FOUND IN britat::. 31 



Hadrian, in connexion with the name of the metallic district, of which it is 

 probable that Chesterfield was then, as Wicksworth has subsequently been con- 

 sidered, the regulating town ; hence this inscription would mean no more than 

 that the block of lead upon which it was stamped belonged to the Emperor Cffisar 

 Hadrian Augustus, from, the metallic district of Lutudarum. The second [n, 

 (13)] would, under a similar interpretation, be stamped with the name of its 

 owner, a proprietor of some mines, perhaps, or a merchant, Lucius Aruconiua 

 Verecundus, with the addition, as before, of the name of the mining district. The 

 third inscription [n. (3)] appears to mean that the lead upon which it is im- 

 pressed formed part of the tribi;te due to Tiberius Claudius from the mines (silver 

 or lead) of the British Lutudae or Lutudarum. These interpretations [which were 

 first suggested by Mr. Lysons and Mr. Crane] are by far the most conformable to 

 custom and common sense." 



The suggestion of Mr. Lysons has also been adopted by Sir Henry 

 Ellis, Townley Gallery, ii. p. 290 ; Mr. Way, Jour. Arch. Inst., 

 1859, n. 61, p. 25 ; and apparently by Mr. Yates, Mining Opera- 

 tions, p. 10. Mr. C. R. Smith, Journal Arch. Assoc, v. p. 228, is 

 of opinion that LUT • is a contraction of LVTVM or LVITVM, 

 signifying washed or purified ; and he refers in illustration to the use 

 of elutia in Plin. Hist. Nat. xxxiv. 1(5, where it is applied to the 

 washing by water of tin from the vein in the gold mines of Spain 

 and Portugal. Mr. Wright, Celt, Roman, and Saxon, p. 238, adnts 

 this opinion as undoubtedly correct. 



In favour of the interpretation received by Mr. Smith and Mr. 

 Wright, may be cited the statement of Professor Phillips, whose 

 authority on such points is justly esteemed of high value, that "he is 

 strongly of opinion that much of the lead ore was collected from the 

 surface by aid of water, artificially directed. The process, in fact, 

 is described by Pliny, in terms so exactly applicable to the modern 

 * hushes ' of Swaledale, that no doubt can remain of this custom, 

 which is now esteemed rude and semi -barbarous, being of Roman or 

 earlier date in Britain." — ' Ancient Metallurgy in Britain,' Journal 

 Arch. Inst. 1859, n. 61, p. 17. 



As to MET • there is no difference of opinion, all agreeing in 

 tracing it to metallum. 



(b) EX • ARG* — These letters are found, as we have already seen, 

 in nn. (3) and (14), and an expansion of them appears on the side of 

 the block, n. (4), in the form EX • ARGENT. Mr. Pegge, Archceo- 

 logia, ix. p. 45, read them ex argent\o\ and regarded them as de- 

 noting that the silver had been extracted from the lead. He cites in 



