392 Archceologia. 



pavements were usually of rough limestones, or sometimes only of 

 the earth beaten down, and they were covered with ashes, and 

 with bones of animals, so that evidently the inhabitants, who must 

 have lived largely upon flesh meat, threw the bones and refuse on 

 the floor, and never troubled themselves to remove them. Pieces 

 of broken pottery, of different degrees of fineness, were also 

 scattered about the floors. An examination of these showed further 

 that there had been no fixed place for the fire, but that it had been 

 made capriciously anywhere on the floor. On one floor, which was 

 more extensive than the others, and appeared to have belonged to 

 a house of more lofty pretensions, were found, among other things, 

 a small knife-blade, a pike, and a plain fibula, all of iron, and a 

 beautiful bronze fibula, tastefully ornamented with yellow lozenges 

 down the front. Part of a human skull was found on this floor. 

 In others of these remains of ancient residences were found imple- 

 ments, or portions of implements, of various kinds, knives, a small 

 two-pronged fork, broken querns for grinding corn, mortaria, and 

 various other articles. In one instance the decayed remains of the 

 four corner posts of the house were found, showing that it must 

 have been surrounded by an area, probably of timber. Several coins 

 have been found, but all Roman. Mr. Carrington's own account of his 

 discoveries is printed in the Heliquary, and enters into very minute 

 details, but we cannot agree with him in thinking that any of these 

 remains belong necessarily to an earlier date than the Roman period. 

 Roman remains of some interest have been found at a place 

 called Andoversford, in Gloucestershire, about fourteen miles from 

 Gloucester, on the Avon. The chief value of the discovery, however, 

 is that it seems to fix the site of a Roman station, called in the 

 Itinerary of Richard of Cirencester, Ad Antorium (on the Avon), 

 and lying between Olevum (Gloucester), and Alauna (Alchester), 

 which has hitherto been a subject of considerable doubt. 



Frequent - discoveries of Roman remains of more than usual 

 interest, both domestic and sepulchral, have been made along the 

 line of the Roman road from Venta (Winchester), through the 

 station of Ad Lapidem (site uncertain), to Glausentum (Bittern). 

 One of the last of these which has occurred within the present year, 

 is that of a Roman leaden coffin, near Bishopstoke, in Hampshire, 

 by some men digging for gravel. The leaden coffin had been in- 

 closed in a wooden one, which remained only in the shape of frag- 

 ments of decayed wood. The coffin was made, as usual with Roman 

 leaden coffins, out of one piece of cast lead, by cutting out the 

 corners, and turning up the sides and ends. Inside was the skeleton 

 of a female, with the broken fragments of apparently four vessels 

 of pale green glass. One appeared to have had straight sides ; 

 another had presented somewhat the form of a soda-water bottle ; 

 and a third was of a more globular form. The glass was very thin, 

 which is characteristic of a rather late date in the Roman period. 

 The leaden coffin measured, internally, five feet six inches in length, 

 by rather more than sixteen inches in breadth, and it was ten inches 

 deep, so that the lady who was buried in it must have been small. 

 J T. W. 



