A HISTORY OF LONDON Wardrobe Tower. The level of the surface was at this time lowered, leaving the base of the Roman wall with the plinth and what little remains above it exposed to view. The general character of this fragment of the wall agrees with the construction usually adopted, differing only in being about one foot less in thickness. As so great a stretch of the wall north of this point has been removed, this piece is of value in fixing the position of the boundary in this direction. It will be found to lie in a straight line with the more definite remains beyond the Tower Ditch. An attempt was made in 1904,^' under the direction of the Society of Antiquaries, to discover further traces of the wall near this spot, and in par- ticular to fix the return angle formed by the supposed south wall ; but, except for some remains of the flint and clay puddling adjoining the fragment already mentioned, no further signs of the wall could be found. The ground has apparently been disturbed at various periods below the level of the original surface. At the opening up of the Wardrobe Tower, Loftus Brock observed that the masonry beneath this semicircular structure differed from the undoubtedly mediaeval work above, and he thus describes it : " We have here a rough mass of rubble masonry 5 ft. high, put together with mortar of iron-like solidity, and of browner colour than that of the first Roman wall. Mingled with this are patches of masonry and broken Roman brick, having the bright red mortar produced by pounded brick, and in too large masses, I think, to justify our belief that they were brought from elsewhere. (Since writing the above the southern face has been bared, and this reveals the fact that much of this walling is built with this same red mortar, but in patches, as if it were a matter of no concern to the builder which mortar was used.) He goes on to suggest that these indications point to the Wardrobe Tower having been built on the base of a Roman bastion. Its position, projecting as it does from the outer face of the City wall, makes this suggestion extremely probable (Plan C, 2). From this point no further trace of the wall is found until passing the Tower precincts, where at Postern Row is the site of the gateway known as Tower Postern (Plan C, S), Judging from the line of Ratcliff Highway, now called St. George's Street, it seems probable that there was formerly a gate situated more to the south, and that the Postern gate was opened after the con- struction of the Tower, when the road was deflected to the north. This gate appears to have been standing before 1 190, when a part of the City wall was broken down and the Tower Ditch formed, by which the foundations of the gate were weakened. The south side of it eventually fell down in 1440, and Stow tells us ' was never re-edified againe of stone, but an homely cottage with a narrow passage made of timber, lath and loame, has been in place thereof set up and so remaineth.' " Adjoining Postern Row to the north much of the wall is still bricked up into a bonded warehouse, and it passes out at Trinity Place, where a con- siderable piece is to be seen (Plan C, 4). The portion here visible above ground appears to have been rebuilt during the Middle Ages, when it was carefully faced with alternate layers of thick stones and Roman tiles and thin stones, which in places have been much patched. The older masonry no doubt lies buried. " jinA. Ix, 239. " Joum. Brit. Arch. Assoc, xxxviii, 130. " Stow, Sarf. (ed. i), 25 ; (ed. Thorns), 12. 50
