Roman Britain in 1914 | Page 6

in III; B, C, D, E. Wooden buildings in western part of fort; F, G, H, K. Stone buildings in eastern part)]
The few small finds included Samian of the late first and early second centuries (but no '29'), and a denarius of Trajan. In respect of date, they agree with the finds of last year and of 1865, and suggest that the fort was established under Domitian or Trajan, and abandoned under Hadrian or Pius; as an inscription of the Sixth Legion was found here in 1744, apparently in the baths, the evacuation cannot have been earlier than about A.D. 130. The occupation of Slack must therefore have resembled that of Castleshaw, which stands at the western end of the pass through the Pennine Hills, which Slack guards on the east. If this be so, an explanation must be discovered for two altars generally assigned to Slack. One of these, found three miles north of Slack at Greetland in 1597 among traces of buildings, is dated to A.D. 205 (CIL. vii. 200). The other, found two miles eastwards, at Longwood, in 1880 (Eph. Epigr. vii. 920), bears no date; but it was erected by an Aurelius Quintus to the Numina Augustorum, and neither item quite suits so early a date as the reign of Trajan. The dedication of the first is to the goddess Victoria--Vic(toria) Brig(antia)--that of the second deo Berganti (as well as the Numina Aug.); so that in each case a local shrine to a native deity may be concerned. It is also possible that a fort was built near Greetland, after the abandonment of Slack, to guard another pass over the Pennine, that by way of Blackstone Edge.
It is to be hoped that these interesting excavations may be continued and completed.
(xii) Holt. At Holt, eight miles south of Chester on the Denbighshire bank of the Dee, Mr. Arthur Acton has further explored the very interesting tile and pottery works of the Twentieth Legion, of which I spoke in my Report for 1913 (p. 15). The site is not even yet exhausted. But enough has been discovered to give a definite picture of it, and as it may perhaps not be possible to continue the excavations at present, and as the detailed report which Mr. Acton projects may take time to issue, I shall try here, with his permission, to summarize very briefly his most noteworthy results. I have to thank him for supplying me with much information and material for illustrations.
Holt combines the advantages of excellent clay for pottery and tile making,[3] good building stone (the Bunter red sandstone), and an easy waterway to Chester. Here the legion garrisoning Chester established, in the latter part of the first century, tile and pottery works for its own use and presumably also for the use of other neighbouring garrisons. Traces of these works were noted early in the seventeenth century, though they were not then properly understood.[4] In 1905 the late Mr. A. N. Palmer, of Wrexham, identified the site in two fields called Wall Lock and Hilly Field, just outside the village of Holt, and here, since 1906, Mr. Acton has, at his own cost, carefully and systematically carried out excavations.
[Footnote 3: A Bronze Age burial (fig. 6, D) suggests that the clay may have been worked long before the Romans.]
[Footnote 4: References are given by Watkin, Cheshire, p. 305, and Palmer, Archaeologia Cambrensis, 1906, pp. 225 foll.]
[Illustration: FIG. 5. ROMAN SITE NEAR HOLT
(1. Barracks?; 2. Dwelling and Bath-house; 3. Kiln; 4. Drying-room, &c. 5. Kilns; 6. Work-rooms?; 7. Clay-pits)]
The discoveries show a group of structures scattered along a bank about a quarter of a mile in length which stands slightly above the Dee and the often flooded meadows beside it (fig. 5). At the west end of this area (fig. 5, no. 1, and fig. 6) was a large rectangular enclosure of about 62 × 123 yards (rather over 1-1/2 acres), girt with a strong wall 7 feet thick. Within it were five various rows of rooms mostly 15 feet square, with drains; some complicated masonry (? latrines) filled the east end. This enclosure was not wholly explored; it may have served for workmen's barracks; the contents of two rubbish-pits (fig. 6, AA)--bones of edible animals, cherry-stones, shells of snails, and Dee mussels, potsherds, &c.--had a domestic look; mill-stones for grinding corn, including one bearing what seems to be a centurial mark, and fragments of buff imported amphorae were also found here. Between this enclosure and the river were two small buildings close together (fig. 5, no. 2 and fig. 7). The easternmost of these seems to have been a dwelling-house 92 feet long, with a corridor and two hypocausts; it may have housed the officer in charge of the potteries. The western building was a bath-house,