48 
in the month of October a very curious discovery was made in 
the garden of St. Mary’s Convent, near Micklegate Bar, in this 
city. A new wing is to he added to that building contiguous to 
Nunnery Lane, and, whilst making the necessary excavations, 
at a depth of foiu* or five feet, the labourers came upon three 
small domestic altars and the greater part of a large statue, 
which were huddled together, and had evidently been huiied 
for the purpose of concealment. The Bomans, when they 
deserted Ehuracum, did not wish to expose these evidences of 
their domestic worship to the neglect or wantonness of those 
v/ho came after them. In 1870 as many as seventeen altars 
were discovered at Maryport, in Cumberland, which had evi¬ 
dently been secreted. There is every reason to hope, that 
similar discoveries will he made in York from time to time. 
The place where the relics at the Convent were deposited is 
the site of a Boman cemetery, and, two or three feet below 
the altars, in their immediate vicinity, the remains of the dead 
were discovered. Those who hid these sculptured stones 
probably imagined that they would escape observation, as they 
expected that no one would care to disturb the bodies of those 
who had been interred below. 
I. The smallest altar in the series is only eleven inches in 
height, and is very clearly inscribed— 
DEO VE 
TERI 
PRIMVL 
VS VOL. 
M. 
which may be thus extended— Deo Veteri Primuhis Yoliisiiis 
(or Volusiamis) merito ? The contracted name Vol. already 
occurs on the base of a statue of Eternity in our Museum. I 
suppose that the last letter in the inscription, J/., stands for 
Merito, one of the four w’ords which constitute the usual formida 
upon altars and tablets. I am not aware, however, of another 
instance in which Merito stands by itself, and the solution of 
this difficulty must be left to those who are more skilled in 
epigraphy than I am. And now who is the Deu8 Vetus to 
whom this little altar is dedicated ? Occasionally we find the 
word written Vitus, the sound of Vitus and Vetus being prac- 
