A leaden anchor-stock found off Porth Felen at the tip of the Llŷn peninsula in 1974 is described. So far unique in British waters, the stock is of a Mediterranean pattern obsolete by the time of the Roman conquest of Wales. From its decoration it may be assigned to the late second century B.C., or possibly a little later. The typology of ancient anchors is considered, and the reasons which may have brought a small Mediterranean craft to that spot are reviewed. The stock is now in the National Museum of Wales.

The existence of ancient pottery sites between the tide lines on the Lincolnshire Coast, north of Skegness, has long been known, but references to them in literature are scanty. The lack of detailed knowledge about them is due to the unusual difficulties which confront the would-be investigator. In the first place they lie buried under six or eight feet of marshland clay. Away from the coast itself they are to be seen only where drains dug to this or to greater depths happen to cut through them. This is naturally a rare occurrence. Along the coast, however, exposures are more common, for there the erosive action of the sea is slowly removing the clays and bringing the pottery sites to view at mid-tide level. The same process unfortunately also removes the material of the sites. Opportunities for investigations are therefore fleeting.

The seventh-century vernacular laws from the kingdoms of Kent and Wessex specify fines or compensation payments using units of account that have given us familiar terms in the numismatics of this period: scillingas (shillings), sceattas and pæningas (pennies). In light of the use of cognate words in Gothic and Old High German, and the comparative values given in the Old English law-codes themselves and in the fifth-century Theodosian Code, it is suggested that these represent a regular and durable bimetallic system correlating values in gold and silver. This proposition is examined further against the evidence of weighing-sets from sixth- and early seventh-century Anglo-Saxon graves, and it is argued that the results give greater and more precise meaning to the use of gold and silver in Early Anglo-Saxon artefacts, such as the great gold buckle from Mound 1 at Sutton Hoo, Suffolk.

A previously unresearched Early Bronze Age dagger-grave found in 1989 at Racton, West Sussex, is profiled here through a range of studies. The dagger, the only grave accompaniment, is of the ‘transitional’ Ferry Fryston type, this example being of bronze rather than copper. Bayesian analysis of relevant radiocarbon dates is used to refine the chronology of the earliest bronze in Britain. While the Ferry Fryston type was current in the earlier half of the twenty-second century bc, the first butt-riveted bronze daggers did not emerge until the second half. The Racton dagger is also distinguished by its elaborate rivet-studded hilt, an insular innovation with few parallels.

The excavated skeleton was that of a senior male, buried according to the appropriate rites of the time. Isotopic profiling shows an animal-protein rich diet that is typical for the period, but also the likelihood that he was brought up in a region of older silicate sedimentary rocks well to the west or north west of Racton. He had suffered injury at or close to the time of death; a slice through the distal end of his left humerus would have been caused by a fine-edged blade, probably a dagger. Death as a result of combat-contested leadership is explored in the light of other injuries documented among Early Bronze Age burials. Codified elite-level combat could help to explain the apparent incongruity between the limited efficacy of early dagger forms and their evident weapon-status.

In this paper an extensive structured system of carved stones in Peru's Chicha valley is presented in its local setting, analysed within its agricultural and social context and compared with similar landscape features elsewhere. In any agricultural society, the timing of planting, irrigation and harvesting events is crucial to maintaining crop yields. To a state system where the administration is dependent on non-written systems of record-keeping, highly visible landscape markers would be essential in defining labour allocations and designating the appropriate allotment of irrigation water. This paper presents evidence that boundaries for water distribution and for management of the irrigation cycles during the Late Horizon period of Peruvian prehistory (c AD 1438–1534) were clearly set out and marked in a manner that enabled state administrators to manage the agricultural round. Though clearly the use of quipu-based recording systems should not be underestimated in this context, timing of the agricultural cycle on a local level could not solely be dependent on central directives from Cusco: local cakndrical tools were necessary to ensure successful agricultural seasons.

Examination of the Rolleston papers and local field-work have permitted identification of the site of the Sancton II cemetery and ascription of objects in the Ashmolean Museum to individual burials described by Rolleston. It can now be seen that, during the sixth century A.D., a small, predominantly inhumation cemetery close to the village was in use concurrently with the large cremation cemetery, which had begun on the top of the wold in the early fifth century and which was possibly used by surrounding communities, and that the Christian church was eventually built on the same site as the inhumation cemetery.

The area north of the Middle Thames situated between Acton and West Drayton reveals extensive deposits which have been referred by H.M. Geological Survey to the Boyn Hill, Taplow, and Low terraces. As within the valley of the Lower Thames, these features have yielded implements and mammalian remains. In the opinion of the officers of the Geological Survey the formation of the Taplow terrace and its contained deposits occurred prior to the formation of the Coombe Rock which succeeded Early Mousterian times; further, they consider this Coombe Rock is to be equated with the ‘Trail’. It has long been established that the series of deposits revealed in a typical section cut through the so-called Taplow terrace of the Middle Thames in this district shows:

5. Surface soil.

4. ‘Trail’, often composed of slipped material from the Boyn Hill or ‘100-ft.’ terrace.

3. Brickearth, with thin layers of pebbles in its lower portion representing land-surfaces, overlying gravel with black seams.

2. Gravel, unstratified, much contorted, and containing large included masses both of solid Chalk and of London Clay.

1. Gravel, stratified, but showing a disturbed and deeply eroded upper surface penetrated by deposit no. 2.

London Clay.

Whereas deposits nos. 1, 2, and 3 have all been regarded as having been laid down by the river during the Taplow terrace stage, it would appear that this is not the case. There are reasons, archaeological and geological, for considering that these beds represent three separate periods and that only one of them (deposit no. 1) belongs to the Taplow terrace sequence proper.

It is the purpose of this article briefly to enumerate the facts which cause the correctness of the official geological reading of this type-section to be questioned.

The Colchester Celtic mirror has been known to students of the period since a photograph of it was published by Henry Laver in the Proceedings of our Society (x·x, 1905, p. 213) as one object in an important grave-group. Laver noted that the back of that portion of the mirror-plate which is preserved is ‘ornamented with a spiral pattern’, but this pattern is not to be seen in the reproduction. Another reference in the literature is that by R. A. Smith, Archaeologia, lxi, 338, who mentions ‘traces of engraved scrollwork’ and an ‘imbricated filling, not of the usual basket-pattern’. Mr. E. T. Leeds produced another group photograph of the find; Celtic Ornament, fig. 10 and p. 30.

The writers of this article collaborated for the purpose of studying the ornament, and of reconstructing the complete design, if that should prove possible. The incised work was found to be very difficult to follow owing to a pustule-like corrosion all over the mirror fragment. Thus, as one of us remarked after the first attempt, ‘it is only here and there, either in a strong cross-light, or with the lens, that one can see and copy it’.

Thereafter both of us worked on the mirror fragment, and gradually the pattern emerged; it is reproduced in fig. 1. This drawing is necessarily an imitative representation of the original; it records not only actual marks on the bronze, but also direct inductions, such as the continuation of a partly preserved curve or circle, a line drawn on one side to match a line preserved on the other, and the development of the ‘matting’ or hatching from intermittent appearances. We have thought it well to indicate corrosion, but the dense obscurity of the original due to this cause cannot be reproduced.

Portions of the rim of the mirror survive. This is as usual a separate strip of metal bent in a C-shape round the edge of the plate. The handle of the mirror is an attractive variant of a familiar design which can be better appreciated in the drawing than in the photographs previously published.

This paper reviews the contribution of Professor Christopher Hawkes, FSA, to the development of Bronze and Iron Age studies in the decades before and – more especially – after World War ii. It also provides an overview and analysis of the Hawkes Papers, kept in the Bodleian Library, and particularly of the general correspondence section, with a view to assessing the potential of this documentation for the study of the development of British prehistoric archaeology within its European context. Examination of the first thirty-one boxes of the archive situates Hawkes at the interface between several networks of individuals and communities of interest, including amateurs, professional archaeologists and his own students.

Recent evidence for fallow deer at the first-century AD Roman palace at Fishbourne, Sussex, is supported by place-names identifying a nearby deer park and testifying to the presence of fallow deer in Anglo-Saxon Sussex.

It has generally been accepted as an axiom that the date of a seal can be determined within close limits by the style of the lettering of its legend. The late G. Demay, in his Inventaire des sceaux de la Normandie, published in 1881, was the first to give serious attention to the subject, and he naturally drew his material almost entirely from French sources. In 1887 the late Sir William Hope, in his paper on the Seals of English Bishops, offered some suggestions as to the date of the different styles of lettering, basing his conclusions on the fact that a bishop's first seal must be of the same date as his appointment to his see. His classification was as follows:

(1) 1072-1174. Roman capitals.

(2) 1174-1215. Rude Lombardic.

(3) 1206-1345. Good Lombardic.

(4) 1345-c. 1425. Bold black letter.

(5) c. 1425-1500. Fine close black letter.

(6) After 1500. Roman capitals.

At the time when I presented my last report the excavation of the ditch had nearly reached a point where the avenue approaches it. In anticipation of our arrival at this position the top of the counterscarp had been laid bare for —a width of 2 ft. in order that a good view of the avenue end, both in plan and section, might be obtained. The details shown were, however, disappointing, for when the south-east trench of the avenue appeared it presented an insignificant-looking, angular section in the bank about 18 in. deep and 3 ft. wide in top measurement, the apex of the angle cutting a groove in the solid chalk below. Where the extremity of the groove approached the ditch it ended at 8 in. from the side, leaving a ridge of undisturbed chalk, and indicating that the ditch was of earlier construction. The contents of the ditch showed that there had been no attempt to carry the avenue across it, nor was there any sign of it on the opposite side. The avenue bank was barely discernible and it is rather doubtful if it came quite to the edge of the ditch. It gave the impression that when making it the builders allowed their work to fade out as they approached the edge. The ditch continued an unaltered course independently of the proximity of the avenue.

The Roman villa on Lockleys Estate, Welwyn, was discovered accidentally in 1930. On that occasion a small portion of it was uncovered; but it was not until 1937 that, by the permission, and with the very generous co-operation, of the Welwyn Garden City Company, it proved possible to examine the site scientifically. The building was completely cleared; and although it was not sufficiently well preserved to justify the expense of preservation, the Garden City Company have undertaken to keep the site free of building, and the complete plan has been laid out on the surface in turf and brick. Of the many persons who by their help made the excavation possible I can only here record the work of Mr. W. R. Hughes, the secretary of the excavation committee, who bore the whole burden of the preliminary arrangements and gave invaluable help in the actual work of excavation and later in the preparation of this report; of Mr. A. E. Hick, who did nearly all the photography; and of Mr. Clarke, who undertook the whole of the surveying. My debt to Dr. Wheeler at all stages of the work is so apparent as hardly to need statement. To Dr. Davies Pryce also, to Mr. K. P. Oakley, and to Mr. Derek Allen I am deeply indebted for reporting respectively upon the Samian, the foreign stone, and the coins; to Mr. Hawkes for much help and advice, particularly in relation to the Colchester material; to Miss Kenyon for examining the fourth-century pottery; to Miss Scott for her collaboration upon many points of detail; and to all others who have given me their advice.

Studies of creole material cultures in historical archaeological frameworks in the Americas and Caribbean from the sixteenth century onwards emphasise the diversity and dynamism of cultural traits that are rooted in a range of different backgrounds: indigenous, African and European. Using a case study based upon recent historical and multidisciplinary archaeological research in north-western Barbados, this paper seeks to chart the development of a distinct vernacular Barbadian creole material culture over the period 1650–1900. It is argued here that the evolution of a strong and characteristic local cultural identity, as evidenced by recent archaeological research, counters the usual perception, common among historians of the period, that the plantocracy and its associated agents merely sought to reproduce English culture in the tropics. In fact the cultural picture as presented here is far more nuanced, and has implications for wider historical archaeological studies in the region.

This study traces the career of a single illuminator (the Ancient 6 Master) who was active in England from c. 1310 to 1335. For much of this time it can be shown that he worked in collaboration with the artist of Queen Mary's Psalter, one of the most profusely illustrated English manuscripts in existence Although a large number of books have been grouped under the heading of the ‘Queen Mary’ style, they have never received a proper classification, nor has any detailed attention been given to the problem dating. This paper attempts both to isolate the works in which the two artists participated and to propose a sequence ofproduction. Since most of these manuscripts are devoid of internal documentary evidence for dating, a chronology has been devised on the basis of the Ancient 6 Master's artistic development; this has involved an investigation of minor aspects of style. As a result, it has been possible to learn about the career of the Queen Mary Artist, and by virtue of the few firmly datable manuscripts, viewed in the light of the chronology proposed, dates have been suggested for the others within this group.

In 1962, an important hoard of Christian late Roman silver was found at Canterbury and declared Treasure Trove. The assemblage, which dates to the end of the fourth century A.D. or the first decade of the fifth, and includes ingots and inscribed spoons, was published in 1965. In 1982, a spoon appeared on the London antiquities market which on investigation proved to be one of five objects (with two stamped ingots and two siliquae) that had formed part of the 1962 discovery, but had not been declared; they were pronounced Treasure Trove in 1983. This paper is an illustrated catalogue and discussion of all the items now known to constitute the Canterbury treasure. Two further sets of late Roman silver spoons are also catalogued, an unprovenanced group in private hands which displays marked links with the Canterbury treasure, and the Dorchester-on-Thames hoard, found in the late nineteenth century and typologically and chronologically closely related to Canterbury. X-ray fluorescence analyses of all the items have been carried out in the British Museum Research Laboratory, and the results are discussed.

The importance of professional affiliations in the history of archaeology has tended to be underplayed. There have been a number of histories of individual professional societies and especially of museums, both of which had significant roles in the institutional development and acceptance of the field during the nineteenth century (e.g. Clark 1925; Evans 1949a, 1949b, 1956; Hawkes 1962; Hinsley 1981). Also, both museums and professional organizations have been generally touched upon in the course of biographies of individual archaeologists—primarily as background information (e.g. Evans 1943; Woodbury 1973; Green 1981; Hawkes 1982). What has not been considered sufficiently is the pervasive character of professional connections and the institutions or societies that made them possible (Trigger 1985; cf. Levine 1986). Organizations, together with accompanying journals, charters, meetings, statements of policy, special committees and so on, form the very basis of a discipline. This was particularly true in the nineteenth century when many sciences or other fields of interest—including archaeology—had yet to find a place in the academic world (Woodruff 1923).

We have studied the techniques of decoration of the backs of the British bronze mirrors according to the methods outlined by us in Lowery, Savage, Wilkins, 1971, 176 f., and the construction of the design on the newly discovered Holcombe mirror (Fox, 1973). Our intention is to examine the technical relationships between the mirror backs and to note some details of bronzesmiths' practice which they illustrate, and on which the Holcombe mirror sheds much light. Our conclusions are based mainly on examination of silicone rubber moulds which, with the co-operation of the museums concerned, have been made of all the decorated mirror backs now available. In default of a similar study of any extensive body of other material, no comparisons outside the mirror series are cited. We are not here concerned with mirrors whose backs are undecorated.

Fresh examination of the detailed zoo- and anthropomorphic motifs on some early Kentish jewellery suggests that they were deliberately designed to deceive the eye. A recurring device is the use of images which have more than one meaning, depending on the angle at which they are viewed. It is suggested that ambiguity may have been a characteristic feature of Style I art, and that the use of this style may have had more than a purely ornamental function.

Excavation of the three Surrey hillforts of Anstiebury, Holmbury, and Hascombe between 1972 and 1977 showed a general similarity of design and function but some variation in detail. Ranging in area from 6 to 10 acres (2·3–4 ha.), they were all related to the use of the sling; two were multivallate but Hascombe was univallate. Occupation was seemingly slight and Anstiebury was possibly uncompleted. The contribution of scientific method to problems of prospecting and dating is discussed. This and the pottery evidence indicate construction within the period 200–50 B.C., most probably 100–50 B.C., and the three sites may have been abandoned simultaneously. At Hascombe a pit- or hearth-filling produced Class I potin coins and the hypothesis is advanced that the hillforts were dismantled as a result of Caesar's landings of 55 and 54 B.C. but it is emphasized that decisive proof is lacking.