1661.In Scot’s Yard, Bush Lane, with the remains of a large building. This issupposed to have been an official residence in the Prætorium. Sentto Gresham College.
1681.Near St. Andrew’s, Holborn—deep down.
”Bush Lane, Cannon Street—deep down.
1707.In Camomile Street—5 feet below the surface, with stone walls.
1785,1786. Sherborne Lane. Four pavements were found here.
1786.Birchin Lane, with remains of walls and pottery, at depth of 9 feet, 12 feet,and 13 feet.
1787.Northumberland Avenue and Crutched Friars—12 feet deep. Society ofAntiquaries.
1792.At Poulett House, behind the Navy Pay Office, Great Winchester Street.
1794.Pancras Lane—11 feet deep.
1803.Leadenhall Street—at depth of 9 feet 6 inches. British Museum.
1805.Bank of England, the north-west corner. British Museum.
1805.St. Clement’s Church.
1835.Bank of England, opposite Founders’ Court, and St. Margaret, Lothbury.
1836.Crosby Square—40 feet long, and 12 feet 1 inch deep.
1839.Bishopsgate Within.
1840.Excise Office Yard, Bishopsgate Street—13 feet deep.
1841.The French Protestant Church, Threadneedle Street—14 feet 2 inches deep.
Two other pavements also found in this street.
”West of the Royal Exchange—at the depth of 16 feet 6 inches.
”Paternoster Row.
”Sherborne Lane, with amphoræ, etc.
1843.Wood Street.
”King’s Arms Yard, Moorgate Street.
”Coleman Street—buildings at a depth of 20 feet, with pottery, sandals, etc.
”M. Garnet’s, Fenchurch Street.
1844.Threadneedle Street, near Merchant Taylors’ Hall—at depth of 12 feet.
1847.Threadneedle Street, with the hypocaust and foundation of a house.
1848.Coal Exchange—at depth of 12 feet. Baths or villa with mosaic.
1854.The Old Excise Office, Old Broad Street—at the depth of 13 feet.
”Bishopsgate Street—at the depth of 13 feet.
1857.Birchin Lane.
1859.Fenchurch Street, opposite Cullum Street—11 feet 6 inches deep.
”On the site of Honey Lane Market, while making trenches for new walls, ata depth of 17 feet the workmen came upon a tessellated pavement;the portion uncovered was 6 or 7 feet long, and 4 feet wide. Some30 feet north of this pavement, and adjoining a spring of clear water,was found a thick wall which had the appearance of a Roman wall. Inthe earth were found many skulls and human bones.
”Paternoster Row—40 feet long.
”East India House—19 feet 6 inches deep. Another pavement found here.
1864.Paternoster Row—9 feet 6 inches deep.
”St. Paul’s Churchyard—18 feet deep.
1867.Union Bank of London, St. Mildred’s Court.
1869.Poultry.
”Tottenham Yard.
”Lothbury.
”Bush Lane.
”S.E. Railway Terminus.
”Cornhill, with the foundations of walls.
”Bucklersbury—19 feet deep.
1867-1871.Queen Victoria Street. Roman pavement in the middle of theroadway, Mansion House end. Close beside the pavement was foundan ancient well, and a passage ran between.

The things that have been found are all pagan: pottery with the well-known Roman figures upon it, figures certainly not Christian; statues and statuettes of Harpocrates, Atys, Mercury, Apollo, the Deæ Matres; tessellated pavements of which the figures and designs contain no reference to Christianity.

As we have seen, tiles have been found inscribed with the letters PRB. Lon. or PRBR. Lon. (see p. [74]).

It is on symbolical monuments that we expect to find evidence of the religion of a people. It is therefore strange that in Roman London, where undoubtedly Christianity was planted very early, we find no trace of the Christian religion. Gildas, who is supposed to have lived in the latter part of the sixth century, refers to the first preaching of Christianity as having taken place soon after the defeat of Boadicea, but reliance cannot be placed on the few historical statements which we find in the midst of his ravings; and he says that the Church was spread all over the country, with churches and altars, the three orders of priesthood, and monasteries. The persecution of Diocletian was felt in Britannia, where there were many martyrs, with the destruction of the churches, and a great falling from the faith. When the persecutions ceased, Gildas goes on, the churches were rebuilt. Tertullian says in A.D. 208, “Britannica inaccessa Romanis loca, Christo vero subdita.” At the Council of Arles, A.D. 314, as we have seen, three British Bishops were present. At later councils British Bishops were always present. Yet no ruins remain in London of a Roman British Church. No monuments, no literature, no traditions remain; only here and there a word—here and there a monogram.

In the year 1813, in the excavations made for the new Custom-House, three lines of wooden embankments were laid bare at the distances of 53, 86, and 103 feet within the range of the existing wharf. At the same time, about 50 feet from the outer edge of the wharf, a wall was discovered running east and west, built with chalk rubble and faced with Purbeck stone, which was probably part of the old river-side wall. No trace of any important buildings was found in the whole of the area thus laid open, but between the embankments there were the remains of buildings interspersed with pits and layers of rushes in different stages of decomposition.

Sir William Tite (Catalogue of Antiquities) speaks of other discoveries along the river:—

“The excavations for sewers, constructed along this part of the boundary of London, appear satisfactorily to have ascertained that nearly the whole south side of the road forming the line from Lower Thames Street to Temple Street has been gained from the river by a series of strong embankments. At the making of the sewer at Wool Quay, the soil turned up was similar to that discovered at the Custom-House; and the mouth of an ancient channel of timber was found under the street. The ground also contained large quantities of bone skewers about 10 inches in length, perforated with holes in the thicker ends, recalling the bone skates employed by the youths of London about the end of the twelfth century, as described by FitzStephen. Between Billingsgate and Fish-street Hill the whole street was found to be filled with piling, and especially at the gateway leading to Botolph Wharf—which, it will be remembered, was the head of the oldest known London Bridge,—where the piles were placed as closely together as they could be driven, as well as for some distance on each side. In certain parts of the line the embankment was formed by substantial walling, as at the foot of Fish-street Hill, where a strong body of clear water gushed out from beneath it. At the end of Queen Street also, and stretching along the front of Vintners’ Hall, a considerable piece of thick walling was encountered; and another interesting specimen was taken up, extending from Broken Wharf to Lambeth Hill. At Old Fish-street Hill this embankment was found to be 18 feet in thickness; and it returned a considerable distance up Lambeth Hill, gradually becoming less substantial as it receded inland. Both of these walls were constructed of the remains of other works, comprising blocks of stone, rough, squared, and wrought and moulded, together with roofing-tiles, rubble, and a variety of different materials run together with grout.” (Pp. xxiv.-xxv.)

Again, on the construction of the new London Bridge it was found necessary to take down St. Michael’s, Crooked Lane, and to construct a large and deep sewer under the line of approach. Three distinct lines of embankment were discovered marking as many bulwarks by which ground was gained for the wharves. One of these lines, lying 20 feet under the south abutment of the Thames Street landmark, was made by the trunks of oak trees squared with the axe. Quantities of Roman things were found 100 feet north of the river.

During the demolition of houses for the construction of the new Coal Exchange opposite Billingsgate Market in 1847, the workmen came upon extensive remains of a Roman building. They lay about 60 feet behind the line of Thames Street, and about 14 feet below the level of the pavement. On its western side was a thick brick wall; the foundations were piles of black oak, showing that the building stood upon the Thames mud outside and below the Roman fort; next to the pavement, but without communication, was a chamber, which was believed by those who saw it to be a portion of the “laconicum” or sweating-room of a Roman bath, of which the hypocaust was also found. These interesting investigations could not be continued except by working under the warehouses beyond. They were therefore all covered over, and will probably never again be brought to light.

The sarcophagi which have been found are few in number (see App. IV.). The most important are—(1) that which was found at Clapton, (2) that found within the precincts of Westminster Abbey, and (3) that found in Haydon Square, Minories. The first was found in the natural gravel 2 feet 6 inches below the surface, lying due south-east and west; it is of white coarse-grained marble and is cut from a solid block. It is 6 feet 3 inches long, 1 foot 3 inches wide, and 1 foot 6 inches deep; the thickness is about 3½ inches. The inner surface is smooth, with a rise of half an inch as a rest for the head. No lid or covering was found. It is plain on all sides but the front, which is ornamented with a fluted pattern. In the centre is a medallion, about 12 inches in diameter, containing a bust of the person interred. There is a name, but it cannot be deciphered. The Westminster sarcophagus is preserved in the approach to the Chapter-House. That which was discovered at Clapton was of marble. Two, containing enriched leaden coffins, have been found at Bartholomew’s Hospital; and another on the banks of the Fleet River, near to Seacoal Lane. The position of some of these, distant from any cemetery, shows that the Roman custom of making tombs serve as landmarks or monuments of boundaries was followed in Roman London. In making the excavations for the railway station at Cannon Street, there was found across Thames Street a complete network of piles and transverse beams; this was traced for a considerable distance along the river bank and in an upward direction towards Cannon Street. These beams indicate, first, that the ground here—below the hillocks, beside the Walbrook—was marshy and yielding; and, next, that very considerable buildings were raised upon so solid and so costly a foundation.