The timber roofs above the main vaults of the abbey, coeval with the parts of the building they cover, are illustrated in J. P. Neale and E. W. Brayley, History and Antiquities of the Abbey Church of St. Peter, Westminster (1823), ii. These important medieval roofs are described only very briefly in an addendum to the Inventory of Westminster Abbey by the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments published in 1924 (entry no. 22a, slip p. 58), and no detailed description of them has so far been published. They underwent heavy restoration at the beginning of the eighteenth century, but survived in great part until the present repairs under the direction of Mr. S. E. Dykes Bower were put in hand. By 1964 the whole of the nave roof had been reconstructed and the roof over the south transept had been taken down and reconstruction was in progress. No major repairs to the roofs of the presbytery or the north transept had been started. At this stage, by kind permission of the Dean and Chapter, the Royal Commission was given facilities to make detailed records of the surviving medieval structures. In the following account the documentary evidence relating to their building and repair is outlined, their construction is described in some detail, and, finally, their historical context and their setting in the general development of roof construction are discussed. The photographs were taken by Mr. J. Parkinson, and the work has been co-ordinated by Mr. A. R. Dufty, Secretary to the Commission.

A late-Roman silver ingot from Kent has recently come to light. It weighs one Roman pound and is stamped EX OFF CVRMISSI. All such ingots seem likely to have been distributed as imperial donatives to troops in the fourth century. They are related to presentation silver plate and other gifts of this type, and more than forty silver ingots are now known from the European Roman provinces. The only other known stamp by Curmissus—or perhaps the curator missionum—is on a broken ingot in the hoard from Coleraine, Co. Londonderry.

More than a hundred and twenty years ago the Society of Antiquaries of London conferred a great and lasting obligation on students of the history of Scotland during the Roman period. At its own charges, and without reasonable hope of pecuniary return, it published in a splendid folio the manuscripts and drawings that had been handed over to it by the executors of Major-General Roy. The pomp and circumstance surrounding the issue immediately secured for The Military Antiquities of the Romans in North Britain the place which it has ever since held in public esteem—a place to which, upon the whole, its intrinsic merits fairly entitle it. Roy was at once a zealous antiquary and a shrewd and capable observer, with a thorough knowledge of military engineering. It is true that the data on which his main thesis rests were too slight to support the elaborate superstructure of which they were made the basis. It is true also that his treatment of a large part of his subject was vitiated by his seemingly implicit belief in the genuineness of Bertram's egregious hoax, the De Situ Britanniae} Still, when every allowance has been made for the defects that inevitably resulted, his book remains one of our archaeological classics. As a storehouse of trustworthy topographical information regarding Roman sites, it can never be entirely superseded.

The excavations of the Roman town of Silchester, Hampshire, undertaken under the auspices of the Society of Antiquaries between 1890 and 1909, are reconsidered in the light of renewed excavation on the site of insula IX, first explored in 1893. The excavation methodology of trial-trenching followed by area excavation of masonry buildings thus located is reviewed alongside the evidence of policy for the recovery and retention of finds. It is estimated that about 95 per cent of the archaeological resource survives for future research.

The Carmarthen brooch, datable not later than c.a.d. 50 and perhaps as early as c. 25, is a direct two-piece successor to the pre-Roman, one-piece, Aylesford type, now known to be considerably later in date than used to be thought. The two-piece construction, which characterizes the entire British trumpet-brooch series, was adopted as a convenience when the bow was given a massive form in order to accommodate Late Celtic decoration in relief, of a western character and antecedents. The central moulding and foot carry petalled ornament of a ‘transitional’ or ‘supporting’ type: this ornament is reminiscent of that sometimes found between the circlet and terminals of early La Tène torcs abroad, but is probably better understood here as the carefully-designed continuation en suite of the open flower or rosette upon the headloop, and thus as half-open flower. Only the Carmarthen brooch retains such a headloop rosette.

The Carmarthen brooch was soon copied in bronze, and on these copies the relief appears in a coarsened and simplified form. The copies are entirely from western findspots. In the southern part of the region in which they occur, the medial petalling is retained (as at Lydney); but in the northern part, additional simplification has led to the suppression of the medial petalling (as at Segontium). Thus the Carmarthen brooch may be seen as the parent of the more fully-developed Rii class of Collingwood's typological sequence, and also of at least one strand in the Ri class, which has been considered up to now as the original form. In the west Midlands, perhaps seizing the opportunity offered by the simplified relief, craftsmen began to apply red enamel to the hollow areas, and to emphasize the central moulding, with its petalling, so that this became the principal plastic ornamental element (as at The Lunt, by a.d. 75). In the north of England, these novel features, enamel and exaggerated moulding, were further developed. The fine northern brooches (Backworth—not enamelled, but engraved—or Risingham) do not have headloop rosettes, and it was in the presence of their exaggerated central mouldings that Collingwood devised his celebrated ‘acanthus’ theory. By the Antonine period, brooches were being produced with polychrome enamel, and with their mouldings confined, very often, to the front of the bow; many of these have been found along the Rhine. Some late derivatives of the Carmarthen type are known from Wroxeter, and form a final group in the Appendix above.

We have the honour of laying before the Society of Antiquaries, on behalf of the Executive Committee of the Silchester Excavation Fund, an account of the excavations carried out by the Committee in 1897, for the eighth successive season.

The paper begins by surveying the different types of early iron-smelting furnace, based on a tentative classification proposed by Coghlan in 1956. The ambiguities in this classification are indicated, together with examples of furnaces that do not fall easily into one of its three categories.

On the basis of data derived principally from furnaces of the Early Iron Age and Roman periods from northern Europe, the author proposes a new classification into two main groups, differentiated by their provisions or otherwise for the removal of molten slag during the iron-smelting operation. Each of these groups is further subdivided, according to the shape of the furnace superstructure and/or the method of supplying the air blast.

The following report of the most recent operations carried out by the Executive Committee of the Silchester Excavation Fund actually includes the reports for the two years 1903 and 1904, which were the fourteenth and fifteenth in succession of the systematic exploration of the Roman town.

The final season of excavations at South Cadbury Castle in July–September 1970 produced evidence for a Neolithic ditch. Five phases of remodelling were detected in the Pre-Roman gateway, and two in the Early Post-Roman gate. An important group of bronze brooches was associated with a massacre at the Roman Conquest. In the interior, both circular and rectangular buildings of the Iron Age were uncovered, as well as a building ancillary to the Early Post-Roman hall. Finds included an ΑΝΤΕΘ stater.

Found in 1897, the important collection of Late Antique silverware known as the first Lambousa treasure (to distinguish it from a second find of Lambousa treasure made in 1902) was acquired in part by the British Museum in 1899. This paper reconstructs the history of the discovery of the first Lambousa treasure and the circumstances of its removal from Cyprus. Research for the paper has brought to light hitherto unknown documents, and throws new light on the collection of antiquities in the early modern era and the politics, attitudes and personalities involved.

All documents which bear upon the history of Westminster Abbey must have a considerable interest for Englishmen. A church in which so many of the English kings since the Conquest have been crowned and anointed will always be venerable in the eyes of the more thoughtful portion of our countrymen, just as Aken and Rhemes must be honoured by Germans and Frenchmen. But, unlike Rhemes, Westminster is not an episcopal church. It became cathedral only for a moment, after its suppression as a monastery, in the reign of Henry VIII. as Aken became cathedral for a few years at the beginning of this century, also a time of much confusion. When we cross the Alps we find again a like case in a church which is not episcopal but collegiate, the church of St. Ambrose at Milan, where the kings of Italy took the iron crown; and a still greater instance in the Vatican Basilica, only a collegiate church, where the golden crown of the world was bestowed upon the Roman emperor. There is a further likeness in the history of St. Peter's at Westminster and of St. Peter's across the Tiber. In both cases the bishop who bestowed the crown has left his seat close to his own metropolitan church and come to live hard by the church where he should crown and anoint his sovereign. The successor of St. Anselm, papa alterius orbis, has left Christchurch, Canterbury, for his manor of Lambeth; just as the pope has left his patriarchal church of St. John Lateran for his palace on the Vatican.

Glass is, in many respects, one of the most remarkable substances in the world. No known substance combines such varied uses with such matchless beauties. For innumerable domestic purposes it has for centuries been considered a necessity of daily life. Without glass innumerable paths in science and the arts would never have been explored; and in these paths progress has been made in proportion as the methods of making glass have been improved. On the other hand the peculiar beauties inherent in or incident to this material are so great that at no period in history has man been able to grasp completely more than one of them at once. The Venetians realized above all others the marvellous capacity of glass for being wrought into all kinds of beautiful forms; our Gothic forefathers developed beyond all others its capabilities in respect of colour; the Phoenicians and Romans did wonders both in form and colour, but were nevertheless inferior to the Venetians in the former, and to our Gothic forefathers in the latter; we, in our day, excel in developing to the utmost (wonderful talent that it is!) the crystalline transparency and brilliancy of glass, but it is in this direction only that we have any true art or artists—in form and colour we do comparatively nothing. Thus, in each instance, the full realization of a period has been but as it were a passing glimpse—it has never been found possible to retain it, so as to carry it into the full realization of another period; even as the highest natural beauty is but for a moment—it increases until maturity, and then immediately begins to fade.

Caister Castle (see air view, pi. xvi, a) stands on the low ground about half a mile north-west of the little village of West Caister, one and a half miles from the rapidly encroaching sea, and some four miles from Great Yarmouth. Interest has always attached to the castle owing to the facts that it was built by the famous Sir John Fastolf, and that it played a part in the chequered fortunes of the Paston family, so brilliantly illuminated by their correspondence. The ruins, with their tall, slender tower, have also attracted attention as an early and splendid example of the use of brick; and we hope to show that the affinities of the castle lie in a quarter hitherto unsuspected, and that it is an important architectural document in the history of the cultural relationships of England during the first half of the fifteenth century.

It is common knowledge that in the reliefs on Trajan's Column the technical skill and achievements of the Roman Army received as much attention and space as did its military prowess and successes. It is clear that emphasis laid upon military engineering was felt to be one of the most effective means of conveying the triumphal concept attached to this marble volumen. Since both Trajan, to whom the reliefs were dedicated, and Apollodorus, his architect, who is likely to have drawn the cartoons for them, were inclined to regard craftsmanship and power as equivalent expressions of Roman glory, one would expect to find in the commemorative sculpture some allusion to specific technical achievements or, at least, to the most important of these.

The work of the French mission under Ghirshman, at Tepe Sialk near Kashan, on the Iranian plateau, has now given us a picture of the use of copper from the earliest times up to 3000 B.C., when the copper industry became firmly established. The present paper is an attempt to trace the development of the metallurgy of prehistoric copper in the light of the new evidence which is now available.

The recent identification of whale baleen from a medieval archaeological context in Perth raises the issue of what uses were made of baleen in the medieval period. This note investigates the military uses to which this unusual material was put.

The late twelfth-century aisled hall at Oakham Castle, Rutland, is well known as the earliest and most complete building of its type in England. This study, based on detailed fabric analysis and little-known excavations of the 1950s, puts forward a new theory for the building's development. It is proposed that the original hall had attached lean-to buildings at both gable ends, probably built of timber, housing services and other lesser rooms. Like other early halls, the principal chamber at Oakham took the form of a free-standing chamber block, some of whose features have been later incorporated in the surviving hall, including its great east window. Tree-ring dating has shown that, although the roof was rebuilt around 1737, many original timbers survive from the 1180s. A comparative study of other early halls is made, to set Oakham into its wider Anglo-Norman context.

This article contains a report of excavations conducted in 196J and ig68 at the ruined church (or chapel) of Stone-by-Faversham, Kent. They were designed to establish whether or not the central part of the building (subsequently the western part of a medieval chancel) was an original Roman structure. The evidence, derived from the type of construction, an opus signinum floor, from the coins, burials, and pottery found in association with the building, all indicate that in origin it was either a mausoleum, or possibly a martyrium, probably datingfrom thefourth century A.D.

A Roman structure subsequently incorporated into a Christian church is unique in this country. The question as to when and how this transformation occurred is discussed in the context ofthepossible survival of Christianity in Sub-Roman Kent, and of St. Augustine's mission. Further excavation revealed foundations of a pre-Conquest wooden nave, and throws fresh light on the methods used by the Anglo-Saxons in building wooden churches.

A limited excavation was undertaken in the Roman reservoir beneath the medieval King's Bath which lies in the centre of Bath. The reservoir had been partially cleaned in 1878 but the lower filling remained in position. Structural details were recovered, sufficient to show the different stages in the reservoir's construction: part of its vaulted roof, added later, was also found. The finds included coins, pewter curses, silver and pewter vessels and other trinkets dedicated to the goddess Sulis Minerva. The subsequent development of the site from the medieval period to the nineteenth century is briefly noted. Future work on the temple precinct beneath the Pump Room is outlined.