CELTIC AND ROMANO-BRITISH HERTFORDSHIRE 



broken at the neck, is supposed to have been found at Royston and is now in the Hertford 

 Museum [Inform from Mr Bullen]. Some of the barrows in the neighbourhood-efpedal y 

 sTe tZSh ?'k ?l°1 ^^^r^^-^- yielded Roman coins and%ottery, but fo^r these 

 see Therfield and Kelshall. The really important finds occur over the Cambridgeshire 

 border, but only a mile or two away, at LitHngton (villa and cemetery) and Limloe Hill 

 (cemetery). No evidence of Roman occupation has been found in the cave here 

 "iTs^rTi '^'°"^' ^"""^^ ''°'''' ^'°°' Cumberlow Green [English Village Community 



St. Albans. — See p. 125. 



SARRATT^Foundations of a building were excavated in October 1907 in a field called Church 

 Field, 200 ft. north of Sarratt Bottom Farm, which slopes southwards from Rosehall Wood to 

 the River Chess. The building was rectangular in plan and measured 48 ft. from east to west 

 and 33 ft. from northto south. It had an apse, 17 ft. across the chord, added on to the west 

 end and built not quite in the centre of the wall, the two rooms being connected by a gap 

 9 ft. or ID ft wide m the separating wall. The east wall of the rectangular room ran further 

 south, but the end of it was not found. In this wall traces of a post were observed 

 which the excavators thought might possibly be the last of a row. The walls were 

 2^ ft. thick, lay 9 in. below the surface and extended 3 ft. deep into the ground. They were 

 bmlt of flint and pure Ume cement that was quite soft and wet Some plaster still remained 

 on the inside of the walls. Many bricks, flue tiles, pottery and glass lay about and two 

 illegible coins were found. More buildings exist further north up the hill, but they have not 

 been opened. The upper part of the tower of Holy Cross Church, nearly half a mile south-east 

 of the farm, is almost entirely built with 

 Roman bricks and tiles, and many tiles and 

 pieces of rough conglomerate (plum-pudding 

 stone) occur in the lower part of the walls, 

 probably from the Roman building. Frag- 

 ments of urns frequently turn up in the 

 churchyard, and an iron key and bronze 

 fibula were found there before 1881, also a 

 large heavy brass ring about 1840. 



A building of somewhat similar plan, 

 but with a square, instead of a circular, in- 

 closure at the end, was found at Castlefield, 

 near Andover (Hants). It had, in addition, 

 two rows of bases for pillars running down 

 the centre, and two open hearths and three 

 sunk furnaces within it. More elaborate 



buildings of the same type have been opened at Clanville (in Weyhill), Thruxton and 

 Holbury (in Lockerley) in Hants, at HartHp in Kent and Ickleton in Camljridgeshire, and 

 elsewhere, and are all evidently examples of a primitive type of Romano-British house 

 which resemble neither the Celtic hut nor the Italian house, nor even the corridor houses of 

 Britain and North Gaul. This building at Sarratt, as that at Clanville, may possibly be 

 connected with others further north by a courtyard, all forming part of one house of a type 

 known as the ' courtyard.' [For these see F.C.H. Hants, i, 302, and references there given ; 

 inform, from Mr. A. Whitford Anderson ; Estates Gazette, 2 Jan. 1909 ; and St. Albans Arch, 

 and Archit. Soc. Trans. Jan. 1909, with plan; Cussans, Hist, of Herts. Cashio Hund. in]. 

 Another dwelh'ng-house near Latimer hes 2 miles west and further up the valley, but in the 

 county of Buckinghamshire, and another at Abbots Langley in the Gade Valley, 4 miles 

 north-east. 

 Sawbridgeworth. — ' Roman pottery has been found in considerable quantity ' on Stonards 

 Farm, about half a mile east of the stream called Fiddler's Brook and 2 miles west of Saw- 

 bridgeworth \Journ. Brit. Arch. Assoc. (i888), xliv, 116]. Two urn burials were found in 

 March 1908 near the River Stort, in a wood called Ashplant, 170 yds. east of the Harlow 

 Road, but within Pishobury Park. They were deposited 6 ft. below the surface on a layer of 

 ashes 3 in. thick, were 2 ft. apart and contained calcined bones and ashes. Each stood on a 

 saucer, and over the mouth of one was a small inverted cup, apparently Samian, 2 in. high 

 and 4 in. in diameter at the top, with a rose-shaped potter's mark stamped on the bottom. One 

 of the urns was of hard, dark grey ware, the other of buff colour, decorated with a small 

 indented pattern ; there was also part of a small brown jug or vase, stained black on the 

 outside and decorated with two parallel lines [Glasscock, East Herts. Arch. Soc. Trans, i. 

 (2), 191]. Cf. Widford. 



163 



Scale of Feet 

 Plan of Roman Building at Sarratt 



