The Ruins of Uriconium. (continued 2)

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 a smother-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 the clays 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 the hair. 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 them dinders, a name which, though it represents the Latin denarius, was no doubt derived from the Anglo-Norman denier.

Many objects of a more miscellaneous character have 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 called dialebanum or dialibanum, gives us in all probability the name of a physician resident in Uriconium. The inscription may be read as follows, filling up the abbreviations:—TIBerii CLaudii Medici DIALIBAnum AD OMNE VITium Oculorum EX Ovo, i.e., the dialebanum of Tiberius Claudius the physician, 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. MANNIVS C. F. POL . SECV NDVS . POLLEN MIL . LEG . XX ANORV . LII STIP . XXXI BEN . LEG . PR H . 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 before A.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 other reasons 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. PETRONIVS L. F. MEN VIC . ANN XXXVIII MIL. LEG XIIII . GEM MILITAVIT ANN. XVIII SIGN . FVIT H . 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. M PLACIDA AN . LV CVR . AG CONI . A XXX D. M DEVCCV S . AN . XV CVR . AG RATRE

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 . TRE NTIVS . EQ . COH THRACVM . AN ORVM . LVII. STIP ENDIORVM H . 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 . A NORVMXXXXVSTIPXXII . MIL . LEG. IIGEM . MILITAVITAQNVNC HIC SII LEGITE . ET . FELICES . VITA . FLVS . MINV IVSTAVINIERAQVATIEGIIIE . INTV TANARA . 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.

The two last words of the first line are extremely doubtful, and I confess that I do not believe in Dr. 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.

The part preceding the verses may be read—

Aminius (perhaps Flaminius), Titi Pollioni Filius, annorum xxxxv., stipendiorum xxii, miles legionis vii 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:—

LERT FGAI ...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 . REI PVBLICÆ NATVS.

It has probably been a dedication to one of the emperors, or an inscription commemorative of him.

It has been stated before, that the site of Uriconium is of very great extent. If the visitor, after having examined the excavations, would seek an agreeable walk, he may turn off by the smith’s shop already mentioned, along the northerly continuation of the Watling Street Road, which soon becomes a deep and pretty country lane, and crosses the Bell Brook. Soon afterwards, on the rise of a bank, we come to a spot where the ancient town wall crossed this road, and where there are said to be traces of one of the gateway entrances to Uriconium. At the latter part of the year 1862, excavations were made in an adjoining field to trace the line of the town wall, which was found remaining to a height of three or four feet; but it was of very rough construction, built merely of small stone boulders mixed with clay, and had evidently been raised hurriedly, at a late period of the history of Uriconium, to meet some sudden emergency. There had evidently been an entrance opening here, but there were no traces of gateway buildings, which were perhaps only of timber. Outside the walls, on the bank to the right, was one of the principal cemeteries, and here the sepulchral inscriptions mentioned above were found. Successful excavations were made in 1862 on the site of this cemetery, and many Roman graves were opened which furnished the Museum in Shrewsbury with another inscribed monument of great interest, a number of sepulchral urns and vessels of glass, and various other objects.

If, instead of going northward, the visitor follows the Watling Street Road towards the south, he will soon reach the village of Wroxeter, and may examine its church. A new gate to the churchyard has recently been erected, and Mr. W. H. Oatley, of Wroxeter, who holds the office of churchwarden, has contributed a shaft of a Roman column, and two Roman capitals, which, together with another shaft given by the Rev. E. Egremont, are now placed on each side of this gateway. The two capitals, which were dragged out of the river Severn, are worthy of particular attention. They are singularly rich in ornament, and mark that late period of Roman architecture which became the model of the mediæval Byzantine and Romanesque. I cannot help wishing that they were safely deposited in the Museum at Shrewsbury, and I think that the Roman columns would serve as well for gateway supports without the capitals, which probably did not belong to them. The church of Wroxeter is a substantial Norman building, with later alterations, and on the outside of the southern wall of the chancel are the remains of a very interesting Norman doorway, which has been built up.

The chancel internally is chiefly remarkable for some fine monuments with effigies of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth centuries, interesting especially for their costume. It has at present a low flat whitewashed ceiling, but there is a fine old timber roof above, and it is greatly to be regretted that the unsightly ceiling has not been removed, so that the chancel might again be open to its lofty roof of timber. At the western end of the church is an early font, pl. 7, which has been formed of a very large Roman capital, taken from some important building in the city of Uriconium. Such applications of Roman monuments to later ecclesiastical purposes are by no means uncommon. In the garden of the vicarage, which adjoins the churchyard, are a few fragments of Roman architecture and sculpture, which have been carefully preserved by the present vicar, the Rev. E. Egremont.

Near the churchyard stands the residence of Mr. Oatley, who has also collected in his garden a few fragments from the ancient city and its neighbourhood. Among these is a cylindrical stone, which at first sight might be taken for part of a column, but which appears, from a few remaining letters of an inscription, to have been more probably a Roman milliarium or mile-stone. Mr. Oatley has placed a Roman capital on the top of it, and both are represented in pl. 6. Several architectural fragments are also preserved in the garden of Mr. Stanier. Two of the most interesting of these, belonging to the shaft of the same column, or to those of two similar columns are represented in pl. 15.

The Watling Street Road leads us direct from the gateway of the churchyard to the river Severn, which is here crossed at present by a ford. On the right is a large rugged field overlooking the river, and occupied by Mr. Oatley, which has been trenched in several directions, but nothing was discovered except a Roman well, ten feet deep, which is kept open, and is now partly filled with clear spring water. In an orchard at the corner of this field, near the road, were found a number of human skeletons, attended with some remarkable circumstances, for an account of which I refer the reader to Dr. Johnson’s remarks at the end of this little volume. On the other side of the Watling Street Road, the ground rises to a little knoll, which looks down upon the river, and seems to have formed the southern corner of the inclosure of the city of Uriconium. The top of this knoll has been carefully explored, and the walls of a square building, perhaps of a tower, were uncovered. Among the objects found on this spot were a head sculptured in stone, and a mould for casting Roman coins, both of which are deposited in the Museum at Shrewsbury. The impress on the coin-mould is that of a coin of Julia Domna, the wife of the emperor Severus, (the commencement of the third century); and it is rather a curious circumstance that a silver coin of this empress, which fits the impress exactly, has been found in the excavations near the Old Wall. This method of multiplying the imperial coinage by casts seems to have been very common in these distant provinces, and was perhaps exercised by the imperial or municipal officers. Another coin-mould, also with the impress of Julia Domna, was found at Wroxeter in 1747, and two, one of Severus himself, and the other of Plautilla, in 1722.

In conclusion, I may perhaps be allowed to make a remark on some of the various points on which the excavations on the site of Uriconium have already thrown more or less illustrative light during the short period in which they have as yet been carried on. We see how, by examining their buildings and comparing the objects that are turned up by the pick and the spade, we get an insight into the condition of the inhabitants of Roman Britain, and learn to what degree they enjoyed the luxuries and comforts of life. We see that they possessed a great majority of the refinements of modern society—far more than can be traced among the population of the middle ages. We are taught even the character of their food by remains of edible animals. The comparison of other objects enables us to judge to a great degree of the state and extent of manufactures and commerce. We learn from inscriptions on their sepulchral monuments and altars the names and occupations of some of the inhabitants of the ancient town, and the races to which they belonged; and from this partial information we are enabled by induction to obtain a general view of the whole. We are thus enabled to form a truer notion of the manner in which this country had been inhabited and governed during nearly four centuries; and we have the further hope of eventually discovering monuments which will throw some light on the more particular history of this neighbourhood in these remote ages. We learn, finally, from the condition in which the ruins of Uriconium are now seen, and especially from the numerous remains of human beings which are found scattered over its long-deserted floors, the sad fate under which it finally sank into ruin, and thus we are made vividly acquainted with the character and events of a period of history which has hitherto been but dimly seen through the vague traditions of writers who at best knew them only by hearsay.