ON SILCHESTER EXCAVATION. 413 



inches high, was found used up as building material in one of the hypo- 

 causts in the southern part of the field. A much-mutilated Attic base of 

 good character, and some portions of marble mouldings and wall linings 

 were also turned up in the same quarter. All these may have come from 

 one or other of the temples during its rebuilding or destruction. 



Large part of a quern of the unusual diameter of twenty-eight inches, 

 of Andernach lava, was found in another of the trenches. It I'etains two 

 of the iron loops of the machinery by which it was revolved. 



The smaller objects included a few good brooches in bronze, a torque 

 and a pin of silver, portions of a pane of window-glass, a rod of solder, 

 part of two large trenchers of Kimmeridge shale, as well as a considerable 

 number of coins. 



The pits and wells also yielded a quantity of bones of oxen, sheep, 

 goat, and horse. 



Tlie search for remains of plants &c. in the filling-in of the pits and 

 wells, which has been pursued with such conspicuous success during the 

 last five years, has been continued by Mr. A. H. Lyell. The results have 

 been examined by Mr. Clement Reid, F.R.S., who has identified the seeds 

 of twenty-four more plants not hitherto known to have been introduced into 

 this country so early as the Roman period. Among the plant remains 

 were clippings of box and the seeds of fig and grape. 



A detailed account of all the discoveries has been communicated to 

 the Society of Antiquaries, and will in due course be published in 

 ' Archasologia.' 



Owing to the limited number of the minor antiquities found last 

 season, it has not been thought worth while this year to have any public 

 exhibition of them, 



The Committee proposes during the current year (1903) to continue last 

 year's excavations westwards, with the object of completing the un- 

 finished insulce. The work was resumed in May, and has already brought 

 to light a building of large extent which seems to be the long-sought-for 

 public baths of the town. 



Looking back over the course of the excavations hitherto, the Com- 

 mittee ventures to .suggest that the opportunity should be taken, in 

 exploring the small fraction of the site which remains, to make special 

 and detailed observations on certain points which do not yet seem to 

 have been made out definitely. The following are suggested as specially 

 worthy of attention : — 



(1) Though the architectural history of Silchester has been elaborated 

 in great detail, very little evidence has been recorded hitherto as to the 

 stratification and sequence of the smaller finds, and as to the question 

 whether any parts of the site were occupied only at special periods, or 

 whether (as would appear from the published reports) there is practically 

 only one stratum of remains on the whole of it. A closer registration of 

 the contents of the numerous pits and wells, and of the areas which are 

 still covered by undisturbed pavements, would probably go far to settle 

 this point. 



(2) The relation in which the rectangular street-plan stands to the 

 trapezoidal wall-plan of the town has not yet been made clear at all 

 points, and might easily be elucidated in the course of the next few 

 seasons' work, by minute study of mound, wall, and ditch ; as well as by 

 confirmatory trenching to greater depths at the points where the street- 

 lines, if produced, would intersect the line of the wall. 



