and Counties Bank on the west side of
the junction of High Street and St. Margaret’s Street, there was
unearthed in 1860, at a depth described as ‘the Roman level,’ a layer
of burnt wheat and wood ashes, 8-10 in. thick—remains, presumably, of a
Roman store which had perished by fire (Arch. Cant. iv, 36; Proc.
Soc. Antiq. Ser. II, i, 327). Later excavations in 1887 showed that
the soil beneath the bank itself was full of Roman debris and burnt wood;
a gold coin of Tiberius, first brass coins of Vespasian, Trajan, and
Hadrian, and Samian potsherds emerged, while, a white clay figurine of
Gaulish type, 7 in. high, of a woman in a wicker chair, was found under
Hammond’s Bank, immediately west of the other Bank (Dowker, Arch.
Cant. xvii, 34: figure in Museum). In connexion with these remains
may~ be mentioned three walls, built entirely of Roman tiles, 3 ft. to 4
ft. apart, running due east and west, crossing St. Margaret’s
Street obliquely, at 9 ft. from High Street, and therefore quite close to
the last-noticed finds (Arch. xliii, 1551, 159, no. 53). The
direction of these walls is oblique to that of those found under High
Street (2) and the Parade (4). Their depth is not recorded. Their position
and construction suggest that they are Roman work.
(4) In the Parade the drainage works of 1860 revealed a
series of 8 or 9 walls, built of stone or tile, 1˝-2˝ ft. thick, 18-25
ft. distant from one another, and 8-10 ft. deep, which crossed the
modern street at right angles at .various points between the London and
County Bank—90 ft. east of St. Margaret’s. Street—and the east end
of the Corn Exchange, a total distance of some 180 ft. (Proc. Soc.
Antiq. Ser. II, i, 328, and briefly Gent. Mag. 1861, i, 70, and
Cant. Olden Time, 15 (Find at Amos’ shop)). Between two of these
walls, in front of the Fleece Inn, at a depth of 7 ft., Pillbrow
discovered in 1867—8 a floor, 4 ft. wide, of white tesserae and, next it
on the west, a tiled floor, laid 3 in. lower, and a flint and mortar wall,
presumably one of those seen in i 86o (Arch. xliii, 155, no. 35;
piece of tessell. in Museum; Mus. Cat. p. 1, unless it be another
find). At a distance of 9 ft. 10 in. north of the building line of
the Fleece Inn, 13 The Parade, a Roman wall of flint rubble 2 ft. 8 in.
thick and running north-west and south-east, was found in 1929 (Journ.
Rom. Studies, xix, 210).
(5) Close to the preceding, at the High Street end of
Butchery Lane, Pillbrow found in
a wall, 4˝ ft. thick, constructed of flint with three courses of
red tiles, and one course of black (?burnt) tiles, possibly a bonding
course. Its foundation was not reached at a depth of 10 ft.; its direction
was east and west, that is, oblique to the walls under the Parade; against
its western face stood a circular column of Roman bricks (Arch. xliii,
163, no. 34). The whole appears to be Roman; the column was perhaps a
hypocaust pillar. Here also may be mentioned some undescribed foundations
detected at the Parade end of Iron Bar Lane,. the age of which is entirely
uncertain (ibid. 156, no. 29).
(6) At the east end of the series of walls in the Parade lay
a great deposit of black vegetable soil, 135 ft. wide and very deep. It
stretched along the street from the Corn Exchange to Iron Bar Lane, and it
was also traced beneath a house (once Frend’s) next to the Exchange on
the north side of the street; while another piece of it, or another
deposit, was noted in 1885 further to the west on the south side of the
street, under the London and County (now Westminster) Bank. In this
deposit lay promiscuously Roman potsherds, oyster-shells, and bones of bos
longifrons (Proc. Soc. Antiq. Ser. II, i, 328 (cf. vi, 378), and Arch.
Cant. iv, 35; xvii, 37). It is probably connected with similar
deposits in Iron Bar Lane and Burgate Street, and may represent a former
channel of the Stour, still partly open in Roman times.
(7) East of the black deposit less has been found. In 1867—8
the drainage revealed under St. George’s Street, in front of a house
once Mr. Sanderson’s, now identifiable as No. 43, midway between Ironbar
and Canterbury Lanes, two walls 8 ft. apart, 3 ft. thick and
coursed with Roman tiles, with a tile floor adjoining the eastern wall;
near by lay a few coins, an enamelled bronze fibula, etc. The tops of
these walls were 9˝ ft. and the floor 10 ft. below street level (Arch.
xliii, 155 (no. 27) and 156 (no. 29), plate xxxii, i). The
walls appear to have been Roman; if so, they are the most easterly Roman
structure yet definitely recorded in Canterbury. Battely, indeed, mentions
as Roman ‘an arch firm and solid’ and near it ‘a pavement of broad
freestones,’ found about 1700 a little within St. George’s Gate
(Somner, Canterbury, ed. 1703, p.. 192). But this can hardly be
discussed without more knowledge of its site, depth, and character. Small
objects of Roman date have, however, been found in the interval between
the black deposit and the gate. Many potsherds are said to have occurred
here, though few details are given (Mus. Cat. p. 20; Proc. Soc.
Antiq. Ser. II, i, 328). A Roman urn containing burnt bones was found
in 1860 near the church, 8 ft. deep in what seemed alluvial soil (Arch.
Cant. iv, 36, and (briefly) Cant. Olden Time, 20, 42, Proc.
Soc. Ant. Ser. II, i, 328). Outside St. George’s Gate and along the
New Dover Road nothing has been recorded, except a Roman leaden coffin
found near the Gate, in Bridge Street (p. 73).
B. Remains found south of High Street and the Parade,
described from west to east.
(8) In Stour Street (Lamb Lane), besides the foundations
by the County Hotel noted above (p. 6z), the works of 1867—8 revealed,
just at the end of Jewry Lane, a pavement 5 ft. wide, made,
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