(26) The north-eastern and
eastern suburbs of Canterbury, from the Stour to the Dover Road, are full
of Roman remains. Three Roman roads leave the town on this side, for
Reculver, Richborough and Dover, and extensive cemeteries have been traced
near them. But here again definitely Roman remains, other than sepulchral,
are rare. Pillbrow records Samian potsherds from the medieval city-ditch
in Broad Street and Brent from Ivy Lane; a gold and onyx ring, engraved
with a head, was found some time ago in the precincts of St. Augustine’s
College (Cant. Olden Time, 31); whilst much Roman pottery and metal
objects have been found in recent years during the excavation of St.
Augustine’s Abbey. Here also, under the western alley of the Norman
cloister, near its southern end, were found in 1929 part of a clay kiln
and a small circular furnace for smelting bronze, in association
apparently with late 1st-century pottery (p. 129). In 1922 a fragment of a
Roman tombstone (Journ. Rom. Studies, xvii, 214) was found outside
the Great Gate of the Abbey, bearing the letters—
[D] M
. . ERNA
. . . XIV
Opposite the same gateway, in 1868, was found a large brooch of an early
Romano-Gaulish type, according to Brent with marks of red enamel on it (Cant.
Olden Time, 46, plate x (i); Proc. Soc. Antiq. vi, 377; C.
R. Smith, Coll. Antiq. vii, 203, pl. misdating it). This and an ‘old
foundation,’ potsherds, bones, glass bead, spearhead, pin and ring found
by Pillbrow 8 ft. under Lady Wootton’s Green (Arch. xliii, 161)
might also belong to Roman burials. The rest are unsatisfactory. The ‘hollows
or pipes carried along in the thickness of an old stone wall, for heating
rooms,’ found near St. Radegund’s Bath just outside the city wall
(Gostling’s Walks in Cant. (1774), 20, hence later writers), may
well be medieval. The 100 ft. of iron slag in Ivy Lane, the quern ‘of
peculiar form and material’ from Northgate, the rubbish pits and gilt
spoon in Love Lane, all found by Pillbrow (Arch. xliii, 153, 160),
are likely to be post-Roman.
(27) The chapel or church of St. Pancras, though in great
part built of Roman material in rather unusually close imitation of Roman
style, is now accepted as post-Roman work. The large amount of Roman
brick, nearly all broken, but with Roman mortar adhering to some of it,
may suggest that a Roman building stood here, and Canon Robertson noted,
deep under the south ‘porticus,’ some fragments of Roman pottery (Arch.
Cant. xiv, 106). But the building which supplied the brick for St.
Pancras must have been extensive, and, though the site has been excavated,
no trace has yet been detected in—or, indeed, near—it of the
foundations, or of the smaller remains, suitable to extensive buildings.
On the other hand, there is no difficulty in supposing the bricks to have
been brought from Roman buildings in the town.
(28) A similar but harder problem arises 250 yds. further
east, in connexion with St. Martin’s Church. This well-known structure
existed (as Bede tells us, Hist. Eccles. i, 25, 26) in the time of
Augustine (A.D. 597) and was, indeed, used by Bercta, wife of
Ethelbert, and her bishop Luidhard before Augustine landed. It was, Bede
adds, built during the Roman occupation of Britain. We can easily credit
the statement that the church existed before A.D. 600. The fabric visible
to-day contains elements, as all observers admit, which may well be as old
as that, and a few Saxon objects Of suitable date have been dug up near
it. The ascription of a Roman origin is another affair. Bede’s statement
is plainly guess or tradition, and we must turn to the church itself. Here
opinion is violently divided. The late Sir William Hope strenuously upheld
the Roman theory; the late Mr. Micklethwaite, Prof. Baldwin Brown, Mr. A.
W. Clapham, and most recent writers think the church a post-Roman erection
built out of Roman materials. The facts bearing on the question are
unfortunately few. The structure contains two distinct elements which have
been judged Roman. One is the regular brickwork in the western half of the
chancel, which resembles that of St. Pancras, but is said to contain fewer
broken bricks (Arch. Cant. xxii, 24), and which, if not Roman
building, is very like it. If, however, we accept St. Pancras as
post-Roman, we may well assign St. Martin’s Church to the same age. The
other and more important element is the nave. This exhibits four Roman
features, two in the walls and two in the windows. The walls show a rough
approximation to Roman bonding-courses, and are plastered with a red
cement containing pounded brick, such as was used by the Romans. The two
splayed windows in the west wall— built with chalk jambs, and round
heads turned in ragstone and tile—have their voussoirs constructed
alternately of tiles and of blocks of whitish stone and cemented with pink
mortar, although the fabric as a whole (including the window jambs) has
white mortar. Both the alternation of light and dark voussoirs16a
and the use of pink mortar at windows, etc., as if for decoration,
are features of Roman
16a The facts about this trick of building
have been ill-recognized by antiquaries, and it may be worth while to
gather them in a footnote. It is not uncommon in Roman work, both in Italy
and outside it. Perhaps it was first adopted for structural reasons, but
its principal later use seems ornamental. It occurs at Pompeii (house of
Popidius Secundus, Durm Baustile, fig. 257), and Dr. Ashby reports
of another early instance, (continued page 75)
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