Within several of the rooms wall paintings remained, the designs in various colours; some divided by lines and bands into panels, others ornamented by a trellis-pattern, or powdering of fancy-coloured spots: besides a quantity of roofing, hypocaust, and building tiles; fragments of pottery, glass, and articles of personal and domestic use. On many of the tiles were the letters PPBR, LON, such as have been observed before to be worthy of notice, as ‘recording the fact of their having been made by the first cohort of the Britons stationed at Londinium’; others were scored with geometrical figures, or small squares worked with a diamond pattern.”
[APPENDIX III]
STRYPE ON ROMAN REMAINS
In the Appendix to his edition of Stow, 1720, Strype devotes a short chapter to the antiquities found in London, which I have thought of sufficient importance to be transcribed in full.
“There are preserved, either in public Repositories, or in more private Custody, many Antique Curiosities: Found chiefly in digging Foundations for the Building of London after the great Fire, and occasionally at other Times.
In the Repository of the Royal Society in Gresham College, there is a large Glass Urn, that holds about a Gallon; and hath a few Shivers of Bones in it: It was taken up since the Fire in Spittlefields. The Glass is somewhat thick, bellying out, and contracting towards the Mouth with a Lip.
But the Collections made by Dr. John Woodward, Professor of Physic in Gresham College, is by much the most considerable of any. For, besides an ancient marble Bust of Jupiter, a Marble Head with a Phrygian Tiara, a Grecian Basso-Relievo, a Votive Shield, exhibiting the Sacking of Rome by the Gauls; the Embossment of which is allowed by the greatest Judges to be the finest and most exquisite that all Antiquity hath left us: Several Icunculi of the Deities, both Egyptian and Roman: A considerable Variety of Amulets, Periapta, Phalli, Bullæ, Scarabæi: Gems with historical Sculpture, Heads, etc. graven upon them. Camei and Intaglias of Egyptian, Grecian, and Roman Work: Many Roman, Greek, Syrian, and other Medals: Roman Weights: A Roman Semi-Congius: Urns, Lachrymatories, and other Things, procured from Alexandria, Constantinople, Rome, etc. And besides, an ancient Roman Altar from the Picts Wall in Northumberland, with a considerable Inscription upon it: Several ancient Weapons of Brass, Thuribula, Pateræ, Urns, etc., found in the remoter Parts of this Kingdom, Cumberland, the Isle of Man, Yorkshire, Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Northamptonshire, Devonshire, etc. He hath a vast Variety of ancient Instruments, Utensils, Vasa, and the like, that have been discovered in several Places in and about this City: In particular, several Vessels of religious Use, and employed in the Sacrifices, as for Example, Præfericula, Simpula, Pateræ, Thuribula, Labra, digged up; together with Horns, Teeth, and other Parts of the Beasts that were offered in Sacrifice; above twenty Sepulchral Urns of various Forms and Sizes: Likewise, Lanxes, Amphoræ, Crateres, Scyphi, Gutti, Pocula, Ollæ nummariæ clausæ; Parts of the Plasmata fictilia, in which the embossed Vasa were molded; and Lamps of various Sorts. The precedent Vessels are of Pot or Earth; several of them extremely fine, well baked, some curiously glazed, and the Colours very beautiful.
As to their Forms, they are universally very elegant and handsome. And indeed the Doctor, the Possessor of them, well observeth, that the Remains of these Works of the Romans shew them to have been a People of an exact Genius, good Fancy, and curious Contrivance.
’Tis observable also in this Collection, that the Things are fair, well preserved, and intire; which, considering the great Number and Diversity of them; how brittle Pots and Glasses are, and how liable to be defaced, injured, and dashed in Pieces, is the more extraordinary.
He hath likewise in his cabinet of Antiquities a Glass Urn, with a Cover; also a Scyphus; divers Ampullæ, Phialæ, and Lachrymatories of Glass, that are very fair and perfect. Then, there are several Pieces of British Money, coined both before and after the Descent of the Romans upon this Island. As also Roman Numismata, coined here: (Besides Saxon, Danish, and Norman Coins, which, as well as others, are very fair, and happily preserved). Likewise, Styles of Ivory, Bone, and Steel: Several Fibulæ, Aciculi, Bullæ, Claves, Armillae, Annuli, Beads of various Sorts; Aleæ, Tessaræ, Pectines, Calcaria, Spicula, Jacula. Likewise Tiles, Pieces of Lithostrata, or tessellated Pavements of Earth, Glass, Paste, Enamel, and gilded.