Later antiquities, of the British, Roman, and succeeding periods, are, or have been, fairly plentiful; the misfortune being that, as we, as yet, have no County Museum wherein they could be preserved, they have doubtless many of them been lost, or, if kept in private hands, are unrecorded.
When the bed of the Witham, by order of the Royal Commissioners, was cleansed in 1788, a number of swords, spears, arrow heads, etc., were found on the hard clay bottom, which had been covered over, and so preserved, by the accumulated mud. And in the “Gentleman’s Magazine” for that year a list of them was given. The late Sir Joseph Banks, of Revesby Abbey, secured a considerable number of such relics, catalogues of which are given in “Lincolnshire Notes & Queries,” Vols. III. and IV. They consist of arms and utensils of our British, Roman, Saxon, and Danish ancestors. Among the more interesting of these was a whittle, or “anelace,” exactly resembling one described by Greene as part of Chaucer’s dress. [107] In connection with Woodhall were the following:—A sword, probably Saxon, brought up from the Witham bed near “Kirkstead Wath,” entangled in the prongs of an eel-stang. The pommel and guard are tinned, as we now tin the inside of kitchen utensils; an art which we should not have known that our forefathers at that period possessed but for such discoveries as this. The polish still remained on parts of the blade “admirably brilliant.” It bore the inscription + Benvenutus + on one side, and on the other + me fecit +, in Saxon characters; the name shewing that the maker was an Italian, the crosses probably implying that he (or the owner, if made to order) was a Christian; while from the Saxon lettering we should infer that the Italian sword-cutler exercised his craft in the north of Europe. Another sword, with brass scabbard, of elegant workmanship and richly gilt, was found near Bardney. Several more swords, with Saxon and Roman inscriptions, were also found near Bardney.
A dagger was brought up by an eel-stang near “Kirkstead Wath,” the handle, of elm, being in fairly good preservation, the only instance of wood thus surviving. [108a] Several others, one of superior work with an ivory handle, were found in the Witham near Bardney.
A spear head of bone, of British structure, was found in Stixwould in an ancient sewer, which was being cleansed. Sir J. Banks says that “it does credit to the skill of the person who made it.” [108b] Several more of these were found at Bardney and other parts of the Witham; and again at “Kirksted Wath” the eel-stang brought up an iron specimen, which from its appearance would seem to have been broken in action.
A large barbed arrow head was found near Bardney, with an orifice large enough to receive a broom handle. [108c]
A Roman lituus, or clarion, was found near Tattershall Ferry. Though imperfect, both ends being broken off, it is interesting as being probably the only one in existence. This instrument is represented among trophies on the base of Trojan’s column in Rome, and appears on some Roman coins. [108d] A description is given in the “Archæologia” of the Society of Antiquaries (Vol. XIV.) of an iron candlestick, of curious construction, being one of six which were found
in the Witham by Kirkstead. We may well imagine that they, at one time, served to light the refectory of the Abbey, where the monks of old dispensed hospitality to the poor and needy, or to the wayfaring stranger. Perhaps the most interesting relic of all is a British shield, of finely-wrought metal, originally gilt, with a boss of carnelian, and ornamented with elaborate devices, shewing that those primitive people, though living a rude life, had attained to a very considerable degree of skill in working metals. It is described in the “Archæologica” (Vol. XXIII.); and an engraving is given of it in “Fenland” by Skertchly and Miller (p. 463). It was formerly in the Meyrick collection.
The above are a selection of the most interesting objects yielded up to us chiefly by the Witham; there have been many more, but of less importance. Several Roman urns in different places have been exhumed. The parish of Thornton runs down to Kirkstead station, passing almost within a stone’s throw of the Victoria Hotel; and in Thornton a small Roman vase was discovered when the railroad was made, in 1854. The present writer has seen it, but it has, unfortunately, disappeared. An engraving and description of it are given in the “Linc. Architectural Society’s Journal,” Vol. IV., Part II., p. 200. It was nine inches in height, of rather rough construction, and with a rude ornamentation. Two Roman urns, or, according to another account, six (“Lincolnshire N. & Q.” Vol. III., p. 154), were also found at the north-east corner of a field, on the road leading from Stixwould to Bucknall, about 3½ miles from Woodhall. They were of the kind technically termed “smoke burnt.” The soil at the spot was a clay of so tenacious a character that several horse-shoes, some of them of a very old and curious make, have been found in the former quagmire. Several large Roman urns have been found in, or near, Horncastle, and are preserved among the treasures of the late Mechanics’ Institute, having been presented to the town by the sole surviving trustee, Mr. Joseph Willson, to form, with other objects, the nucleus of a local museum at some future time. Engravings of these also are given, with a Paper by Rev. E. Trollope, the late Bishop Suffragan of Nottingham, in the abovementioned Journal, at p. 210.
At Ashby Puerorum, so called because certain lands in the parish go to pay for the choristers of Lincoln Cathedral, in the year 1794, a labourer, cutting a ditch, discovered, three feet
below the surface, a Roman sepulture, a stone chest squared and dressed with much care, in which was deposited an urn of strong glass of greenish hue. The chest was of freestone, such as is common on Lincoln heath. The urn, of elegant shape, contained human bones nearly reduced to ashes, and among them a small lacrimatory of very thin green glass. [110a]