As yet, the excavations on the site of Uriconium have not been carried far enough to enable us to form any idea of the general distribution of the Roman town, but it is evident that the buildings on which the excavators are employed were inclosed by three main streets, crossing at right angles, forming a square mass. It has been stated that the few discoveries hitherto made as to the character of the streets in the Roman towns in Britain would lead us to think that they were little more than narrow alleys, but this was certainly not the case with these three streets of Roman Uriconium, which seem to have been fine wide streets, and in the one to the north, the pavement of small round stones appears to have occupied only the middle part of the street, designed probably for carriages and horses. A tolerably wide space on each side seems, as far as can be traced, to have beenunpaved. But, although we have as yet made little advance towards discovering the general character of Uriconium as a city, and the manner in which the houses were distributed over the Roman town, we had found sufficient fragments of different kinds to give us a tolerable notion of the houses themselves.
The average thickness of the walls of a house, even where they only separated one small room from another, was three feet. They are rarely less than this, and it is only in one or two cases of what appeared to be very important walls that they exceed it, when they reach the thickness of four feet. This measure of three feet was no doubt a well understood one for the wall of a house, and it was continued in the middle ages, when, in ordinary dwellings, only the division walls between house and house were of solid masonry. Municipal regulations then fixed these partition walls at a minimum of three feet in thickness, the cause of which limitation was probably the fear of fires; and in these mediæval municipal regulations, it was further ordered, that closets or cupboards in the wall should in no case be made more than one foot deep, so that if your own cupboard and your neighbour’s happened to back each other, there would still be a foot of solid masonry between the two houses. Andthe masonry of the Romans may well be called solid. Its character may be seen perhaps to most advantage in the Old Wall above ground. The process of building seems to have been to raise first, gradually, the facings of neatly-squared stones, supported no doubt between frames of woodwork, the supports of which left holes which are still seen in the face of the wall. The interior was then filled up with rubble mixed with liquid and apparently hot cement, which formed the mass of the wall, and in setting has become in course of time harder than the stones themselves. After a certain number of rows of facing-stones, the Roman builders almost invariably placed a string-course of broad thin bricks, the object of which is not at all evident, for they do not go through the wall so as to form real bonding-courses. The Old Wall still standing in probably nearly its original height, will also give us a notion of the elevation of the principal houses of the Roman towns.
In spite, however, of this rather considerable elevation, which, reckoning for dilapidation at the top and the portion buried under ground, cannot have been much less than thirty feet, it seems nearly certain that the Roman houses in Britain had no upper stories, and that all the rooms were on the ground floor. No traces of a staircase have ever been found,and all the fragments which are met with, indicate that the rooms were open to the roof. These roofs appear to have been of substantial construction, and were probably supported on a strong frame of woodwork. The common coverings of the Roman houses of this island consisted of large square tiles with strongly flanged edges, and these tiles being joined side to side, a curved tile forming the half of a cylinder was placed over the flanges of the two tiles which joined, thus holding them together, and at the same time protecting the juncture so that rain could not pass through it. These tiles, and the manner in which they were arranged, will be understood by our figures, (pl.IV.,figs.1, 2, 3). The Roman houses were also very commonly roofed with slates, or rather flags, and this appears to have been the more usual description of roofing in Uriconium. These roof-flags are found scattered about abundantly on the floors, sometimes unbroken. They are formed of a micaceous laminated sandstone, which is found on the edge of the north Staffordshire and Shropshire coalfield, at no great distance from Wroxeter, and must have produced a glittering appearance in the sunshine. Their form is represented in our cut, (pl.IV.,fig.5); it was that of an elongated hexagon, with a hole at one end, through which an iron nail was passed to fix it to the wooden frame-work. The nail is often found still remaining in the hole. These flags,which are very thick and heavy, were placed to lap over each other, and thus formed a roof in lozenges or diamonds, as represented infig.6. Slates forming one half of the hexagon (fig.4), were placed at the top of the roof, so as to make a strictly horizontal line. It is a curious circumstance, that in the illuminations of Anglo-Saxon manuscripts we find roofs of houses which evidently represent both these methods, and which appear, therefore, to have been continued long after the Roman period. In fact they are still used in Yorkshire, and perhaps in other counties, and have been used very recently on the Welsh border. In the towns which were the head-quarters of a legion, as at Caerleon, Chester, and York, or which had been occupied for some length of time by legionary detachments, we often find the name and number of the legion stamped on the roof-tiles. These roof-tiles were frequently used for other purposes. They are sometimes employed in the string-courses in walls, when the builders appear to have run short of the ordinary square tiles or flat bricks; and they are still more frequently used to form the beds of drains and aqueducts, when the flanged edges were turned up and, set in the cement, formed the side of the water-course. A very good example of this use of the roof-tiles may be seen in the drain at Wroxeter mentioned above.
Internally, the walls of the Roman houses were covered with fine hard cement, which was painted in fresco, that is, the colours were laid on the cement while it was wet, and they thus set with it, and became almost imperishable. In some of the houses in Roman Britain, and especially in the large villas, the internal walls were covered with fine historical subjects as in the walls at Pompeii, and sufficient remains have been found in this island to show that they were here also executed in no mean style of art. Nothing of this kind has yet been discovered in Uriconium; but numerous fragments are picked up in the diggings, on which the colouring is perfectly fresh, and which exhibit portions of designs which are always elegant and in good taste. In one case a piece of the stucco from the internal surface of a wall contained some letters of an inscription. One of the walls near the hypocaust where the three skeletons were found presented a singular and rather laborious method of ornamenting its interior surface. Instead of being painted, it was tessellated, the surface being covered with tessellæ, one half of an inch by three-fifths in dimension, set in the cement, alternately of dark and light colours, in horizontal lines, so as to produce somewhat the appearance of chequer-work. Perhaps, when entire, it presented an ornamental pattern. I have already stated that a similarly tessellated wallwas found in the easternmost part of this line of rooms. Circumstances have come to light which show that the exterior of the walls of houses were also plastered and painted. The exterior of the semicircular end of the largest hypocaust yet opened was thus plastered over, and painted red with stripes of yellow.
It is worthy of remark that in the walls, to the certainly not very great elevation they now generally reach, few doorways are discovered, a circumstance which is by no means easily explained. Small rooms are found without any apparent means of access. Perhaps, in such cases, the doorway was at a certain elevation in the wall, and was approached on both sides by wooden steps, which have long perished, and left no traces of the means of entrance. Of course none of the walls of the houses remain sufficiently high to enable us to judge of the manner in which light was admitted into the rooms, whether from side windows, or from openings in the roof. Probability, however, is in favour of roof-windows being in common use, and an interesting circumstance connected with the excavations at Wroxeter seems decisive as to the material of the windows. Considerable quantities of fine window glass have been found scattered over the floors of the houses, of an average thickness of full one-eighth of an inch, which have been duly deposited in the Museum at Shrewsbury.It is the more curious as it has been the common opinion, until recently, that the Romans, especially in this distant province, did not use window-glass; and the fragments of window-glass which have been found more recently in the excavations on the sites of Roman villas have been much thinner than that found at Wroxeter, and of very inferior quality. It is evident, that some of the rooms, all the walls of which were only walls of separation from other rooms, must have received light from above, or have been quite dark.
I must now describe a peculiar characteristic of the domestic economy of a Roman house in Britain, and in the other western and northern provinces of the empire. The Romans did not warm their apartments by fire lighted in them, as was the case in the middle ages, and in modern times, but by hot air circulated in the walls. The floor of the house, formed of a considerable thickness of cement, was laid upon a number of short pillars, formed usually of square Roman tiles placed one upon another, and from two to three feet high. Those of the largest of the hypocausts yet found at Wroxeter were rather more than three feet high. Sometimes these supports were of stone, and in one or two cases in discoveries made in this country, they were round. They were placed near to each other, and in rows, and upon them were lain first larger tiles, and over these athick mass of cement, which formed the floor, and upon the surface of which the tessellated pavements were set. Sometimes small parallel walls, forming flues instead of rows of columns, supported the floors, of which an example has already been found in the excavations at Wroxeter. Flue-tiles,—that is, square tubes made of baked clay, with a hole on one side, or sometimes on two sides,—were placed against the walls end-ways, one upon another, so as to run up the walls. These arrangements,—which were called hypocausts, from two Greek words, signifyingheat underneath, and were used in Italy and Greece chiefly for warming baths, are represented inplateIV.,fig.7, whereAAis the floor of cement,BBthe pillars supporting it, andCCthe flue-tiles running up the wall of the room. They had an entrance from the outside, somewhat like the mouth of an oven, and fires being lighted here, the hot air was driven inward, and not only filled the space under the floor, but entered the flue-tiles by the holes in the sides, was carried by them up the inside of the wall, and no doubt had some way of escape at the roof. The ashes and soot of the fires have been found in the hypocausts at Uriconium, just as they were left when the city was overthrown and ruined by the barbarians. The ashes are chiefly those of wood, but considerable remains of mineral coal have been discovered. These hypocausts must sometimes havebecome clogged and out of order, and it would be necessary to cleanse them, as people in aftertimes cleansed chimneys. A sort of alley across the middle of the large hypocaust last-mentioned was probably intended for this purpose. It communicated with another hypocaust adjoining it to the north by a doorway, and this other hypocaust was entered by a rather large archway at the foot of the steps already mentioned. People appear to have been sometimes satisfied with having the hot air merely under the floor, and the flue-tiles were not always used. Comparatively few of them, indeed, have been yet found in the hypocausts of Uriconium.
Therequirements of agriculture have rendered it necessary to cover up again all the excavations to the north of the Old Wall, and the walls of the great public building at the corner of the two streets can no longer be seen by the visitor. A piece of ground, however, immediately to the south of the Old Wall has been taken by the Excavation Committee at Shrewsbury upon a rent, and in this piece of ground the excavations are now carried on. It forms a parallelogram, 319 feet long, by 279 feet wide, containing an area of exactly two acres, includingthe Old Wall at its northern edge. This piece of ground has been strongly fenced round with hurdles, and it is entered by a gate from the Watling Street Road. By the liberality of the Excavation Committee the public are admitted to this inclosure freely, and it is to be hoped that the visitors will acknowledge this liberality by carefully abstaining from committing any injury on the Roman remains, or by walking upon or entering into the parts in the course of excavation.
The plan annexed (pl.5) of the excavations now in progress will enable me to explain them to the visitor. The darkly-shaded massa arepresents the Old Wall, or portion of Roman masonry standing above ground; to the north of which lay the extensive building formed by the wallsb b,c c,d d, running parallel to the Old Wall. The walld d, bordered upon a wide street. To the east of these walls lay an inclosure, e, perhaps a court-yard, and a large space,f, which has been conjectured to have been a garden, but which has been very imperfectly explored. All these remains have been explained above; they have been buried again, and the ground is now covered with crops. The Old Wall, which stands just within the north-eastern corner of the space separated from the rest of the field by a fence of hurdles, now forms the northern boundary of the excavations.
The visitor is introduced into this space by a gateway from the road, nearly at its north-western corner. Opposite this gateway he will see an apartment, which the excavators are now in the course of exploring. It is nearly a square, and is about thirty-four feet in its longest dimension. The side towards the street seems to have been open, or at least the masonry of the wall presents the appearance of having had wide folding doors, or a framework of wood of some kind in two compartments 6, 6. In the centre of the room is a large pier of masonry (1), perhaps a table for workmen. More towards the north-western corner, a sort of furnace or forge (2) was found, built of red clay, with a hole or cavity in the upper part sufficiently large for a man to thrust his head in. As the surface of the cavity, internally, is completely vitrified, and as there was much charcoal strewed about, there can be no doubt that the cavity had been occupied by a very fierce fire. A low wall has been traced, running across the room east and west in a line with this furnace; and two transverse low walls of similar character. Upon the low wall a little behind the forge (at 3), the excavators came upon what was supposed to be the lower part of a column with its base; but it is formed roughly, and I think it more probable that it was a stone table for the use of the workman at the furnace. It was at first supposed that this might belong to a colonnade running along the wall; but no trace of such a colonnadehas been found, although a large piece of a shaft of a column lies in the middle of the room. This column, however, is of larger dimensions than the supposed base (3). Had such a colonnade existed, it seems so little in accordance with the existence of a forge, that we might be led to suspect that the room had, at some late period, been diverted from its original purpose, and occupied by a worker in metals, or even in glass, as fine specimens of glass were found scattered about, and also many fragments of metal. But objects of all kinds seem to have been thrown about in such a manner, when the town was plundered, that it would be unsafe to argue upon the purpose of any particular building, merely from moveable articles found in it. Among other things found in this room were nearly a dozen hair-pins, two of which were much more ornamental than any we had found before; a much greater quantity of fragments of Samian ware, and of higher artistic merit, than had previously been met with in one spot; a portion of a large bronze fibula; a number of coins, and other things. One of the vessels of Samian ware is a fine bowl, with figures in high relief, representing a stag-hunt. Upon the low wall of the sill (6) a number of copper Roman coins (about sixty) were found together; and near them the fragment of a small earthen vessel, in which probably they had been carried by some one who dropped them here as he was hurrying out of the place. Turning from the gate of the field to the right, or south,along the inside of the hedge, the visitor will come to a portion of uncovered wall,h h, running north and south, upwards of eighty feet, in which there are two entrance gateways,i,p. The first of these is about twelve feet wide, and was approached by a sort of inclined plane, formed of three large squared masses of stone, each about four feet square by eleven inches in thickness. The other entrance which was only five feet wide, was approached by two steps, each similarly formed of one mass of stone; of which the lower step is worn very much at its south-west corner, in a manner to lead us to believe that the great majority of the people who passed through this entrance came up the street from the south. The upper step, or stone, is so much worn by the feet of those who passed over it, that it broke into three pieces under the workmen’s picks. On one side of it there is a deep hollow, representing nearly the form of a small human foot, which seems to have been scooped into the stone for some purpose with which we are not acquainted. These two entrances lead into one square court, the floor of which, proved by the steps and inclined plane to have been on a higher level than the street without, was paved with small bricks laid in herring-bone work, like the great inclosure to the north of the Old Wall. It is found to have been much damaged and mended in ancient times, which seems to countenance the suppositionthat the wide entrance and the inclined plane by which it was approached were intended for horses and perhaps for carts or for heavy barrows. Among the objects found in excavating here was a portion of a horse-shoe. On each side of this court a row of chambers is found,m m m, four on the north side and four on the south, from ten to twelve feet square. The westernmost of these chambers, on the north side of the court, has been cleared out, and was found to be ten feet deep, with a low transverse wall at the bottom, the object of which is at present quite inexplicable. A quantity of charcoal was found in this room, as though it had been a store-room for that article. One of the other rooms, on each side of the court, seemed to have been a receptacle for bones, horns, &c.; and as some of these had evidently been sawn and cut, and others partly turned on a lathe, they suggested the idea of having belonged to manufacturers of the various objects made of this material which are found so commonly in the course of the excavations. They may, therefore, have been the magazines of manufacturers and tradesmen, a notion which is somewhat confirmed by the circumstance of several weights of different sizes having been found in this part of the excavations; or they may have been mere depots for the stores and refuse of a large mansion or other establishment. These rooms are, perhaps, all deeplike the one already cleared out, but it is remarkable that, as high as the walls remain, that is, about two feet above the floor of the court, there is no trace of entrances to them, which must, therefore, have been rather high in the wall, and they were entered perhaps by a ladder.
The back part of this court consists of a long narrow inclosure, which is divided into compartments by four transverse walls proceeding from the western wall about halfway across the inclosure, thus leaving a passage along the eastern side. These compartments have much the appearance of small shops or stalls for selling, and seem to confirm the notion that this building may have been a market-place. The workmen, finding a doorway in the wall of the back of this inclosure, atnin the plan, a trench was carried through the ground to the eastward. At about twelve feet from the opening atn, they came upon a wall ath, running parallel to the wallo oof the court, and beyond this they found first a narrow passage, and then a rise with a pavement of cement which extended some four or five feet, and then suddenly sank to a floor of large flag-stones, at a depth of upwards of four feet from the floor of cement. This flagged floor, the position of which is marked by the letterqin the plan, was perhaps a reservoir of water; the bottom was found covered with black earth filled with broken pottery and other things, such as mayeasily have been supposed to have been thrown into a pond. The water appears to have been only between two and three feet deep, as the floor on the opposite side runs about level with the ledge or step just mentioned, and is continued eastward until, atr, we come upon the rather massive walls of a building, the nature of which cannot be determined without further investigation. At a short distance within this wall, at a depth of about three feet below the cement floor, we find a floor ats, about ten feet wide by thirty long, formed of flat Roman tiles, twelve inches by eighteen inches square. This floor has been uncovered, and as there was an indentation in the middle which seemed to indicate that it was hollow underneath, a hole was made there, but it led to no discovery. This seems also to have been a tank of water, perhaps a cold water bath. The cement floor was continued easterly until it was terminated by a wall,t, which ran at right angles to the eastern end of the Old Wall, and appears to be the eastern termination of the buildings now in course of exploration. The earth and rubbish from the excavations have been here thrown into a great mound, from the top of which the visitor can enjoy a bird’s eye view of the excavations. A few yards to the north, he will come to the important line of excavations nearer to the Old Wall. A small chamber, about eight feet square, with a herring-bone pavement in very goodpreservation, projects beyond the line of this eastern wall atuin our plan. To the west of this is a small hypocaustv, the floor of which has been a little lower than that of the roomu. In this hypocaust were found the remains of two skeletons, one of which was that of a young person. The northern wall of the roomvis particularly interesting, because in its whole height of full nine feet, it presents the remains of the lines of flue-tiles which ran up it, hardly an inch apart, and which show that this room must have been intended to be very much heated. It was, perhaps, asudatoriumor sweating room. The opening fromutovoccupies nearly the whole width of the former room, and was perhaps closed by a wooden door. On the western side of the hypocaust, atw, the wall has a sort of basement, formed of large stones scooped out in a singular manner, the object of which is by no means evident. We here come upon a series of passages,x, to the north of which were four rooms,z z z z, extending to the Old Wall. On the face of the Old Wall, we can distinctly trace the springing not only of the walls of division, the lower parts of which are found underground, but of the vaulting, from which it appears that these rooms had what are technically called barrel-roofs of masonry. They were slightly explored at the beginning of the excavations, and in one of them was found a quantity of burnt wheat, as though it had been a store-room.
In the passages alluded to, there is aty, a square pit, somewhat like what might be a cess-pool, of very good and substantial masonry, at the bottom of which runs north and south a very well formed drain, the bed of which is formed of large roof-tiles. To the south of this is a hypocaust,A, which differs from the other hypocausts yet opened in being partly formed of low parallel walls instead of rows of pillars. On the wall of the passage leading to this hypocaust from the east was found the inscription mentioned at page45. Westward from the hypocaustA, but without any apparent communication between them, was another hypocaust,B, which had been constructed in the usual manner, the floor supported by rows of low columns formed of square thin bricks. It was in this hypocaust that the three skeletons mentioned before (p.41,) were found, the man who possessed the money crouching in the north-west corner, and the two persons supposed to be women, extended along the side of the northern wall. The opening into this hypocaust was through its southern wall, from the interior court, so that the fugitives must have crept along the whole length of the hypocaust to reach their place of concealment. The part of this interior court, immediately adjacent to this hypocaust, which has been excavated to some extent, presents several interesting features. A breach in the eastern boundary wall had been newly repaired with much inferiormasonry at the time when the city of Uriconium was taken and destroyed; and it is a curious circumstance that some large pieces of stone lie here on the floor of the court, unfinished by the masons, as though repairs and alterations in the buildings were going on at the very moment of the final catastrophe. Adjoining to this hypocaust, at its north-west corner, is a square room, c, with the herring-bone pavement, exactly like that atuin character and dimensions, which had opened into the room above the hypocaustB, much in the same manner asuopened in the roomv. Separated from this room by a wall, but apparently without any communication with it, is an interesting staircaseD, leading down, to the entrance to a larger and apparently more important series of hypocausts. This staircase descended from a square room, about the same size as the roomC, which had a smooth pavement of cement. It is composed of three steps each formed of a large squared stone. A part of the space at the bottom, the north-eastern corner, appears to have been used by the later Roman inhabitants of this building as a receptacle for the sweeping of the floors, and when it was first opened the earth, to the height of about sixteen or eighteen inches from the floor, was filled with all kinds of objects, such as coins, hair-pins, fibulæ, needles in bone, nails, various articles in iron, bronze, and lead, glass, broken pottery, bones of edible animals andbirds, stags’ horns, tusks and hoofs of wild boars, oyster shells, in one of which lay the shell of a large nut, &c. A large shaft of a column lay across the steps. The Roman masonry here is very good. To the right hand, towards the south, a rather large arch, turned in Roman bricks, led into the hypocaustE, a doorway in the southern wall of which formed the communication between this hypocaust and the still larger hypocaustF. The latter had supported what must have been a handsome room, which was about fifty feet long, including the semicircular northern end, by thirty-five feet in breadth. When first opened, this hypocaust was in a state of preservation in which such buildings are seldom found in this country. A hundred and twenty columns of bricks were counted, most of them at their original height of rather more than three feet. At the north-eastern corner, the columns supported a small portion of the floor in its original position. It is a mass of cement, eight inches thick, with the upper surface, which no doubt had formed the floor, perfectly smooth. During the time that the Excavation Committee were excluded from the field, all the pillars of this interesting hypocaust were thrown to the ground, and a great part of the bricks which formed the supporting columns were broken to pieces—even the piece of the floor and its supports at the north-east corner were overthrown. A very exact drawing of thelatter, however, had been preserved, which served as a pattern for restoring it; and it is to the ingenuity and labour of Dr. Henry Johnson that the public owes the restoration of this hypocaust as far as it was possible to restore it.
Returning to the steps by which these hypocausts were entered, atD, the floor from which we descended appears to have an opening of some kind to the west, which looked down upon a court outside the semicircular end of the hypocaustF, which from this point presents to the view an imposing mass of masonry. In the corner just under this opening the remains of a very young child were found, which we might almost imagine to have been slaughtered in the room above, and thrown out into the court. This court, or open space, seems to have been continued to the walla a, and to have been entered by a doorway in that wall atg, which was approached from the passage to the north by a step formed by a large squared stone. On the outside of the semicircular end of the hypocaustF, lay, as if it had fallen or been thrown down, an immense stone, carefully worked into the shape of the arc of a circle, and no doubt forming one of a course at some unknown elevation in the wall. On the outward side of it, a large iron pin was soldered into it with lead, evidently for the purpose of attaching some weighty object on the outer side of the building.
Another step and doorway in the walla awas found ath, which must have been much more frequented than the other, for the stone which formed the step was worn in an extraordinary degree by the rubbing of footsteps. It led to an inclosureP, which presents the appearance of having formed publiclatrinæ; and which is separated by a long narrow inclosure from the room already described as apparently the shop of a worker in metals.
Such is a brief and general description of the ruins of Uriconium, at present open to the visitor. The real character of the buildings we have been describing appeared for a while very doubtful. The first discoveries led to the belief that it was a great mansion, perhaps the principal mansion in the Roman city, the residence of the chief municipal officer; but in this case we might have expected to find some very fine Mosaic or tessellated pavement, specimens of which had been met with in other parts of the area of the town. On the contrary, all the floors yet discovered to the south of the Old Wall, with the exception of those of herring-bone brickwork, and that of a supposed bath, seemed to have been of mere smoothed cement. This led us to suppose that we were still exploring buildings erected for some public purpose. A comparison of the character of these various buildings leaves no room for doubting that they belonged to the public baths of Uriconium; and furtherexcavations to the south and west shewed that they formed an extensive square (k,k,k,k), the northern side of which was formed by the Old Wall and its continuation westward; and the southern side of which bordered upon the other street running east and west, the pavement of which, similar to that of the street atl, has been uncovered in its whole extent along the line,L L.The western and southern sides of the square were formed by a wide gallery or cloister (k,k,k), no doubt the ambulatory, which was considered as an important part of the public baths of the Romans. The ground to the eastward, in which no buildings could be traced, may have been gardens, which were also usually attached to the baths of the Romans.
Having once decided that the building we have thus explored, is the public baths, another equally interesting question arises out of it. The public baths of the Roman towns in Britain are not unfrequently mentioned in inscriptions commemorating the repairing or rebuilding of them; but it is a circumstance of some importance that this building is combined with the basilica, or town hall. Both seem to have participated in the same accidents, and to have undergone decay together. Thus an inscription found at Lanchester in Cumberland (supposed to be the Roman town of Epiacum) speaks of the baths and basilica (BALNEVM CVM BASILICA); and at Ribchester, in Lancashire, the baths and basilica (BALINEVM ET BASILICAM)were rebuilt after having fallen into ruin through age. We are therefore, I think, justified in concluding that the two great public buildings, the baths and the basilica, usually joined each other; and I think we may venture further to assume that the large building to the north of the Old Wall, the remains of which are now covered up, was the basilica of Uriconium. The proportions of this building are rather extraordinary, and cannot be easily explained; but it is probable that in a provincial town the basilica served a variety of purposes. An inscription found at Netherby in Cumberland, speaks of a basilica for practice in riding (BASILICAM EQVESTREM EXERCITATORIAM.)
We may now proceed a little further in identifying the topography of the ancient town. The line of the buildings we have traced parallel to the Watling Street Road is at some distance within the hedge of the field; and I believe that, when the farm buildings were erected on the opposite side of the road, what appeared to be the front of buildings facing the opposite direction, were found likewise at some distance within the field. This, with the road, would make a very wide space; very much wider than either of the two transverse streets. Moreover, a glance at the plan will shew that, beyond the transverse street to the south, this wide space became considerably narrowed; and in fact it seems to have been reduced to the width of an ordinary street. It is my belief that this widespace was the forum of Uriconium; and in that case it is rather remarkable that the basilica held here exactly the same place, in regard to the forum, as at Pompeii.
We have thus already brought to light a very interesting portion of the ancient Roman town, and have learnt something more than we knew before of the character and economy of the Roman towns in Britain. The basilica, as we have seen, came up to the front of the street, and formed the side of a transverse street; but this was not the case with the baths, for a space of some width between them and the forum was occupied by other buildings, which I have already described.
Other apartments surrounding the metal-worker’s shop are in course of exploration, and will, I think, make us better acquainted with the character of the whole of this line of buildings which looked upon the open space which I have supposed to be the forum. I have already said that this open space contracts to the south of the transverse streetL L, in what has been no more than the breadth of an ordinary street, which ran down towards the river. A gutter, very well made, of carefully squared stones, and remarkably well preserved, runs near the houses on the eastern side of the street; the only side which at present can be explored, as it is near the hedge of the Watling Street Road. It runs very near the walls of the houses, is a foot wide, and about a foot deep, and from place to place squarestones are laid in lozenge-fashion, apparently intended for stepping stones, but they must have stopped the current of water down the channel. The buildings at this corner consist of small rooms, and were probably private houses. The existence of walls running parallel and transverse to the streetL Lhas been ascertained along the whole length of its southern side; but they have not yet been sufficiently explored even to be laid down in the plan.
Theobjects of antiquity found in the course of the excavations have been so often alluded to, that the visitor will no doubt expect at least a brief and general description of them. I have already described those which illustrate the building and construction of a house, and we naturally continue the description by turning to those articles which belong especially to domestic life. Of this class, the most numerous division, and that which strikes us first, is the pottery,—of which certainly the most remarkable to the general observer is the ware resembling in colour and general appearance bright red sealing wax, known commonly as Samian ware, a name the propriety of which has been disputed. The Roman writers speak of an earthenware much used at table,and said to have received its name from having been originally made at Samos. It is described as being of a red colour, as being of more value than the common pottery, and as being proverbial for its brittleness, all which characteristics belonged to the red ware found in this country, which was covered with tasteful subjects of all kinds in relief, and was evidently much valued, as we often find vessels in this ware which had been carefully mended, and the brittleness of which was such that we seldom find a specimen unbroken. Such mendings, chiefly by means of metal rivets, are exhibited in specimens of Samian ware found in the excavations at Wroxeter, and deposited in the Museum at Shrewsbury, where there are also several pieces of this pottery, presenting subjects which are interesting and by no means of common occurrence. It may be further observed that the Samian ware in this country resembles a Roman ware of which the potteries have been found at Aretium, the modern Arezzo, in Tuscany, but this ware was much superior, especially in the degree of artistic talent displayed in its ornamentation, to that which was in use in this island, and which no doubt was imported from Gaul, where, especially on the banks of the Rhine, the potteries in which it was made have been found.
Extensive potteries have also been found in this island, especially at Castor, in Northamptonshire,where there was a Roman town named Durobrivæ, and on the banks of the Medway, at Upchurch, in Kent. The ware from both these potteries is of a blue or slate colour, produced by imperfect firing in what is called asmother-kiln; that is, the air being excluded and the heat being insufficient thoroughly to bake the pottery, it retains so much carbonaceous matter as to give it a black colour. The pottery of these two establishments is distinguished by the difference of shapes. The ornamentation of the Upchurch ware is in general of a very simple character; that of the pottery from Castor is much more elaborate, and often consists of hunting scenes and other subjects, laid on in a white substance after the pottery had been baked. Specimens of both these wares are found at Wroxeter.
The excavations at Wroxeter have brought to light at least two new classes of Roman pottery, both evidently made in Shropshire. The first is a white ware, made of what is known as the Broseley clay, and consisting chiefly of very elegantly formed jugs, with narrow necks; mortaria, or vessels for rubbing or pounding objects in cookery, the interior surface of which is covered with grains of hard stone; and bowls, which are often painted with stripes of red and yellow. The other Romano-Salopian pottery is a red ware, differing in shade from the red Roman wares usually found, and also made from one of theclays of the Severn valley. Among the vessels in this ware are bowls pierced all over with small holes, so as to have served the purpose of colanders. We find also some very curious specimens of an imitation of the Samian ware; but we have as yet no means of ascertaining where it was made.
Many very interesting fragments of glass vessels have also been found in the excavations at Wroxeter. Two or three other objects intended for domestic purposes have been met with, such as a small bowl or cup made of lead, and what appears to have been the handle of some larger vessel, made of block tin, neither of which metals, used for such purpose, are of common occurrence among Roman remains in this country. A ladle and several knives have also been found, and a handle of a knife made of stone, as well as several whet-stones.
Of personal ornaments the most numerous are the hair-pins, most of which are made of bone, though there are a few of bronze, and one of wood. Their use was to hold together the knot into which the Roman women rolled up their hair behind the head, and through which the pin was thrust. They are, on an average, about three inches long, with a large head rudely ornamented; and it will be remarked that the shank is thicker in the middle, and that it becomes generally thinner near the head, no doubt to prevent the pin from slipping out of thehair. Some of these pins had evidently been saturated with an oily substance, which shews that the ladies in Roman Britain applied oil to their hair. Several fibulæ of the common Roman forms, have been met with; they are all of bronze, of superior workmanship to the hair pins, and most of those hitherto found at Wroxeter are, or have been, enamelled. Their use was to fasten the mantle and other parts of the clothing. Among the personal ornaments found already in the excavations are a number of buttons, finger rings, bracelets, glass beads, and other objects, of which it is not necessary here to give a particular description. Of two combs, both of bone, one is remarkably neat in its form and make. Several bone needles may also be mentioned, and a pair of bronze tweezers for eradicating superfluous hairs.
Roman coins are found in considerable numbers, but many of them are so worn and defaced that it is no longer possible to decide to what emperor they belonged. The earliest met with during the present excavations is of the emperor Domitian. A great number are small coins of the Constantine family of emperors. Only two silver coins have yet been found, the others are of bronze or brass. The peasantry call themdinders, a name which, though it represents the Latindenarius, was no doubt derived from the Anglo-Normandenier.
Many objects of a more miscellaneous characterhave also been found during the present excavations; or have found their way into the Museum from former discoveries. Among these are three artists’ pallettes, for using colour; several weights, some marked with Roman numerals; a steelyard; several keys; portions of iron chains; styli, for writing on wax tablets; an iron trident, which may perhaps have been the head of a staff of office or authority; one or two spear heads; a strigil for scraping the skin in the sweating baths; a portion of an iron horse-shoe; and two or three very nice statuettes in bronze. The most curious, however, of these miscellaneous objects is a medicine stamp, intended to mark packets or bottles of what, in modern times, would be called patent medicines. A certain number of these Roman medicine stamps have been found in Britain and on the Continent, and they are all, like this stamp found at Wroxeter, for salves or washes for the eyes, diseases of the eyes having been apparently very common among the inhabitants of the western provinces of the Roman empire. The Wroxeter stamp, intended for a collyrium or salve for the eyes calleddialebanumordialibanum, gives us in all probability the name of a physician resident in Uriconium. The inscription may be read as follows, filling up the abbreviations:—TIBeriiCLaudiiMediciDIALIBAnumAD OMNEVITiumOculorumEX Ovo,i.e., the dialebanum of Tiberius Claudius thephysician, for all complaints of the eyes, to be used with egg.
A few stones, with Roman inscriptions, chiefly of a sepulchral character, have been dug up at Wroxeter in the course of accidental excavations. Three of these were found in 1752, and are preserved in the library of Shrewsbury School. The first inscription may be read thus:—
C. MANNIVSC. F. POL . SECVNDVS . POLLENMIL . LEG . XXANORV . LIISTIP . XXXIBEN . LEG . PRH . S . E.
C. MANNIVSC. F. POL . SECVNDVS . POLLENMIL . LEG . XXANORV . LIISTIP . XXXIBEN . LEG . PRH . S . E.
intimating that it marked the grave of a soldier of the twentieth legion (which was stationed at Chester, the Roman Deva) named Caius Mannius, of the Pollian tribe. Another commemorated a soldier of the fourteenth legion, and has been supposed to belong to a very early period, as that legion was withdrawn from Britain beforeA.D.68. It was the legion which suffered so much in the war against Boadicea, and this soldier may perhaps have been engaged in that war, although his having died in Britain does not necessarily imply that the legion to which he had belonged was there at the time, or indeed that it had ever been there, unless we had some otherreasons for supposing that it had been there. His name was Marcus Petronius, the son of Lucius, of the Menenian tribe, and the inscription may be read as follows:—
M. PETRONIVSL. F. MENVIC . ANNXXXVIIIMIL. LEGXIIII . GEMMILITAVITANN. XVIIISIGN . FVITH . S . E.
M. PETRONIVSL. F. MENVIC . ANNXXXVIIIMIL. LEGXIIII . GEMMILITAVITANN. XVIIISIGN . FVITH . S . E.
The third of these inscribed monuments was divided into three columns or tables, commemorating three members of the family of a citizen of Uriconium, named Deuccus. The inscription on the third column is entirely erased, but the two others may be read as follows:
D. MPLACIDAAN . LVCVR . AGCONI . AXXX
D. MDEVCCVS . AN . XVCVR . AGRATRE
Another sepulchral stone, also preserved in the Library of Shrewsbury School, was found in 1810, and bore an inscription commemorative of Tiberius Claudius Terentius, a soldier of the cohort of Thracian cavalry, which may be read as follows:—
TIB . CLAVD . TRENTIVS . EQ . COHTHRACVM . ANORVM . LVII. STIPENDIORVMH . S.
TIB . CLAVD . TRENTIVS . EQ . COHTHRACVM . ANORVM . LVII. STIPENDIORVMH . S.
In the excavations on the site of the cemetery, in the autumn of 1862, a sepulchral stone was found, which had not improbably been placed over the door of a sepulchral chamber of masonry. There had been a figure above, the lower part of the legs and feet of which alone remain. The slab bears the following inscription, which from the damage the stone has sustained is very difficult to decipher, but I owe this reading to the knowledge and acuteness of my friend Mr. Roach Smith. I may add that some of the letters are extremely doubtful
AMINIVS . T . POL . F . ANORVMXXXXVSTIPXXII . MIL . LEG.IIGEM . MILITAVITAQNVNC HIC SIILEGITE . ET . FELICES . VITA . FLVS . MINVIVSTAVINIERAQVATIEGIIIE . INTVTANARA . DITIS . VIVITE . DVMSPI . . .VITAE . DAT . TEMPVS . HONESTE.
AMINIVS . T . POL . F . ANORVMXXXXVSTIPXXII . MIL . LEG.IIGEM . MILITAVITAQNVNC HIC SIILEGITE . ET . FELICES . VITA . FLVS . MINVIVSTAVINIERAQVATIEGIIIE . INTVTANARA . DITIS . VIVITE . DVMSPI . . .VITAE . DAT . TEMPVS . HONESTE.
It is clear, at a glance, that the latter part of this inscription contains three lines in hexameter verse; unfortunately they are the lines most rubbed and most difficult to make out. Dr. Mc. Caul, president of the University of Toronto, in Canada, in his recent work on “Britanno-Romano Inscriptions,” suggests that they may be—
Perlegite et felices vitâ plus minus jutâ;Omnibus æqua lege iter est ad Tænara Ditis.Vivite, dum Stygius vitæ dat tempus, honeste.
Perlegite et felices vitâ plus minus jutâ;Omnibus æqua lege iter est ad Tænara Ditis.Vivite, dum Stygius vitæ dat tempus, honeste.
The two last words of the first line are extremely doubtful, and I confess that I do not believe inDr. Mc Caul’s reading, which, of course is but conjectural. The second does not appear at all to answer to what remains of the original, with the exception of the last words Tænara Ditis. But of the last line, Mr. Smith’s reading is much the best, and indeed appears to me to be the correct one,—
Vivite, dum spatium vitæ dat tempus, honeste.
Vivite, dum spatium vitæ dat tempus, honeste.
The part preceding the verses may be read—
Aminius (perhaps Flaminius), TitiPollioniFilius, annorum xxxxv., stipendiorumxxii, mileslegionisvii geminæ. Militavit aquilifer. Nunc hic situs est.
Aminius (perhaps Flaminius), TitiPollioniFilius, annorum xxxxv., stipendiorumxxii, mileslegionisvii geminæ. Militavit aquilifer. Nunc hic situs est.
It may be remarked that in many respects this is one of the most curious Roman inscriptions found in this island, and that it appears to be of rather an early date.
Another mere fragment of a stone, of the present existence of which I can learn nothing, is said to have contained the letters:—
LERTFGAI...TILES.
LERTFGAI...TILES.
Lastly, a monument of stone, which, during the middle ages had been formed into a holy water stoop, and which is now in the vicarage garden, presents what has formed part of a Roman inscription—
BONA . REIPVBLICÆNATVS.
BONA . REIPVBLICÆNATVS.
It has probably been a dedication to one of the emperors, or an inscription commemorative of him.