Page:VCH London 1.djvu/76

A HISTORY OF LONDON Basing Lane/*^f Cheapside, St. Paul's Churchyard, Paternoster Row and Square, Warwick Square, Old Bailey, Seacoal Lane (Holborn Viaduct station) and Newcastle Street amply confirm the course here suggested for what is usually called the Watling Street. The present street of that name has been pierced throughout for sewers, but no trace of the old metalling discovered : "^ it will be seen to lie off the line drawn on the map, but its eastern extremity and continuation (Budge Row) represent the old road. It was apparently here that a discovery was made about 1833 ; in excavations for a sewer 'in the line of that part of the City which retains the name of Watling Street,' what was considered the old Watling Street way was found at a depth of 20 ft. with a substratum of chalk and a pavement of flint.^*'* Excavations for Queen Victoria Street in 1869 also revealed an ancient roadway exactly on this line, between the churches of St. Mary Aldermary and St. Antholin (Budge Row). It was nearly in a line with Watling Street, and was found at a depth of loft. 3in. from the sur- face. The road or causeway was hard and well made, slightly elevated in the centre and formed of rough stones and gravel, among the upper portion of which were found quantities of broken Roman pottery which, with other local circumstances, would lead us to the con- clusion that it marked the course of a road or highway of some antiquity.'** If the measurements can be trusted to represent its original condition, the road was I oft. narrower than the main Watling Street discovered in Edgware Road and this in itself would shew it to be a branch road from Holborn Bridge. It no doubt crossed the Walbrook by a bridge near Cannon Street Station. Piles and a massive oak beam have been discovered here,"' and a Roman wall of rubble with layers of tile and concrete was seen on this site in 1853."° A lump of herring-bone pavement ^°°^ {spicata testacea of Vitruvius) from this part of Cannon Street is in the British Museum, the red tiles being set on edge in pink mortar mixed with pounded brick, and measuring 4 to 4J in. in length, 2j to 3 in. in depth, and about i in. in thickness. Two other speci- mens are in the Guildhall, the tiles being of the same average dimensions ; and a label {Cat. p. 72, no. 26) states that the larger piece (at least) formed part of a causeway or landing-place on Walbrook near Dowgate Hill, and was found 21 ft. below the surface under St. John's Churchyard. Near this spot was a quantity of stout oak piling and the sill of a bridge which crossed the brook from east to west. It will also be observed that the route suggested passes between the courtyard of Cannon Street Station and St. Swithin's church, in the south wall of which is preserved the famous London Stone. This relic consists of a rough lump of oolite now protected by an iron grating, and has been known possibly since the tenth century, but "" Now absorbed in Cannon Street between Bread Street and Bow Lane ; the alleged site of its discovery is in favour of the sepulchral slab of Onesimus, aged thirteen years, erected by his father Domitius Elainus (see Topog. Index, under Cannon Street). '" Tite, Antiq. Royal Exch. rv'i. '"' Gent. Mag. 1833, ii, 422, continues : 'The same appearance of a paved way at the same depth presented itself also in Upper Thames Street. . . In Bishopsgate Street, a short time since, 20ft. below the surface, a gravel way was found from which were thrown up fragments of amphorae,' &c (p. 423). "* J. E. Price, Descr. Rom. Tessel. Pavement In Bucklersbury, 77. '" Gough, Camden (1806), ii, 92. '*> Joui-n Brit. Arch. Assoc, k, 84. ISO* -pjjjj pattern has also been found in Lad Lane and Cateaton Street, London ; at Silchester {Arch, lix, 344), at Uriconium (Wright, Urictmium, 207), and Chester {Joum. Archit. Arch, and Hist. Soc. of ChtsUr, viii, (1902), 87). 3+