but 

 seven had the feet ' more to the north,' and two were north and south, 

 the feet being at the north end. It may be observed in passing that 

 these nine exceptional graves were poorly furnished, there being no 

 signs of a coffin, and generally nothing but an iron knife or spear-head. 

 Almost exactly half the orientated graves retained traces of wooden 

 coffins, and in seven cases special mention is made of the thick timber 

 employed for the purpose. Some are stated to have passed the fire, but 

 it is possible that the black colour of decayed wood may have deceived 

 the explorer : the application of fire in any case would have been 

 perfunctory, and purely for symbolic purposes. 



The sex of the interred could in many cases be decided by the 

 bones or the grave furniture ; and in the graves of males there was 

 generally a spear-head by the side of the skull, usually on the right, 

 and occasionally what is described as a ' pilum,' perhaps a missile 

 weapon, on the other side. The latter was in one case found to 

 have measured 4I feet, in another a foot less, as the head and ferrule 



' Coll. Antiq. ii. pi. xxxvii. figs. 8, 9. 

 a Pagan Saxondom, pi. xxiv. fig. 3 ; see also below. 

 » Nen. Brit. pi. ix. fig. 2. 



» Ibid. pi. xxii. fig. 6, p. 96, found with vase, pi. xxiii. fig. 5. 

 • Described and illustrated in Inv. Sep. pp. I-34. 

 I 353 45 



