Page:VCH Kent 1.djvu/451

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ANGLO-SAXON REMAINS the ' usual Runic characters ' upon it,' but was no doubt embossed with intertwined animal forms, like that in the chapter house at Canterbury/ Stowting lies close to the Roman road, about 2 miles west of Lyminge. In 1844, during the formation of a second road from the village to the Common, about a mile from the Roman road between Canterbury and Lympne, upwards of thirty human skeletons were dis- covered, with weapons of iron, ornaments, some coins, a pottery vase and a bronze bowl/ The graves had been cut in the chalk soil, and some of them were capacious enough for six bodies ; and while the weapons were confined to the graves of men, those of the other sex were marked by beads and ornaments. The relics were of the usual Radiated Bronze Brooch, Lyminge ([). [4. BRONZE Brooch, Lyminge (}-). kind, the shield-bosses being of ovoid form ; and the vessel of light brown ware' was 10 inches high and 25 inches in circumference, with a narrow mouth, the shoulder being ornamented with wavy lines. The basin was 10 inches across and 5 inches deep, without ornament of any kind and of thin metal, closely resembling some from Sandwich. Besides coins of Antoninus Pius, Plautilla, and Valens, much worn by circulation, was a thin bronze coin plated with gold, evidently imitated from a Merovingian or Byzantine specimen. In 1866 Mr. John Brent unearthed twenty-five burials in a field adjoining the newer road mentioned above. ^ There was no indication ot mounds on the surface, and the graves were irregularly cut, perhaps ' Proc. Soc. Antiq. Land. x. 206. " Pag. Sax. pi. xi. fig. 2. ' Jrch. xxxi. 398 ; Proc. Soc. Antiq. Land. 1st ser. i. 28 ; Arch. Journ. i. 69. < Illustrated by Rev. F. Wrench, who secured most of the objects found in 1844 and bequeathed them to the parish, to be kept as heirlooms in the rectory {Brief Account of Stoxting Parish, pi. iii. fig. 2). « Jrch. xli. 409. 365