all laid between two iron bars, each 15 in. long by 2 in. wide by ¼ in.
thick, and covered by an inverted bowl in which the actual bowl was made
of wrought bronze, and has mostly perished, while the handles and base
were of cast bronze and have survived (ibid. 161, with plate, here
reproduced. The interment is plainly Roman, however misdescribed.
(ix) A small red vase, with a head decorating the mouth (a late type of
pottery), was found in Broad Street in 1849, seemingly in connection with
a burial; it is now in Liverpool Museum (cf. Brit. Arch. Assoc. Journ. v, 337).
(x) In Lower Bridge Street, between Ivy Lane and the New Dover Road, the
drainage
trenches in 1867—8 revealed, 6 ft. deep, a lead coffin coated with lime
and wrapped in clay, containing
the skeleton of a young girl, lying with head to north, on a bed of lime.
The coffin itself, 14. in. by 56 in. in size, bore on the lid a raised pattern of ropes, running
diagonally, and roses, common on such
Roman coffins (Arch. xliii, 160; C. R. Smith in Arch. Cant. xiv,
35, plate). In Gent. Mag. 1868, i,
369, other coffins are stated to have come to light at the same place and
time.
(xi) Black vases containing burnt bones were found in 1867—8 in an
extensive deposit of black vegetable mould under Wading Street (p. 65),
just within Riding Gate, and also a silver spoon and boars’ tusks which
have presumably nothing to do with the burials (Arch. xliii, 157,
plate of the spoon).
(xii) Outside Riding Gate, a little way down the Old Dover Road, an urn
was found at the same time with animals’ bones (ibid.).
(xiii) The handle of a Roman bronze mirror is said to have been found in
1864 in a stone coffin, just outside Riding Gate, near the site of St.
Edmund’s Church (Brent in Proc. Soc. Antiq. Ser. II, iii, 55;
compare Cant. Olden Time, i 118, 259). Many medieval stone coffins,
from the church, were found here three or four years later in the drainage
works, and the provenance of the mirror-handle may have been mistaken or
misstated. Still the object itself may well have come from a Roman grave.
(xiv) Lastly, the fragment of a tomb-slab was found in Stour Street in
1911. The first three of the surviving letters are uncertain, but just
enough remains to suggest that the slab was erected by a mother to her
daughter (Journ. Rem. Studies, xiv, 246). The stone is now in the
Canterbury Museum.
7. Of uncertain origin. Canterbury Museum contains a Roman
tombstone of unrecorded origin—in this resembling many other objects in
that museum. It is a slab of calcareous limestone, 14 in. high, 4¾—5¾
in. wide, and 1¾ in. thick, with letters 11—14 in. high, inscribed:
D(IS)
M(ANBUS) S(ACRUM) P(UBLIA) VAL(ERIA) MAXIMINA, ANN (ORUM) VI,
OPP(IA) VALE
RIA ET S(EXTUS) POM(PEIUS) CAPRATINUS FILIAE PIENTI
SSIMAE
F(E)C(ERVNT) S(IT) T(IBI) T(ERRA) L(EVIS).
Despite irregularities in the nomenclature, the stone may be genuine. Its
provenance is un-known, but may well be Italy. Brent’s Catalogue (Cant. 1875, p. 29) prints it (not quite accurately) without giving any
origin, and the Museum Donation Books, searched back to
contain no reference to it.. It does not resemble a stone from Rome or
Italy: it might be Gaulish or local; in any case it seems worth recording.
3. ROCHESTER The dominant geographical feature of North Kent in its central portion is
the winding Medway. This river, still tidal as far as Allington lock, and
navigable by fair-sized barges even above Maidstone, bordered sometimes
with marsh and sometimes with tall hills, cuts a sharp, sinuous furrow
across the north of the county. In particular it affects traffic. It is
very rarely fordable, and spots where its width and its banks agree to
suggest bridges are few and important. Of these spots the most famous is
that which is nearest to the sea, where Rochester Bridge connects
Rochester and Chatham with Strood and Frindsbury. There has been a bridge
here since Roman days. The Romans, laying out their roadway from the port
of Richborough to Canterbury and thence along the fertile margin of the
North Downs to London, directed its line upon this convenient spot. And,
before long, the bridgehead became the focus of a considerable
Romano-British population.
In the absence of evidence to the contrary, it may be assumed at present
that this new bridgehead population formed the first significant
settlement upon the site. But, apart from the incidence of the
river-crossing, the site
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