ROMANO-BRITISH STAFFORDSHIRE unknown. It is impossible that it can have been situated at Chesterton, as by the course of the itinerary it must have been somewhere to the west in Shropshire. The reason for identifying Mediolanum of the tenth itinerary with Chesterton is that its position agrees approximately with the distance given by Antoninus (nineteen Roman miles) from Condate (Kinderton in Cheshire), the previous station; but it is improbable that there should have been two stations of the same name comparatively near to one another. 9 The remains as yet discovered at Chesterton do not indicate more than the existence of a large rectangular camp of an (as yet) undetermined age, lying on the west side of the road leading from Audley to Newcastle- under-Lyme, here called Newcastle Street, which road may here be part ot a Roman highway from Stoke-upon-Trent to Kinderton. The evidence as to its identification with Mediolanum, however, is wholly inconclusive. INDEX ALSTONFIELD. In 1845 a large barrow called 'Steep Lowe" was opened near Alstonfield. It was about 50 yds. in diameter, 15 ft. in central elevation. A skeleton, two iron spear-heads, a drinking cup, some smelted iron ore, animal bones, and three Roman coins were found. The coins were third brass, one of Tetricus (A.D. 768-73), one of Constantine (A.D. 306-37), the third was undecipherable. Later, other objects, probably of an earlier period, were found. [Ante, ' Early Man ' ; Bateman, Vestiges of Antiq. of Derb., 76-7.] In the following year two barrows were opened in Stanshope Pasture, near Dovedale, in the same parish. One contained coarse pottery, calcined bones, and flint ; the second a few fragments of a human skeleton and some pieces of Samian ware. Bateman records that this is the only instance of Samian ware being found in a sepulchral deposit in the counties of Derby and Stafford [Bateman, op. cit. 86]. ALTON. In 1725, about 900 yds. from Alton Castle, were found three gold coins, one of Vespasian (A.D. 70-7) ; one of Titus (A.D. 79-81) ; and one of Domitian (A.D. 81-96). Plot mentions that a cave at ' Alveton ' called ' Thurse House 'was inhabited as late as 1680. It was of the same type as the limestone caves of Derbyshire, and ' Thor's Cave ' [see Wetton. Plot, Nat. Hist. Staffs. 172 ; V.C.H. Deri, i, 233, note i]. ARELEY. (See UPPER ARELEY.) BARR. (See GREAT BARR.) BILSTON. Coins are said to have been found here [Willmore, Hist. IVahall, 25]. BRANSTON. On the summit of a hill (called Sinai Park) in the village are the remains of a ' Roman camp.' Stebbing Shaw and others have endeavoured to identify the site with the station of Ad Trivoman mentioned by Richard of Cirencester, though not by Antoninus, but the evidence of a Roman station either of this name or on this site is very problematical [Stebbing Shaw, Hist. Staffs, i, 21 ; Reliq. ii, 208]. BURTON-ON-TRENT. Stukeley supposed that a Roman station was situated here, but no record of the discovery of Roman remains has been made, except the somewhat indefinite statement that in pulling down the old bridge over the Trent in 1876 it was found that the buttresses were built on oak piles, and some of the older stones were thought to be Roman [Pitt, Hist. Staffs., 41 ; Burton-on-Trent Nat. Hist, and Arch. Sac. v, pt. i, p. 4]. CALLINGWOOD. (See TATENHILL.) CASTERN. (See ILAM.) CHESTERTON. The distance given in the tenth tier of the Antonine Itinerary from Mediolanum to Condate (Kindeston), 19 Roman miles, has been thought sufficient to justify the identification of Chesterton and Mediolanum, but as has been stated under the heading of 'Roads' in this article, the evidence of such an identification, as far as our present information goes, appears 9 There is probably an error in the distance in this section of the second itinerary (f.C.H. Shropt. i, ' Roman Remains '). The Mediolanum of the second iter was on the road from Viroconium (Wroxeter) to Deva (Chester) between Rutunium near Roden in Shropshire and Bovium, probably near to Stretton in Cheshire. Mediolanum was described by Ptolemy as a town of the Ordovices, which would also place it west of Staffordshire. See further Chesterton in Topog. Index. 189
