Page:VCH London 1.djvu/99

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ROMANO-BRITISH LONDON later date and containing pieces of mediaeval tile, chalk, flint, and other material, held together by soft yellow mortar, while the portion furthest under the roadway was of ragstone, very solidly built with hard white mortar, and containing pieces of Roman tile but no perfect tiles arranged in bonding courses. As far as could be seen in the restricted space of the tunnel, it appeared to be similar to the style of building employed in the base of the bastions. At lo ft. from the house-fronts a built face was found running diagonally in a north-easterly direction, but this was not followed further than 2 or 3 ft. This was in all likelihood the foundation of the flanking towers of the Roman gate which might have projected outwards from the wall, the distance of the tunnel being about 1 5 ft. in advance of the City wall. A plan of this gate as it existed in the late i6th century, with flanking towers of similar shape to the bastions, is given on the interesting survey of the Holy Trinity precincts made about 1592 and preserved at Hatfield (Fig. 15 (I)). As Mr. Lethaby suggests,'^ the gate possibly still contained Roman work. The thick base recently discovered, which appeared to turn diagonally, may very well have been the starting of the curved front of such a structure as is shown on the survey. From Aldgate the wall takes a more westerly turn along the line of Duke Street, and formed until twenty years ago the base on which the houses on the north side were built ; much of it no doubt now lies buried under the roadway in consequence of the widening of the street in 1887. Loftus Brock describes the wall then exposed as consisting of the chamfered plinth of dark brown sandstone with layers of squared facing of Kentish rag- stone and bands of bright red Roman tiles'^ (Plan C, 16). Ogilby and Morgan's map shows two bastions on the line of wall in Duke Street, and they are also given with more detail on the survey of Holy Trinity of 1592 (Fig. 15 (I and II)). There is little doubt that these are the towers "^^ Fig. 15. — Plans of the Wall and Bastion at Aldgate I. Holy Trinity Priory Sun-ey, 1593 II. Ogilby and Morgan, 1677 ' Lond. before, the Conq. 82. Journ. Brit. Arch. Assoc, xliii, 203-4. 53