THE ROMAN MILITARY STATION AT NEWSTEAD. 207 
as a strand in the manufacture of plaited articles—a craft which 
the basket work from the Newstead Roman Station would 
indicate to have been appreciated, if not practised, by the Romans 
—must have been of greater antiquity than the period of the 
Roman occupation, 
TABLE” 1L 
Samples of Earth and Vegetable Remains from Pits 
and other Situations. 
Sample A.—A dark vegetable earth containing a considerable 
number of pieces of chipped oak, evidently chippings of timber of 
some size. Mixed with other vegetable remains are twigs of hazel 
and birch in some quantity, the former being particularly numerous, 
while pieces of hazel bark are plentiful, some of the pieces being 
from trees of fair size. There is also a certain amount of charcoal 
and a piece of eae bone. This sample yielded twigs of Pyrus 
eat with 
mple B. is PR this I obtained wood of Pyrus Aria, some of 
the ‘brafiehes being of fair size. The great bulk of the material 
consists of leaves of grasses matted and pressed together. The 
deposit is almost entirely of a vegetable nature, fea the material is 
too much decomposed to determine its character. Many small 
wood chips, chiefly birch, are present, and nieces of birch bark, 
Sample C.—This is a closel y-caked mass of sepoiabie remains 
composed almost entirely of wheat-chaff. It appears to be the 
discarded refuse after winnowing and cleaning the grain, and 
indicates that the cleaning of the grain was carried on at 'New- 
stead. Among the chaff occur numerous seeds of Lychnis 
Cithegn, a troublesome weed of corn fields in some parts of 
Britain at the present time. Other weed-seeds ee os pnale 
are Stellaria media, Cerastium sp., Geranium sp., o lupu- 
lina, fruits of Potentilla Wormentilia. Rumex eto. pk oasis pl 
sp., and the fruits - several grasses 
Sample D—A black deposit with numerous twigs and leaves. 
Leaves of hazel a identified, and several hazel nuts and pieces of 
hazel-nut shell were found, also catkins of hazel. The rhizome of 
a fern and the leaf rachis of a fern were identified. Grasses matted 
together form a large part of the deposit, The twigs and woods 
identified were hazel and birch. 
Sample E.—This sample consists of a light-coloured wad with 
layers of a darker vegetable deposit running through it. Many 
grains of wheat and a little wheat-chaff were found. The sample 
proved one of the best for weed-seeds. It was carefully washed 
and the vegetable remains separated from the clay and sand. The 
fruits and seeds identified were those of Picris hieracioides, Cnicus 
