ANGLO-SAXON REMAINS mens of solid construction that are apparently of Anglian origin. Both terminate in a conventional horse's head, and the smaller of the two is of the realistic character noticeable on the earliest Teutonic imitations of the Roman brooch in vogue during the fourth century, somewhat resembling a crossbow. Of the others, two have some points of resem- blance with specimens from Offchurch noticed later, and there was an example of the quoit-shaped brooch, as well as of the horseshoe or penannular form 1 similar to specimens found at Longbridge. At Norton, twelve miles to the south in Northants, a very similar burial place came to light about twenty years later, during the excavation of a mound 2 or 3 yards wide and about a yard high, which ran by the hedge along the Watling Street. The level at which the bodies had been deposited was about 6 feet below the crown of the Roman road and about 25 feet from its centre, just outside the original embankment. The graves were in a single line, and contained, besides the skeletons which it is believed lay with the heads to the south, some formless pieces of metal and one rude bead of amber. 2 The burials on the Roman road do not however belong to the main Teutonic district of the county, and more characteristic remains occur on the other side of Dunsmore Heath, in the valley of the Learn. During the construction of the Rugby and Leamington railway, Anglo-Saxon relics were found, about 1850, in an artificial mound of earth at Marton. Two of the urns then brought to light were bequeathed to Rugby School Art Museum by Mr. Bloxam of Rugby, who gave an account 3 of this and other Warwickshire finds in 1851 ; and another urn, about half the size, is now in the museum at Warwick, with three shield-bosses from the same site. All were quite plain and of globular form, the larger specimens being 8 inches high and of about the same diameter, the smaller being 2 inches less. They were not made on the wheel, and could be easily distinguished from Roman pottery, specimens of which have also been met with in the county. The contents too showed that they belonged to another period and another people ; for besides fragments of bones, there were two spearheads of iron and a fragment of the same metal, which was taken to be part of a sword, 2^ inches wide. Neither the Romans nor the Romanized Britons buried weapons with the dead, and the presence of a long broad sword of the usual Anglo-Saxon type is quite in keeping with the brooches which were happily recovered from the mound. One was circular, with the face ornamented by means of a punch ; this type is common enough in central England, and is not confined to a particular district, as the saucer-shaped brooch appears to be. Of this latter description there was a single specimen, found on the top of some bones in one of the urns. This direct association with the rite of cremation should be noticed, as even in the mixed cemeteries of 1 These are figured in Baron de Baye's Industrial Arts of the Anglo-Saxons, pi. ix. figs, i , 6.
- Arch&ologia, xli. 479 ; Victoria History of Northants, i. 234.
8 Reports of Associated Architectural Societies (1850-1), Northampton, p. 230. 255
