Excavations were carried out by the Verulamium Excavation Committee, on behalf of the Research Committee of this Society, for a fourth season lasting 7½ weeks in July and August 1958. Work was confined to two areas. The plan of the extra-mural building (Site S) north-east of Verulamium on the opposite side of the river, beside the A5 road, was recovered in so far as affected by the new road which is soon to cover it; the remainder of the work was devoted towards completing the plans of, and obtaining the fullest information about, sites in Insulae XIV and XXVIII, which had been already partly explored in 1957. Those parts are already sealed under the new road; if the Committee fails to explore the remainder of such buildings, in so far as they extend outside the area of the new road, before pegs and landmarks disappear it will never be possible to complete the plans accurately. In view of the importance of most of the buildings which need further treatment in this way, it is to be hoped that support will not fail before the work is done.

One of the most spectacular pieces of martial equipment in use among the Celtic peoples in the later stages of the La Tène culture was the animal-headed war-trumpet, the name of which, in Greek versions, has been preserved variously as karnon or karnyx. In the latter form, the name carnyx has been applied by archaeologists to the fairly plentiful representations and the very few surviving fragments of such instruments. Of the latter, the best-known is that represented today only by drawings and engravings, dredged from the river Witham at Tattershall Ferry in 1768. It is the purpose of this paper to discuss this object once again, and also to put forward the suggestion that the sheet-bronze object in the form of a boar's head, found at the beginning of the nineteenth century at Deskford in Banffshire and fortunately still surviving, is in fact the mouthpiece of another carnyx.

The ‘enclosed hut-groups’, or native homesteads consisting of round or rectangular buildings within an enclosure, of N.W. Wales are well known and have been discussed by Ralegh Radford as well as by Hemp and myself. Caernarvonshire contains many examples of these farmsteads, but few have been excavated and the problems of their origin, date, and development are still numerous and perplexing. Howel Williams excavated two sites of this type near Rhostryfan in 1921–2, and these yielded Romano-British pottery and other objects datable to the second to fourth centuries A.D. Two hut-groups at Caerau, near Pant-glas, excavated by O'Neil in 1933–4, proved to have been occupied during the second and third centuries. This dating is in accord with what is known of similar sites in Anglesey, the best known of these being at Din Lligwy. On the other hand, a more recently excavated homestead in the island, at Pant-y-saer, has produced evidence of occupation during the earlier part of the dark ages.

In 1953 a bronze prick-spur was found without other remains, at a depth of about 2 ft. on Cleave Hill, in the parish of Longstock, Hants (no. 17, fig. 1, pl. XIV). The finder, Mr. J. Chandler, presented it to the Salisbury Museum (ace. 21/54) and it is recorded and illustrated in the Museum's Annual Report (1955), p. 11 pl. 1a.

It is of extremely delicate manufacture, and the riveted prick appears to be ornamental rather than useful. It is also ornamented with a row of dots in circles round the heel, and these are enclosed in expanding lines all engraved in the bronze. The edges are lightly serrated. The arms are engraved with a spiral line, which seems to imitate the leather binding of some rougher iron prototype. Delicate bronze rings, attached to the loops, have flattened ends which are pressed together and probably once held a light leather strap, though the bronze has broken away leaving only parts of the rivet holes. There are few ornamental features from which to date this spur, but according to Jahn's typology it should fall within the first Century A.D.

The course of the Roman road from London to York, today known as Ermine Street, is well attested. Much of it underlies our comparable modern trunk road, the Great North Road (A1), but there are many deviations. To review the East Midland sector, the modern road covers approximately the Roman road from Huntingdon to the south-east gate of the walled town DVROBRIVAE at Water Newton. Here the modern road bears more to the west and leaves the Roman line. This passes through the ancient town as its main street, crosses the river Nene and continues in the same line until, at a point some three miles south-east of Stamford, it bears more westerly, running west-north-west through Burghley Park. It crosses the Great North Road on the western boundary of the park, where it was exposed in 1732 and seen by Stukeley (1883, ii, 269). From this point its course alters to north-west and, after crossing the river Welland, it underlies a suburban road in the western part of Stamford and crosses the Empingham (Oakham) road (A606). North of this it is seen as a boldly-upraised ridge crossing several fields diagonally until, some three-quarters of a mile south-east of Great Casterton, it joins once again the line of the Great North Road and runs parallel to and immediately adjoining the south side of the modern roadway.

1. An ideal opportunity for making a detailed comparative study of ten of the royal effigies from Westminster Abbey was presented by their temporary assembly for cleaning purposes in the Undercroft.

2. It was possible to make a special examination of the backs of the figures as well as the parts usually exposed, and in the course of study two distinct methods of metal-casting were recognized, (a) a bell-founding technique similar to that described by Theophilus, and (b) a wax-cast technique.

3. Mercury, or fire-gilding, had been applied in all cases. In one instance chemical analysis of a silvery smear in the folds of the drapery showed it to be due to gold amalgam. There was no corrosion of the surrounding metal.

4. The colour of the gold surface was occasionally greenish, indicating that a base gold had been employed in making the amalgam. In other cases an artificial richness had been imparted, doubtless with the lapse of time, by the red cuprous oxide of the underlying base metal shining through the thin surface film.

5. Of the two wooden effigies examined, that of William de Valence showed more points of interest. The question as to whether there was indeed champlevé work in the enamelled ornament had to be left open, as it was considered impossible to answer without in a measure undoing something of the recent work of the restorer.