Roman Intaglios Discovered in Bath Drain in England

Taking your valuables with you into a swimming pool is always a risk. The Romans should have paid better heed, judging from the quantity of gemstones recovered from the drain of one of their bathhouses.

As many as 30 semi-precious stones have been discovered by archaeologists almost 2,000 years after their owners lost them at a site in modern-day Carlisle, just behind Hadrian’s Wall.

The stones had dropped out of their ring settings, their glue probably weakened in the steamy baths. They were simply flushed into the drains when the pools and saunas were cleaned.

Their loss would have been painful as these were engraved gems, known as intaglios. Although barely a few millimetres in diameter, they bear images whose extraordinary craftsmanship suggests they would have been expensive items in their day – the late 2nd century or 3rd century.

One bather lost an amethyst depicting Venus, holding either a flower or a mirror. Another lost a red-brown jasper featuring a satyr seated on rocks next to a sacred column.

Frank Giecco, an expert on Roman Britain who is leading the bathhouse excavation, was astonished by the collection: “It’s incredible,” he said. “It’s caught everyone’s imagination. They were just falling out of people’s rings who were using the baths. They were set with a vegetable glue and, in the hot and sweaty bathhouse, they fell out of the ring settings.”

He can imagine the Romans cursing after realising their loss. “They may not even have noticed until they got home because it’s the actual stone falling out of the rings – although we’ve also found one ring with a setting.”

Professor Martin Henig, an expert on Roman art at the University of Oxford, said: “Metal expands. If the stone is not properly secured, it can fall out, as it can today with people bathing. I imagine that the gems recovered from the drain were accumulated over time, and we must remember that a lot of people used those baths.”

Intaglios have previously been recovered from drains at York and at Caerleon near Newport. The Romans faced the dilemma we still face today of either losing their valuables in the water or to a sneak thief while they were bathing. This is reflected in several “curse tablets” found in Bath and elsewhere, which wished revenge on the perpetrators of such crimes.

One of those curses targets a ring thief: “So long as someone, whether slave or free, keeps silent or knows anything about it, he may be accursed in blood, and eyes and every limb and even have all intestines quite eaten away if he has stolen the ring.”

Henig said: “The difficulty is that you needed to take your ring off, but there were dangers. Where did you leave it? People must have been very upset when they lost a ring or the gem set in its bezel.”

The bathhouse was adjacent to the most important Roman fort on Hadrian’s Wall, the empire’s northern frontier, which held an elite cavalry unit and had links to the imperial court. Excavations will continue next year, but the evidence recovered so far – including imperial-stamped tiles – suggests that the bathhouse complex was monumental and opulent.

Giecco said: “You don’t find such gems on low-status Roman sites. So they’re not something that would have been worn by the poor.”

Beyond their decorative purposes, as rings worn by men and women, there was a symbolism within their imagery. The newly discovered intaglios include military themes, such as the god Mars holding a spear, and fertility, notably a charming image of a mouse nibbling a branch – Romans saw mice as symbols of rebirth or fertility.

Giecco said: “Some of the intaglios are minuscule, around 5mm ; 16mm is the largest intaglio. The craftsmanship to engrave such tiny things is incredible.”

The drain discoveries also include more than 40 women’s hairpins and 35 glass beads, probably from a necklace.

Victorian-Era Lead Coffin Unearthed at Leicester Cathedral

Excavations at Leicester Cathedral have uncovered the lead coffin of a surgeon at the city’s Victorian asylum.

Edward Entwistle Wilkinson’s remains were unearthed in a dig by University of Leicester archaeologists.

The find triggered research into his life and career as the first resident medical officer at the Leicestershire and Rutland County Lunatic Asylum.

Academics found he had made “a significant contribution” to modern medicine in the city.

The university team found Wilkinson’s coffin while they were digging in the area of the cathedral’s song school, which has been demolished to make way for a new visitor centre as part of the continuing Leicester Cathedral Revealed project.

It was among more than 1,000 burials so far revealed by the archaeologists in rows which were in use from the late 1820s to the closure of the cemetery in 1856.

Amber Furmage, from University of Leicester Archaeological Services (ULAS), discovered Wilkinson, who lived from 1796 to 1846, was a house surgeon and apothecary at the Leicester Infirmary and the first resident medical officer of the then newly opened county asylum.

The asylum building would later become the first University of Leicester campus and is now called Fielding Johnson Building.

During his 17 years in the role, he expanded the dispensary, improved the medicinal planting in the hospital’s garden and helped procure an Infirmary Carriage for Accidents.

At the asylum, his peers praised his talents and conduct and “his ability and tenderness in the treatment of patient”.

Wilkinson died from typhus fever in July 1846 aged 50.

A plaque in the great south aisle of the cathedral was dedicated to him and his wife Elizabeth.

Ms Furmage said: “The discovery of a named individual is always exciting due to the amount of information we can track down about their lives, and this has been particularly true in the case of Edward Entwistle Wilkinson.

“Over his lifetime, he made significant contributions to the development of modern medicine in Leicester, leaving a lasting impact on the city and beyond.”

The remains will be reinterred by Leicester Cathedral once the project is completed.

Rare Iron Age Wooden Axle Discovered in England

Part of an “exceptionally rare” Iron Age wooden axle from a chariot or cart has been found in a waterlogged pit.

The fragment was uncovered in 2021 at Eastbridge, Suffolk, ahead of tree planting for the Sizewell C nuclear power station project.

Recent analysis revealed the hazel wood axle was made between 400BC and 100BC.

Archaeologist Chris Fern said it joins a handful of finds “from British later prehistory, such as the axle found at Flag Fen, Peterborough”.

The dig unearthed two Iron Age pits, which experts believe were most likely used as watering holes for livestock.

As they were waterlogged, they provided “ideal preservation conditions for wood”, said Mr Fern, a Cotswold Archaeology post-excavation manager.

The base of the axle had been broken, burned and reused and was found with charred boards, which might also have come from the same chariot.

Mr Fern said: “Most of the spindle – for the wheel hub – survives, as well as part of the rectangular axle-bed which would have been secured to the underside of the cart or chariot.”

The fragment has just been identified through analysis by dendrochronologist Michael Bamforth, a research associate at the University of York.

The axle had been repurposed in ancient times to prevent the collapse of the waterhole into the site’s sandy soil, Mr Fern said.

He added the axle” is an “exceptionally rare find”, which can “be viewed in the context of the famous chariot burials of the Iron Age in Britain, such as those from Wetwang, East Riding of Yorkshire”.

Mesolithic Human Remains Discovered in Northern England

Human remains unearthed in a cave in Cumbria have been dubbed the “oldest northerner” after being found to date back 11,000 years.

Bone and a shell bead discovered at Heaning Wood Bone Cave, near Great Urswick, were analysed by the University of Central Lancashire.

Dr Rick Peterson said the site had been used for burials.

He described it as evidence of “some of the earliest dates for human activity” in northern Britain after the Ice Age.

The site had been excavated since 2016 by local archaeologist Martin Stables with the university brought in to “try to interpret the evidence”.

Dr Peterson, who teaches archaeology and cultural anthropology, led the academic team.

He said several bodies from the cave had been dated and the group was amazed when one set of remains was found to be much older than thought.

“The caves have been dug before, in the 1950s, and work by Liverpool John Moores University about 10 years ago dated some of the material to the early Bronze Age [about 4,000 years ago].

“There were at least eight people buried in this cave. Some of them came back [dated] from the Bronze Age, some of them were Neolithic which is about 6,000 years ago.

“One individual and one piece of shell bead buried with him came back with a date roundabout 11,000 years ago which is astonishingly early for the north.

“To put it in perspective, the last Ice Age lasted until about 11,600 years ago. After that period, the global temperature warmed rapidly over about 100 years to give us the climate we’ve got today.

“These people are just about as early as we could expect them to be – the pioneers reoccupying the land after the Ice Age.”

Earlier human remains have been discovered in southern England and Wales but the destructive effect of past glaciations means such finds are rare in northern Britain, the university said.

Before this discovery, the “earliest northerner” was a 10,000-year-old burial from the nearby Kent’s Bank Cavern discovered in 2013.