On a Romano-British Mosaic Pavement, representing Romulus ... · curable nearer than Plumpton a...

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THE EARL DE GREY AND RIPON.

^m-'^xm'btnk. THE DUKE OF NORFOLK, THE DUKE OF LEEDS. THE EARL OF EFFINGHAM. THE EAKL OF HAEEWOOD. THE EAKL OF DARTMOUTH. THE EAKL PITZWILLIAM. LORD WHARNCLIFFE. LORD LONDESBOROUGH. VISCOUNT HALIFAX. VISCOUNT MILTON, M.P.

HENKT BBIQGS, ESQ. DR. WM. ALEXANDER. H . C. SORBY, ESQ., F . R , S . HENRY HOLT, ESQ. BBNTLEY SHAW, ESQ. T. P . TEALE, ESQ.

VISCOUNT GALWAY. EDWARD AKROYD, ESQ., M.P, JOHN WATERHOUSB, ESQ., P.E.S. "W. B. BEAUMONT. E. B . DENISON, ESQ. LORD HOUGHTON. JOHN SPENCER STANHOPE, ESQ. JAMES GARTH MARSHALL, ESQ. THOMAS "WILSON, ESQ.

€mml RICHARD CARTER, ESQ. T. W. EMBLETON, ESQ. REV. DR. BURNETT. DR. SOHOLEFIELD. WM. CHADWICK.

J. G, MARSHALL, ESQ.

H. C. SOBBY, ESQ., Sheffield. HENEY BRIGGS, ESQ., Wakefield, DR. ALEXANDER, Halifax. DR. SCHOLEFIELD, Doncaster.

p0trorarg S^ttxttnx^.

WM. SYKES WARD, ESQ., F . 0 . 8 .

HENRY DENNY, ESQ., A.L.S.

Pomrrarg €nmiat». I T. W . EHBLETON, ESQ.

BENTLET SHAW, ESQ., Huddersfield. RICHARD CARTER, ESQ., Bamslej. REV. DR. BURNETT, Bradford. DR. PALET, Eipon.

MR. FAIBLESS BARBER then read the following paper, by H. E. Smith, Esq., of Birkenhead:—

ON A ROMANO-BRITISH MOSAIC PAVEMENT, REPRESENTING

ROMULUS AND REMUS, DISCOVERED AT ALDBOROUGH

(iSURIUM OF THE ROMANS). BY HENRY ECROYD SMITH.

Aldborough, by Boroughbridge, in the West-Riding, bears a name common to many places in the United Kingdom,

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inclusive of nearly half-a-dozen in the great province of Yorkshire alone. One and all of them may fairly lay claim to Saxon origin, as eald-hurghs, hut it may be questioned whether any can boast of the antiquity appertaining to that situate upon the left bank of the TJre, and but little above the confluence of this river with the upper portion of that of Isis (Ouse), now bearing the name of Swale. The site was known in pre-historic Britain as Yseur—a name evidently a compound of Isis and Eurus—the chief city of the warlike Brigantes, the leading people of the island at the Roman advent, whose territory stretched from the Humber and the Mersey on the south, up to the Tweed and the Solway, and who far surpassed in their abilities and energy all the more southern tribes, a character ably sustained by their successors, and, to some extent, descendants, for we rarely find proof of whole races being exterminated, or even completely driven away from their native country. The inhabitants of Yorkshire and Lancashire excel all the rest of England, whether we select arts or literature, agriculture or manufactures. Yorkshire indomitable pluck, energy, and perseverance, have contributed in no small degree in the formation of the national character, and now proudly sustains it in every quarter of the globe.

The remains of the ancient Brigantine capital are not known to be numerous; but, in all probability, much more of the early rampart and ditch which preceded the Eoman circumvallation, might yet be disclosed by a thorough investigation. When a portion of these were accidentally laid bare, ancient British pottery was found, and among other objects a remarkable one of brass was met with, representing the head of a human-faced coiv, the earliest form under which the goddess Isis is said to have been worshipped by the ancient Egyptians—one of those relics of the early commercial intercourse between this country and the Carthaginian


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territories, which it is the fashion of Mr. Wright and other antiquaries of the present day to ignore and often to deny, but which have certainly been found in numerous places along our coasts, though but rarely inland.

Yseur, however, possessed yet earlier mementoes of her connection with archaic races in the " Devil's Arrows " (Duil AraJ, without doubt one of the finest monuments of primaeval North Britain, though by what race up-reared, whether Brahminial or purely Scandinavian, remaias to be determined. Between these four (now reduced to three) msenhirs or pillar-stones, the JBetoel of the Phoenicians, and probably the very earliest memorials in our land, and Yseur an Idol of stone was found at a great depth underground. I t is of sufficiently rude execution to compare with any South Sea Island deity; but the material is remarkable, being of the same coarse grit as the neighbouring ''Arrows "—a stone not naturally procurable nearer than Plumpton, a distance of ten miles !

The conquest of the district by the Romans in the latter part of the first century, after it had remained for some time in a tributary condition under native chieftainship, brought a marked change upon the scene. Yseur, a well-situated and strongly fortified place was at once utilized, and under the distinctive title of Isuriimi-Brigantum (Yseur of the Brigantes) it became not merely the head-quarters but the actual capital of the victorious invaders, until, after the pacification of the country the growing necessities of the capital of so important a province as Britain induced removal to a site more accessible to navigation as the chief means of supply of grain, &c., not alone for the army but at times for the Imperial court itself. This was found lower down the river, at the junction of the Ouse and Foss; and here uprose the future metropolis, firstly of the Romans in North Britain, secondly of the Saxon kingdom of Northumberland or Deira, and, lastly, of the great ecclesiastical district, still


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claiming as its head the truly historic city of York, than which not even London itself is more famous throughout the national annals.

Isurium, thus bereft of the august patronage and residence of Emperors or their Generals, now subsided into a second-rate town, but it could not be entirely stripped of importance as a good military station upon the great north road. I t was occupied by a portion of the Sixth Legion, whose headquarters were Eburacum. The remains of temples, a basilica, And other public buildings, bear witness to the early develop-ment of the place, whilst the numerous well-executed Mosaic pavements yet existing testify to the abundance of good private dwellings. Other tessellated floors are of plainer designs and coarser work, whilst the example before us can be classed in neither category. I t is a Mosaic of average size as to materials, but rudely executed, and for Romano-British manufacture, decidedly of late date, and probably referable to the end of the third or the beginning of the fourth century. Since the publication of the "Reliquiae Insurianse," in 1852, several pavements have been found in the city of York and its immediate suburbs, yet the total number scarcely amounts to one-half of similar relics found at Aldborough. This paucity of known specimens of an important and remarkable class of remains at Eburacum has been much dilated upon, and I am disposed to regard ii as arising from the great depth at which such lie, rather than to their absence from the buildings of the Roman city. The slow but certain rise of the ground-level of large towns and cities is a very remarkable feature, but rarely chronicled; with the exception of London probably no place in the kingdom exhibits a greater heightening of the surface level than York, where the foundations of the earlier Roman buildings are laid upon virgin soil from sixteen to eighteen feet below the present pavements of the streets. Consequently


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ROMAN MOSAIC PAVEMENT, FOUND AT ALDBRO', THE ROMAN ISURfUM BRIGANTUM

SIZE.™ 4 FEET SQUARE.


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it is now but rarely that excavations for intended foimdations are sxmk at a depth sufficient for the uncovering of the pavements of dwelling rooms of Roman houses.

But to return to the more immediate subject before us, the " Romulus and Remus Floor."

The example of Roman Pavement to which this paper refers, is not introduced as an artistic work; it is simply a construction of much interest and curiosity. In default of j&neness of execution, it seemed the more desirable that the peculiar conformation of the details of the floor should be accurately rendered; in short, a fac-simile upon paper. (See plate xvi. accurately lithographed from a photograph executed by Mr. Hanson, of Leeds).

The floor, as now remaining, is small, being only about four feet square, but in all probability it formed the central compartment only of a twelve or sixteen feet square room or apartment, in one of the average dwelling-houses of Isurium-Brigantum. I t was discovered about twenty-five years ago, but, through peculiar circumstances which it would be tedious to relate, I did not include it among the illustrations of kindred remains in my "Reliquige Isurianse." The site where it was discovered is adjacent to Aldborough Hall and the east gate, and lies to the southward of the main road through the village, which deviates little from the direct line of the Roman street between the eastern and western gates of the city. Shortly afterwards it was exhumed by a mason named Lonsdale, and removed to a garden attached to his cottage in Boroughbridge, where for many years it formed the floor of a small summerhouse. In 1863 it was purchased for the Museum of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Leeds, where it is still preserved.

The outermost border of this fragment consists of a series of elongated lozenges or diamonds, each containing others of a diminishing volume, but all perfectly plain, and of alter-


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nating white, black, and red colours. Upon looking oyer numerous illustrations of Romano-British Pavements, I find this variety of configuration in fourteen difierent instances, but in only three of these does it occur as a border; one being the interesting and valuable pavement at Thruxton, the copper-plate of which is in the possession of my friend Joseph Clarke, Esq., of Saffron "Walden, where the diamonds alternate with crosses, assumed, but probably erroneously, to be the Christian symbol. In the other eleven cases they are Worked up with the ornamentation in the body of the floors, often in cubical patterns. All these diamonds are plain, but eight other examples occur—such comprising knots of the guilloche or braid, &c.,—two of which possess it in the borders, and the remainder in portions of central work. The last include three floors at Aldborough, viz., the old Manor-house, and the two corridor floors (" Reliquiae Isurianse,'' plates xii., xiv). I t will thus appear that as a border this pattern is quite a rare one in this country, though in France and Grermany it is supposed to be of more frequent recurrence. The centre piece of this floor, set within its border as a a picture within its frame, represents a group of Roman paternity, produced occasionally upon coins and medallets of the later Roman emperors,* but rarely appearing in sculpture,f mosaics, or, as far as can be judged, oil paintings. This world renowned scene, the discovery of Romulus and Remus, suckled by a wolf, has been variously treated by our modern historians, some accepting the tradition as founded upon fact,

*I t appears upon some of tlie large brass coins of a few of the earlier Emi)erors, viz., Hadrian, Antoninus Pius (two types), and Philip Senior,—reappearing in the Anglo-Saxon series, being copied by Ethelberht II., King of Kent, from the the small brass of Constantine.

t Mr. Roach Smith owns a good intagliate camelian bearing the group, and I find a spirited representation of it in carved ivory, part of the design of an Arabian Diptychon, engraved in a rare work, " Thesaurus Veterum Dipty-Chorum," by Ant. Franc. Gori; Florence, 1759. This engraving is described p. 205, engraved in Table 22, and stated to belong to the Vatican Collection,


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others, including the deservedly honoured Dr. Arnold, holding the story as a perfect myth, invented by the imaginative history-mongers of the Consulate, to gratify the craving of the citizens of Rome for something at once sensational and satisfying to their vanity and self-love in the rapid rise and growth of their city. In the absence of perspicuous proof, this solution is the safest; and we find the traditions include several curious points not generally known, comprising the following items;—Nxmiitor, king of Alba, had two grandsons, the children of Mars and Ilia, who were seized and cast within a wooden box into the Tiber, by order of Amidius, who had usurped the throne of his brother Numitor. The boys thus abandoned in their wooden receptacle, were carried by the overflow of the Tiber to the foot* of Mons Palatinus, and stranded at the mouth of a cave or grotto, where, under the friendly shade of a fig-tree, and suckled by a large she-wolf, which had made a cover of the cavern's recesses, the youngsters were discovered by the king's herdman, Faustulus. In our Aldborough mosaic the compartment may be held as representing a section of the cave, whilst the wolf, the historic infants, and the fig-tree are immistakably portrayed. Ovid repeatedly refers to the story, and a few selected extracts are subjoined:—

" Arbor erat: remanent vestigia : quseque vocator Eumina nunc ficus, Eomula ficus erat,

Venit ad exposites (mirum) lupa f oeta gemelloa. * * * * * * Constit et canda teneria blanditur aluninis

Et fingit lingua corpora bina sua."

These lines occur in Ovid's "Fas t i , " t or Festivals of the Boman Calendar, and are thus translated by John Gower,:}: Master of Arts :—

"A iig-tree stood, the stump remains this day ; Then Eumina, but now called Romula,

*' EiToneously stated by Lempriere to be on Mount Palatine. + Lib. ij., 1. 411. J London, 1640.


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To these poor barns [bairns] there comes a she-wolf wild— Most strange a wild beast should not hurt a child. Yet that was nothing ; she assists and nurses Those whom their kindred to their death enforces ; She stands and fawns upon the nuddling twins, And with her tongue licks o'er their tender skins,"

The cave above alluded to, and thus immortalized for all mundane time, appears to be a spacious natural grotto, possessing three large compartments. Situate at the foot of Mount Palatine, upon which Romulus is said to have laid the first foundation for his capital, of buildings subsequently replaced by the immense palace of the CEesars, it occupied a central position in the later imperial city. In earlier times the approach to it lay through a dense forest, and several streams issued therefrom. I t became sacred to the great deity of natural providences, Pan. From the traditional discovery here of the Alban infants, it was designated the Lupercal, or cave of the wolf, originating, it is said, from the wife of Faustulus, who nursed them, being named Lupa. Games and bacchanalian revelries in honour of Pan had their head-quarters here, whence, in the annual saturnalia, wild and licentious processions issued, parading the streets of Rome to the great indignation of the Christianized portion of the community, in the first and second centuries. These orgies were known as the Liipercalia, and it is a singular coincidence that I had no sooner commenced writing my description of this Romano-British Mosaic than the telegraph flashed over the civilized world the news of the re-discovery of this celebrated Lupercal, after an obscurity of many centuries. I t seems that a certain "Signor Gori, an advocate, on visiting the Cloaca Maxima of Tarquin, directed his attention to a very limpid stream of water, flowing from a lateral conduit, and, after considerable investigation, guided by historical memorials and his own


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deductions, found the celebrated cavern near the present church of St. Anastasia."*

Allusion has been made to the coins depicting the wolf and twins, but the adjuncts of cave and tree do not appear upon any. They are chiefly of the third or small-sized brass, struck by Constantino the Great in honour of the founding of Eome, and inscribed " TJrbs Eoma." Mr. Roach Smith describes a rare silver denarius of this type, found in London, t In the larger brass, this design, which it is natural to assume would be a favourite one with the Roman moneyers, proves to be by no means frequent, being almost confined to the colonial series. J The woodcut appended displays the reverse of a Greek Colonial piece, struck in the reign of Elagabalus, and found at Jerusalem. I t is inscribed "COL. AVP. ML. CAP." with P. F . in the exergue. Jerusalem, restored by ^ l i u s Hadrianus, was erected into a Roman colony, and named after this emperor, and also Capi-tolina, in honour of Jupiter Capitolimis,^ thus doubly accounting for the re-production of the wolf and twins. Illustrations are likewise supplied of two reverses of the small coins of Constantino, just mentioned. I n each, case the teats or dugs of the wolf are carefully produced, and in no other instance than ia the pavement before us have I found them to be absent.

The general design being a most popular symbol, and consequently likely enough to occur to Roman artificers, it

*Atkenceum, 15th June, 1867, p. 798. + See his Catal(ûe of the Museum of London Antiquities, p. 89. $ Cities honoured -with the titles of Eoman Colonies not unfrequently affected

the design upon the reverses of their coins. § Jûmismatic Chronicle, New Series, vol. ii., p. 116, pi. iii., No. 7.


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yet proves remarkably rare in works of the sculptors and mosaists of this era. Repeated enquiries have only residted in a knowledge of one instance in mosaic, a compartment of a floor probably forty feet long, in Rome, and of an example in fresco found at Pompeii.

A curious plaque of copper-bronze found in the city of London some years ago, and figured in Mr. Roach Smith's " Catalogue of the Museum of London Antiquities," as also in his " Roman London." I t is thus described :*—

" A circular ornament (plate iii,, fig. 2), engraved of the actual size, embossed with a design of the mystic story of Eomulus and Eemus Buclded by a wolf. I t is formed of a piece of plain thin metal, in which copper largely predominates, shaped by stamping, and afterwards finished by rude chasing and frosting with a punch, and has" been affixed apparently to wood. The birth of the fabled founders of Rome was a favourite subject with the ancient artists. It often occurs on coins as a type, as

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an ornament on the shields of some of the Eoman Emperors, on the obverses of their coins, and on gems and other works of art. In this instance the story is more than usually illustrated by the introduction of the fig-tree—Rumini ficiis, of which Ovid tells us some remains were in existence in his time.

" The bird no doubt is intended for that which shared with the wolf the honour of feeding the infant heroes.

' Lacte quis infantes neseit crevisse ferino, Efc Picum expositis ssepe tullisse cibos !'

' Ovid's Fasti, lib. iii., I. 53.'

" It was found in Moorfields, with a thin star-shaped piece of similar metal, perforated in the centre."

The last quotation from Ovid is rendered by Mr. Gower—

" 'Tis known these infants sucked a wild beast's teat, And that a Pie did daily bring them meat,"

The only exception we have to take here is the adoption of a Picus, or member of the Woodpecker family, for Pica, a pie or magpie,—a palpable but not unnatural error for a non-naturalist to make. Pieus was a fabled king of Latium, celebrated for his beauty, and of whom Circe, meeting him in the woods of Monte Circello, became greatly enamoured. Mortified at her advances being treated with disdain, this ocean nymph, or syren, brought her celebrated magical arts to bear upon the scornful monarch, who was summarily converted into a Woodpecker.

In this circular engraving we have a very different treatment from that of the mosaic; for although somewhat rude, it is yet far less conventional in style, and the tree appears more shrubby, being devoid of any main stem or trunk. But we have also an addition to the group, in the introduction of a bird, unquestionably the woodpecker alluded to by Ovid, the honoured assistant in sustaining the traditional foimder of Borne and his brother. The dugs are large and rotund, offering a great contrast to the narrow elongated ones of the long-legged brute upon one of the smaller coins, and the


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hugely clawed feet are very noticeable. This unique and very interesting little plaque or boss, formerly in Mr. Roach Smith's Museum of London Antiquities, is now in Mr. Eoach Smith's Collection in the British Museum, it is, as has been stated, of bronze, but it contains a much larger proportion of copper than usual. Along with it was found a flat star-shaped object of similar metal and size; and there can be little doubt they had been connected by rivets upon some post or lintel of wood in decoration.

Reverting to the mosaic, it only remains to notice the composition and colours constituting the groundwork used in its production. The bluish-black and the white, and the few yellow, tesserae, are all natural stones, the former being blue lias, and the latter magnesian limestone. The tesserae of a red colour alone are artificial, being of baked clay. The whole are set in a deep bed of the admirable concrete of the Roman architects, too well known to require description here.

ON T H E GEOLOGY OF T H E BAKNSLEY C O A L - F I E L D . BY A. H .

GREEN, M.A., OF T H E GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF GREAT

B R I T A I N .

Though I might occupy the time at our disposal with an account of the objects of geological interest in the immediate neighbourhood of Barnsley, and by no means exhaust the subject, I think I shall make this paper more interesting and instructive if I take rather a wider range, and show first of all the relation of the rocks we now stand upon to the general geology of England.

If we draw a line from Iôttiagham, through Derby and Asbboume, to near Trentham, then wind it up to Manchester, and thence to the estuary of the Mersey, this liue will be the northern boundary of the New Red Sandstone plain of


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