xxii PLEISTOCENE MAMMALIA. 



Samian ware, and Roman coins. Others, also, in Yorkshire, Cumberland, and 

 Derbyshire, were occupied by the Brit- Welsh in the fifth or sixth centuries, and are 

 fully described in the third chapter of my work on ' Cave Hunting.' That of 

 Longberry Bank, near Penally, in Pembrokeshire, explored by the Rev. H. H. Winwood, 

 E.G.S., contained the remains of Celtic shorthorn, sheep or goat, badger, dog or wolf, 

 oyster shells, limpets, mussels, flint-flakes, a human vertebra, premolar, and metacarpal, 

 along with fragments of red fine-grained pottery turned in the lathe, of a kind that is 

 generally found in the refuse-heaps of Roman cities and villas. 



Romano- Celtic or Brit- Welsh Food. 



The list of the animals associated with Roman remains in Great Britain, proves that 

 the principal supply of meat was obtained from flocks and herds rather than from the 

 chase. In nearly every refuse-heap which I have examined there are the broken bones of 

 the horse ; and from their varying ages it may be inferred that they were kept for food, 

 as well as for riding and driving. The bones of colts are rare, but so also are those 

 of the old and worn-out horses ; and they present an appearance very different from that 

 which is offered by accumulations of horses' bones in the neighbourhood of kennels, as, 

 for instance, that at Oulton, in Cheshire, the seat of Sir Philip Egerton. It is a 

 remarkable fact that none of the horses of that time which have passed through my 

 hands present any trace of the diseases of the bones of the extremities which are the 

 result of the hardness of our modern roads. It would, indeed, almost seem that roadsters 

 were then very uncommon, and that the horses were used principally for riding 

 over the soft grass lands. But, however this may be, horseflesh was a more frequent 

 dish in Roman Britain than venison. Horses were used for food in Britain as 

 late as the year a. d. 787, if there be any truth in the charge made against the English 

 in the Council of Chelsea, " Equos etiam plerique in vobis comedunt, quod nullus 

 Christanorum in Orientalibus facit." 1 In Norway, Hacon, foster-son of iEtlielstan, was 

 compelled to eat horseflesh in honour of Odin in 956 ; and the bloody battle of 

 Stikklestadt, in 1030, in which Olaf, the Saint, met his death, was fought on account of 

 the cruelties which he practised on the eaters of horseflesh. 2 



Pork was almost as commonly used by the Brit- Welsh as the flesh of the sheep and 

 goat, and the swine belonged principally to small domestic breeds, in which there was a 

 large infusion of the blood of the Sus Indica, or the turf-hog. The dog was not eaten, 

 for invariably the long bones are unbroken and untouched by the saw, while the 

 Celtic shorthorn supplied the greater portion of the food. 



1 ' Concilia,' vol. vi, p. 1872. - Laing's 'Sea Kings of Norway,' p. 31G. 



