FOURTH TO NINTH CENTURIES 15 
Goose, Barnacle Goose, Duck, Crow, Jackdaw, Kestrel, Crane, 
Capercaillie, Blackbird and Pigeon, were exhumed from a cave 
dwelling in Somersetshire* considered to be late-Celtic, but 
Rom2n coins were found as well. 
Setting aside the Father of Natural History, that is, 
Aristotle, we must begin with the labours of the celebrated 
Pliny, who died a.p. 79, leaving to posterity a work of 
encyclopedic magnitude, and very discursive—the “ Historia 
Naturalis.” “ Pliny,” writes Professor Newton, quoting from 
his first translator, Holland, ‘“ relying wholly [in the case of 
birds] on characters taken from the feet, limits himself to 
three groups—without assigning names to them—those which 
have hooked talons, as Hawks; or round long claws, as 
Hens; or else they be broad, flat, and whole footed, as 
Geese and all the sort in manner of water-fowl.’”’t 
It is not to be expected that there should be any bird 
in Pliny’s Natural History answerable to the Solan Goose, 
although he does name a species which appears to be the 
Cormorant.{ Nor is there much in that first century 
work which has reference to England, or its Natural History, 
‘ except where, as Professor Bensly points out, Pliny makes 
this observation, that ‘‘ of the Goose kind there are Penelopes 
and also Chenalopeces, the latter generally smaller than a 
Goose ; and Britain knows no richer feast than these.” The 
‘“* Chenalopeces ”’ were possibly what we in England now call 
the Sheld-Duck.$ 
We therefore commence with the Roman occupation 
of England, which lasted from 52 B.c. to a.p. 410, during 
which time many permanent settlements were formed by 
the conquerors. The excavations undertaken at the Roman 
town of Calleva (now Silchester) in Hampshire, by Sir 
William St. John Hope and his colleagues, have done much 
and helped to reveal to us the then fauna of England. But, 
previously to this, remains of the Horse, Stag, Fox, Boar, 
Hare, Rabbit, Mouse, Cat, Polecat, Goat, Pig, Sheep, Duck, 
Fowl, Rook, and some smaller birds had been disinterred 
* « Archacologia,’”’ 1911, p. 590. 
+ ‘ Dictionary of Birds,’ Introduction, p. 3. 
{ Book L, ch. 69, and Book XI., ch. 41. 
§ See Turner “ Avium Praecipuarum ” (Evans’s edn., p. 25). 
