Contents of the fikst volume

BOOK I. CHAP. II.]

ROMAN HISTORY.

31

But the noblest discovery ever made here, or perhaps in Britain, was in the year 1796,

when the shelving hank of the Ribble exposed the following remains, which seemed to

have been deposited in an excavation of the earth, filled up with soil of a different quality. 1

These were, 1st, a large flat earthen vessel, extremely thick, with the potter's stamp very

distinct, "BORIEDOF, Boriedi Officina." 2nd. An entire patera of copper, about six

inches diameter, with a handle. 3rd. The imperfect remains of a similar vessel. 4th. A

colum, or colander, of the same size and metal. 5th. Several concave and circular plates

of copper, with loops behind, which had evidently been intended to fasten them perpen-

dicularly against a shaft, in order to form a Roman vexillum : such are frequent upon

ancient monuments, but, for a particular illustration, the reader is referred to a monument

of Lucius Duccius, Signifer 2 of the ninth legion, in Horsley. (Yorkshire, VIII.) 6th. A

very fine helmet (of which the crest was a sphinx, afterwards unfortunately lost 3 ), the head-

piece enriched with a basso relievo of armed men skirmishing with swords, and a visor con-

sisting of an entire and beautiful female face, with orifices at the eyes, mouth, and nostrils. V

From the style of the head-piece it is conjectured by the best jiidges not to be prior to

the age of Severus ; but the vizor is a much more delicate and exquisite piece of workman-

ship, and is supposed not only to be Grecian, but, from the boldness of its lines, to belong

to a period somewhat anterior to the last perfection of the arts in that wonderful country.

All these remains are now in the museum of Charles Townley, esq. who, it is hoped,

will one day gratify the public with a comment on the symbolical figures in front of the

helmet. 4
" A Roman cyathus or diota, the instrument, no doubt, of much ancient conviviality at Coccium, was found here,

and is now in the possession of Dr. St. Clare, of Preston." (Bichmondshire, ii. p. 462.)

1 [The site of this remarkable discovery is described by Mr. Townley as " a hollow that had been made in the

waste land at the side of the road leading to the church, and near the bend of the river. The boy, about thirteen years

old (son of Joseph Walton), being at play in that hollow, rubbed accidentally upon the helmet, at the depth of about

nine feet from the surface of the ground. When the helmet was extracted the other articles were found with it,

deposited in a heap of red sand, which formed a cube of three feet. They are much defaced by the effect of the sand.

Joseph Walton dug them out, and sold them to C. T. 8 Dec. 1797."]

2 There is now at Standen, near Clitheroe, a sepulchral stone removed from Ribchester by the late Mr. Serjeant

Aspinall, without inscription, but with a figure in high relief of a Roman standard-bearer of the lower empire, with the

labarum in his hand.
3 [" In the summer of the year 1796, Mr. Wilson, of Clitheroe, and myself saw a bronze helmet and other remains

of Roman antiquity, then recently discovered at Ribchester, and I now distinctly recollect that, besides the pieces in

Mr. Townley's possession, there was a sphinx of bronze, which, from the remains of solder on its lower side, and also

from its curvature, appeared to have been attached to some convex surface, probably to the top of the helmet. And

on September 19th, 1798, on a second visit to this celebrated station, I learned that a piece of brass (to use the man's

own words) having the body of a lion, and the face of a woman, and which was found along with the helmet, &c. had

been for some time in the possession of Laurence Walton, brother of Joseph Walton, from whom Mr. Townley purchased

the other remains, but that, as it was carelessly left on the chimney-piece of his cottage, it was, as he supposes, carried

away by his children, and irretrievably lost." T. D. Whitaker. Sept. 19, 1798, in Vetusta Monumenta, vol. iv. p. 12.]
4 [This passage occurs in the first edition of the History of Whalley, at p. 23, and appears to have been written

very shortly after the discovery was made in 1796. It is almost as unaccountable that it should have appeared in the

first edition (published in 1800) as that it should not afterwards have been removed or altered : for Mr. Townley's

32

HISTORY OF WHALLEY.

[BOOK I. CHAP. II.

[The course of the discoveries made at Kibchester is pursued in Dr. Whitaker's own

words in the History of Bichmondshire, where he resumed the subject (correcting the

account given in the notes to the third edition of this work, p. 17) :

" In the month of July, 1811, some workmen, in securing the same bank (where the
' Account of Antiquities discovered at Ribchester " was addressed to the Secretary of the Society of Antiquaries on the

17th Jan. 1798, and it was published in their Vetusta Monumenta, accompanied by four Plates, on the 23rd April,

1799. The first and second of these Plates represent the bronze helmet in its actual size as seen in profile and front;

Plate II. its scull-piece expanded so as to show the whole of the figures of warriors in relief upon it; and Plate IV.

represents several of the minor antiquities which also occur upon Dr. Whitaker's plates.
Of those two Plates the present Editors now attempt to supply the explanation which has hitherto been deficient.
PLATE I. 1. Four circular plates, considered by Dr. Whitaker to have formed a Vexillum. They are also engraved

in Vetusta Monumenta, IV. pi. iv. figs. 1, 2, 3, 4, with the reverses of two, that have four rings or loops; but they are

all of one size, viz. 4 inc. diatn. Mr. Townley thus describes them: " Four circular plates, 4 inc. in diameter, with a

moulding at the border. They are gently hollowed, and in every respect resemble the form of the patera without a

handle; they had also no doubt the usual protuberance in the centre, as the nail, or the hole of the nail, that held

something which is wanting, remains in the centre of each of them. On the back of these plates are loops for fastening

them occasionally to whatever they were applied, by strings or straps. Their resemblance to the paterae which formed

one kind of Roman military standards, and their being found together with a helmet in a Roman military station, are

sufficient grounds to decide that they served for that purpose. Upon the Trajan Column, engraved by Bartoli in

plates xxxviii., xli., and xliii., where standards of this kind appear, the paterae are of the same form, and bear the same

proportion in size to the human heads, as these do."
2. The back and front of another circular plate. There were three of these, which Mr. Townley thus describes:

" Three circular plates, about 1| inc. diam., of the same form as those last mentioned, but from their small size, and

the addition of a hinge, with the remains of a tongue, they appear to have been fibula?, or buckles to fasten the toga,

the paludamentum, or the chlamys at the shoulder. Such kinds of fibulas are often seen upon ancient busts and

statues. See Gori, Museum Etruscwn, i. tab. 140." Engraved in Vetusta Monumenta, fig. 7.
3. The bronze helmet, back and front. Upon this subject Mr. Townley's dissertation is of great length, occupying

seven large folio pages. He describes it, "A helmet, divided into two pieces, one of which is the skull part, ornamented with

figures of eleven combatants on foot and six on horseback ; the other part is the mask or vizor to cover the face, which has

very effeminate features, and joins exactly to the skull part, to which it was fastened by rings and studs, some of which

still remain. The beauty of the features, the excellent work of the figures in relief, and more particularly the sharp

edges and lines with which the eyebrows, eyelids, and lips are marked after the manner of Grecian art preceding the

Caesars, denote this mask to have been executed some centuries before the headpiece, the coarse and heavy work of

which corresponds with that of the artists employed in the reign of Severus, and particularly with the sculptures upon

his arch at Rome. The mask measures 10| inches from the skull -piece to the bottom under the chin. On a row of

small locks of hair a little above the eyes rests the bottom of a diadem or tutulus, 2j inches high at the centre and 1 J

inches at the ends. The lower part represents a wall divided into seven parts by projecting turrets, with openings for

weapons. In the middle division are two arched doors, and one in each of the end divisions. The upper part of the diadem

had seven embossed figures under seven arches, the abutments of which are heads of genii. The central arch and its

figure are destroyed, but the other six arches are filled by a repetition of the following three groups : a Venus sitting

upon a marine monster, before her a draped figure with wings bearing a wreath and a palm branch, and behind her a

triton, whose lower parts terminate in tails of fish. Two serpents are represented on each side of the face near the

ears, their bodies surrounding each cheek and joining under the chin." This mask Mr. Townley believes to represent

the goddess Isis, who, according to Apuleius and other ancient writers, comprehends all the female deities, in her

generating, preserving, and destroying capacities as the Dea Triformis. The first is referred to by Venus attended as

usual by marine deities, the second by the walls and turrets, and the third by the face of the Gorgon Medusa, who held

among the three Gorgons the same malefic character as Hecate, among the three Dianas, and is often represented as

handsome and even joyous. A helmet thus composed ia honour of the Magna Mater was a proper appendant in Roman

PL, I

trsatfi.

'

ic i:rliil>,'iitfin (fitasdani HpHKitiar I'rtujtnrij iv/iifin'a,r iiiajjixi <:r />wnlei/ Ann:

- .l/i/i/ii/mi/'ni/ii Lmrfincnsi . /vv/cv/.V cl olijtruatititt bntamiutu ffrw/ia,dicat Soda/it obseattfnti&itnMf T.f). Wbttnkrr.

BOOK I. CHAP. II.]

ROMAN HISTORY.

helmet was found) from the depredations of the Bibble, at the distance of forty or fifty

yards below, and almost opposite to the parish church of Ribchester (at about a yard

beneath the surface), several fragments of flagstone, each containing Roman characters.

This led to further investigation, and when all the pieces were put together, like a dissected

map, they produced this fine but very difficult and still mutilated inscription :

camps, which, as well as the Circensian games, were placed under her particular protection. She is even called, on the

medals of the elder Faustina, the Mater Castrorum. The altar found at Ribchester dedicated to the De

are supposed to be Juno, Cybele, and Ceres, shows this to be only another of the many names of the trinity com-

prised in Isis.

Another theory, however, was advanced by the Rev. Stephen Weston, B.D. F.S.A. in a paper on this helmet

addressed to the Society of Antiquaries, and printed in the Archseologia, vol. xii. He considers that the mask or visor

was intended to represent Bacchus, who was called &tvr)s and ><^o'p0os, partaking of both sexes, and remarks that it

accords more perfectly with a head of Bacchus on a coin of Thasos, than with Cybele or Isis, or even Medusa.

When perfect this helmet must have been equal in beauty to those in the museum at Portici, which are considered

the finest known, and Mr. Townley believes that it is the only ancient example having a vizor imitating so exactly the

human features. He is of opinion that it was not destined for actual wear, but only for a trophy erected at military

festivals or carried in processions. Such trophies are seen on medals ; and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, comparing the

styles of Demosthenes and Plato, says that they differ as much as arms made for war do from those made for processions

(De vi dicend. in Dem. 22), which proves that arms of the latter sort were lighter and more ornamented than the

former, like this helmet, which is exceedingly ornamented and too flimsy for defence. There seems, says Mr. Townley,

to be nothing remarkable in the combatants on the skull-piece. At the time of the Antonines, the Romans had adopted

in addition to their original oval and oblong-square shields, the oblong-hexagonal used by the Parthians and other

barbarous nations. The armour and caparisons are the same as the Roman of the second and third centuries.

4. A sickle-shaped fragment, not described by Mr. Townley.
5. A colum, or colander, which Mr. Townley describes as " about six inches in diameter, and near four in depth;

in good preservation, with its perforations unusually large and of an elaborate design." There were also parts of two

others, exactly alike. Engraved, in its real size, Vet. Mon. pi. iv. fig. 8.
VOL. I. F

34 HISTORY OF WHALLEY. [BOOK I. CHAP II.

To explain this in order: the characters is. DN. ET CASTR. sv. can have no other

meaning than Matris Domini Nostri et Castrorum suorum. Now the empresses this

distinguished were, the elder Faustina, Julia Pia the wife of Severus, Julia Mammaea, and

Julia Otacilia the wife of the elder Philip. For the first of these the character of this

inscription is far too modern, besides that IVLI are visible upon the stone. It must there-

fore be one of the Julias. Julia Mossa was described as Mater CCNN. et Castrorum, in

reference to Caracalla and Geta. For Julia Mammsea, written at length, I find, upon

another trial with compasses, that there is not room on the black space, where a fragment

has been lost. The last, though her son was for a short time Augustus, would probably

have been described as the wife, not mother, of the reigning emperor. Julia Pia, or Domna,

the wife of Severus, alone remains, for whose addition there is exactly space enough on the

stone.
I have now therefore to retract my conjecture made in a former work, 1 that this Mater

Castrorum was Julia Mammoca, and consequently that the title of the emperor, Dominus
C. " A bust of Minerva, attached to a circular disk, three inches in diani. with the remains of the nails and cramps

which served to fasten it, as an ornament, probably of a lectisternium or tripod. It is of coarse work. An ornament

of this kind is engraved in Caylus, Recueil d'Antiquite's, vol. i. pi. Ixxi." Engraved in Vet. Mon. fig. 5.
All these antiquities are now preserved in the British Museum.
The silver Arm, also represented in this Plate, is described hereafter in p. 45.
PLATE II. The vessel at the head of this plate is thus described by Mr. Townley: "An ansated patera 5J inc. diam.

and 1 inch deep, well preserved. The borders, inside and outside, are ornamented with parallel and perpendicular

lines, which at the first had the appearance of letters."
The " bronze patera, 7J inc. diam." at the foot of the Plate, is restored, for the greater part of its basin was

wanting. There was also the rim and the handle of a third patera, 6 inc. diam. of which the basin was destroyed.

Five bronze vessels of the same kind were found at the Castle Howard estate in Yorkshire in 1856, and are engraved

in the Arch&olor/ia, vol. xli. pi. xv. accompanied by a memoir by Edmund Oldfield, esq. M.A. F.S.A. who considers

that they were used for measuring out wine. Two others found in 1841 in the parish of Masham, co. York, are pre-

served in the museum at Swinton Park, and were exhibited to the Archaeological Institute at York in 1846, on which

occasion they were described as " two patella, or skillets, of bronze, the inner side tinned, supposed to have been culinary

vessels. They have flat handles, perforated at the extremity for suspension. The bottom is of considerable thickness,

and ornamented with deeply-cut concentric hollows and raised mouldings, formed by the lathe." These were somewhat

smaller than those found at Eibchester: and on the handle of one is an impressed pattern, composed of a thyrsus, vine-

leaves, and tendrils. (These ornaments favour Mr. Oldfield's view of the use of such vessels.) A fine example, found

at Prickwillow in the Isle of Ely, is figured in the Archasologia, vol. xi. pi. viii. ; a pair, found near Dumfries, in vol.

xi. pi. viii.; and another, of silver, found near Capheaton, Northumberland (and now in the British Museum), in vol.

xv. pi. xxiii. See also Montfaucon, torn. iii. pi. Ixiv.

The basin of bronze resembles some engraved in Gori, Museum Etruscum, vol. i. pi. xii. and xiii. It was not so

perfect as it is represented.

The next is the earthen vessel which Dr. Whitaker has described in the text. The part lightly shaded is intended

to show where the edge is lowered in order to afford a spout in pouring out liquid. A similar vessel with a different

potter's mark is engraved in the Archceologia, vol. xii. pi. li.
The vase is a restoration of a vessel of which the only remains were the bottom and part of its sides. " It appears

(writes Mr. Townley) to have been about 10 inc. in diameter and 15 in height; was highly finished, the polish still

remaining in the inside, and the metal has a line of silver, similar to that of which the ancient mirrors were made."
The Celt, found at Read in Lancashire, which is the last article in the Plate, is also in the British Museum.]
1 [.. the 3rd edition of the History of Whalley, at p. 18.]

PL. II

Paf-em ffJirr, / :,'.', 2>i. ': i/in/ii.

Cc/ttl Incbae frtie: found at Seed iti Lancashire

',1ml,,,,, /,///,,

contervatut.

,///,, f.rbilwtfin qita,n/,i/,i Koinamr i-fhi,flntit irli.finn.f mnmia e.r /xnte infrr mdfm (','irii iv/x-rhis ,-t in J///.>VY> Catv/i Tmmtty

ut. S,>ei,'lnw, L,>iil>.mv,intinr/?n">'K<' ,<>'/>'> ,'/''" f X

BOOK I. CHAP. II.]

ROMAN HISTORY.

35

Noster, referred to Alexander Severus. Another reason is this : a fragment of the upper-

most line, excepting that containing the name of the divinity to whom the whole was

dedicated, still remains. Now this must have contained the name of the emperor ; hut in

this precise situation, instead of any distinct characters, there appear to he some slight

vestiges of letters industriously erased. These must surely have heen part of M. Aurel.

Antoninus Aug. If, in the next place, any antiquary should doubt whether Caracalla

was ever entitled Dominus Noster, I must tell him that the question has been satisfactorily

answered in the affirmative by Horsley (p. 350. Cumberland 44).

The next difficulty occurs on the violent contraction of PRAEPN. ET BEG., after a most

attentive consideration of which, I can assign no other sense to the words than prcepotenti

mtmini et reginee. And here again I expect to be met with the objection that Begina

generally, if not exclusively, applies to Juno. But when the discovery of the brazen head

of Minerva, 1 almost under the wall of this temple, is taken into the account, and that Luna

or Diana is also styled Eegna by Horace, I think it will be admitted that, while there is no

analogy against it, circumstances are so strongly in favour of a dedication to Minerva, as

hardly to admit of any other rational interpretation. With these explanations, therefore,

the inscription may be read as follows :
DEAE MINERVAE
PRO SALVTE IMP M AVREL ANTOXIXI AVG ET

IVLI PIAE MATRIS DN ET CASTR SVOR ET

VAL CRESCENTIS FVLVIANI LEG EIVS PP PR PR

T FLORIDVS NATALIS LEG PRAEP N ET REGINAE

TEMPLVM A SOLO EX RESPONSV RE-

STITVIT ET DEDICAVIT.

Or more at length,
Dese Minervse Pro Salute Imperatoris Marci Aurelii Antonini Augusti et Juliae Pise matris domini

nostri et castrorum suorum, et Valerii Crescentis Fulviani Legati, provincise prsesidis, proprtetore, Titus

Floridus Natalis legatus prsepotenti numini et reginse templum a solo ex responsu restituit et dedicavit.
On the whole this inscription is extremely valuable, as it adds one if not two names

(for Natalis was probably the successor of Fulvianus in the province) to the catalogue of

Imperial Legates in Britain. There is, however, before the second LEG. something like a

centurial mark, which would have reduced Natalis to a very inferior rank, had it not been

turned the wrong way, and that the name of the legion is omitted. In addition to these

remarks, I have only to observe the superstitious fondness of the Romans for names of

good omen : Valerius Crescentius in the first designation, and Titus Floridus Natalis in the

second, being all adopted with an anxious regard to that circumstance.

But to return. This sufficiently proved the existence of a temple, of which the

inscription must have formed the tympanum. Accordingly, in the summer of 1813, leave

having been obtained to dig into the adjoining gardens, betwixt the river and the church-
1 [Dr. Whitaker here applies this description to the helmet.]

36 HISTORY OF \VHALLEY. [Boon I. CHAP. II.

yard, the first appearances, at the depth of about three feet, were a stratum of charcoal,

evidently formed by the conflagration of the roof, and nearly in the centre a cavity in

the earth had been made, by the uniting of the ends of the beams at their fall, large

enough to contain a man sitting. Beneath this was a confused mass of large amphora?,

some almost entire at first, 1 and many beautiful remnants of paterse in the red Samian

ware, mingled with which lay several human skeletons, all of the largest size, in every

direction. Every appearance about the place indicated that it had been taken by storm,

and that the defenders had been buried in the ruins of the roof ; but the absence of tiles

or slates seemed to prove that the outer covering of the building had been previously

stripped by the assailants. Here too was found a very curious Roman statera, or steel-

yard, very exactly graduated, and a singular bodkin of polished stone.
The progress of discovery was now once more suspended, till (a few months afterwards)

the sexton, digging a grave where no interment had taken place before, on the left hand

of the entrance of the churchyard, found the base of a column and an anta or square-

moulded corner of the naos itself, upright and in their original situations. Measurements

were now accurately made from the place where the inscription was found, which must

have been the front of the building, to the base of the column. This gave the entire length,