COLLECTIONS ILLUSTRATIVE OF ROMAN OCCUPATION.

ROMAN VILLA AT HADSTOCK, ESSEX.

DISCOVERED BY THE HON. RICHARD NEVILLE, F.S.A.

DURING the autumn of the past year, the unwearied zeal, with which Mr. Neville has pursued the investigation of British and Roman vestiges in the neighbourhood of Audley End, was again crowned with success. His constant kindness and liberality have given us the gratification of bringing the results before the members of the Institute.

The discoveries made by Mr. Neville, with which our readers are already conversant, through the communications given in the Journal, were connected with the neighbourhood of the Roman station at Chesterford, on the borders of Cambridgeshire and Essex. The present notices relate to a locality in the county last named, of singular interest, on account of its vicinity to the remarkable range of hillsepulchres in the parish of Ashdown. The solution by the late Mr. Rokewode of the long-mooted question regarding the age of the Bartlow Hills, and the purpose with which they were raised, must be numbered amongst the most interesting discoveries of recent years in England.' The field in which the villa lately excavated by Mr. Neville is situate, lies about half a mile northward of those tumuli, which are plainly seen from the spot, and about a mile from Hadstock Church. At the lower end of the field runs the boundary line between the parishes of Linton, in Cambridgeshire, and Hadstock, in Essex. In the summer of 1846 an excavation was there commenced by Mr. Neville, and a small tessellated pavement, now in his museum at Audley End, was found. During the summer of the last year he determined to ascertain whether any foundations or further vestiges still remained, and he recommenced operations on August 6th, 1850.

During that and the succeeding month, the site of an extensive villa was brought to light, with various interesting

See the Memoirs on the Bartlow Hills, Archæologia, vols. xxv. p. ; xxvi. pp. 300, 462; xxviii, p. 1.

details of ancient construction, of which admirable drawings and a plan were preserved by Mr. J. C. Buckler, as also a valuable descriptive report. Mr. Neville has not only placed all these at our disposal, but he has generously presented the accompanying illustrations.

A great part of the foundations had, unfortunately, been taken up some years since, for the purpose of repairing the highways. There are several persons in the neighbourhood who state their recollection that, some twenty years ago, a great quantity of stones were obtained from what appeared to be very thick and solid walls. The line was indeed perceived, during the late operations, where the earth had been formerly moved, and the foundations broken up. It afforded indications, with the vestiges actually brought to light, that this villa must have been unusually extensive.

The following memorials, by Mr. Buckler, will enable the reader to appreciate the interest and importance of these remains :

"At the distance of about 150 yards, in a south-easterly direction, from the isolated fragment of a massive wall of Roman workmanship, formerly noticed, have recently been brought to light the foundations of a villa, with which have been preserved a greater variety of interesting features than appeared in the remains of other examples of similar buildings discovered at Ickleton and Chesterford, and described in the Archaeological Journal, Vol. vi., p. 14. In those instances, the walls, wherever any portions of them remained, had been destroyed, to within about two feet of their foundation; but, in the present instance, the destruction which seems to have commenced at one angle, extending even to the uprooting of the foundations, was stayed ere the buildings were uniformly demolished to the level of the ground or principal floor; and in this example it is evident that the subterranean chambers suffered greater injury from the descent of the materials of the superincumbent walls, at the time of their overthrow, than from violence offered to them in any other way.

"The severity, with which the work of mischief commenced, precludes the possibility of knowing either the utmost extent or complete figure of the building; whilst the sparing hand, with which the sentence of destruction was finally carried out, has left so many intelligible remains in addition to a connected series of walls, that a considerable variety of