i86 
PROCEEDINGS COTTESWOLD CLUB 
1917 
Mr Sewell then called the attention of the party to ^i^'e gold Roman 
coins, in mint condition, the munificent gift of Lady Church to the Museum 
in memory of her husband, Sir A. H. Chui'ch. The coins arc of the Emperors 
Valentinianus a.d. 364 (2), Gratianus a.d. 375, and Honorius a.d. 395 (2), 
and a very interesting contemporary forgery of \’alentinianus found in the 
Market Place, Cirencester. 
These coins were secured by Sir A. H. Church while residing at Ciren- 
cester, and formed a valued pait of his collection. On his death, they 
were found by Lady Church, who felt that their proper place was in the 
Corinium Museum, and accordingly offered them to Mr Sewell, as 'Curator, 
who accepted them with gi'atitude. 
Mr Sewell added that it was fitting that the first announcement of 
Lady Church’s valuable gift should have been made known to the public 
at a meeting of the Club, of which Sir Arthur Church was for many years a 
very distinguished member. 
The President drew attention to the fine example of a Saxon warrior’s 
skeleton, with remains of his shield ; i.e., its boss and studs, found eight 
years back beneath the Barton Villa pavement, and to a stone (uninscribed) 
Romano-British coffin from the “ Querns.” He also referred to the im- 
portance of the local place-names. Cecily Street occupies the site of a 
district which formerly bore the interesting name Inchstrop — i.e., incg : 
streamlet ; thorp : vill — which lay beyond the actual walls of the town, 
and may well have commemorated the temporary and peaceful settlement 
of the beaten Danes who remained here throughout an entire year (liaving 
come up from Chippenham), after their defeat, under Gothrum at 
Ethandune (c. 879). .A. Salt-wick is mentioned in 1522 as existing beside 
the Bothehall, [i.e., near the modem Com Hall buildings). The common 
term Wick — in the above Salt-wick — signified a store or a dairy, as well as 
(earlier) a village (L. vicus). As at Gloucester, there was a Goo.sc-ditch, and a 
Goose-acre, in St. Lawrence’s Ward, and a Gildene-bridge (1317) in the custody 
of the town Confraternities, or Guilds (M. E. Giildena). Sperving-gate was 
a gate closed with a bar ; M.E. sparven, hence the term in shipping : ” a spar.” 
Proceeding to the Church, the Anne Bullen Cup given by Queen Eliza- 
beth to Dr. blaster, her physician, and the other Elizabethan Plate, was, 
by the courtesy of the Churchwardens and the authorities of the Bank, 
displayed to the Members of the Club. After the main features of the Cluirch, 
and its various periodic additions and rebuildings, had been noticed, the 
Members were admitted, by the kindness of Mrs Dugdale, to the neighbouring 
grounds (or precinct) of the vanished ancient Abliey of S. Mary [Augitstiman). 
The history was related of the transition from a Saxon College of Prebends 
under its once famous Dean, Reinbald de Cirencestre, the first Chancellor of 
England (and a mighty landowner in Dorset, Hereford, and Berkshire), to a 
rich Abbey of Canons Regular under its warm patron Henry I., and onwards 
to its acquiring practically life and death powers (by purchase from the 
impecunious King Richard I.) over the entire population of the town. The 
Abbots thus became Rectors of the Parish, and Lords of one local Manor that 
