ROMANO-BRITISH NORTHAMPTONSHIRE It is said to have been discovered with an empty urn, but no proper record appears to exist. It is a flanged rooftile, and bears the inscription LEGixHisP, legio mna Hispana} The other tile was found in 1822 at Whittlebury near the churchyard on the west side with some unin- scribed tiles and a bronze celt. Some coins are said to have been found at the same spot then or subsequently : they included a silver drachma of Alexander the Great, a forged coin of Metapontum, a small brass coin of Panormus, two Republican denarii (Postumia, Cornelia), two ' second brass ' of Hadrian and a ' third brass ' of Gallienus. The tile is now in Northampton Museum, where I have seen it ; it is broken in two pieces, which bear the inscriptions leg and xxvv ; that is, legio vice- sima Valeria victrix.^ These two tiles are legionary tiles ; that is, they were made by the tile-makers of the legions named on them, and were doubtless intended for buildings to be occupied by soldiers of those legions. They justify us in supposing that some portion of the legions were at some time quartered in the spots in question. That would most naturally occur in the early years of the conquest, and other evidence suggests that it did so occur. We know from inscriptions that the Ninth Legion was posted at Lincoln at a fairly early period and the Twentieth no later at Chester. It can hardly be an accident that a tile of the Ninth Legion occurs on the road from London to Lincoln and a tile of the Twentieth near the road from London to Chester. Here we probably touch the strategy of the earliest Roman conquest. The Roman forces in a.d. 43 and following years appear to have advanced in three divisions — the Second Legion (with auxiliaries no doubt) on the left wing along the south coast ; the Fourteenth and Twentieth across the Midlands to Wroxeter and Chester ; the Ninth Legion up the east coast to Lincoln. At some point, we cannot tell precisely what, in this advance we may suppose that the two North- amptonshire legionary tiles were made. It is much to be regretted that no further search has ever been made to follow up these two remarkable little discoveries. 7. INDEX The following is an alphabetical list of the principal places where Roman remains have been found or supposed in Northamptonshire. For the places where vestiges of f>ermanent occupation have been found, it has seemed sufficient to refer to the preceding account. For the rest the character of the remains is briefly indicated and the chief authorities for each named. Alderton. — Gold coin of Antony and Octavia (probably Cohen i) and some silver Republican coins found about the end of the eighteenth century [Welton, p. 186 ; Journal of the British Arch^ological Association, ii. 355]. Perhaps an early hoard, buried before a.d. 4.3. Aldwinkle. — Coin of Augustus [Morton, p. 532]. •^ TroUope, dissociated Archil. See. Reports, ix. 156 ; Archaokgical Journal, xxxi. 356, xli. 92 ; Antiquary, January, 1884, p. 35 ; information from Mr. J. W. Bodger ; Ephem. Epigraphica, iii. 142. The site commands a wide view north, east and west, and is otherwise not unsuited to a Roman fort or post, if such could only be discovered.
- Baker, ii. 73 ; Ephem. Epigraphica, iii. 142 ; brief reference in the Journal of the British Archteo-
logical Association, . iii. The coins are a very mixed lot, and more likely to have been lost by a modern collector — some rector of Whittlebury at a time of spring cleaning — than left by the Romans. Tiles, celt and coins might all have belonged to such a collection. But as the coins were apparently found after the tiles it is possible that there is no connexion between them. 215
