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ANCIENT BRITISH SKULL.
EROM GEAVE AT NORTON NEAR MALTON, E. R. YORKSHIRE.
(MALTON, THE KOMAN DELGOVITIA ?*, ]?MST TO FIFTH CENTURY A,D.)
Cranium from Roman grave at Norton near Maltón.—Quarter-size.
IN making excavations for a new school at Norton, close to Maltón, in the year 1852, some
Roman graves were opened at a depth of about four feet. The remains of three bodies were met
with, laid at fuU length and side by side, with the heads towards the west. On the breast of
that one to which the skull Kthographed belonged was a bronze fibula. This ornament was of
the bow-shape. It had a cruciform head, formed by a transverse bar, having a knob at each
endt. EibulsB of tliis form have been met with in Scotland and Erance, as well as England,
some of them in gold. They are considered to be late Roman, not earlier than the fourth or fifth
century J.
* The late learned historian of Roman York, commenting
upon the difficult question of the name of the Station at Maltón
and the various solutions that have been offered, concludes his
remarks by saying, "i t must be confessed that, considerable as
the station appears to have been, the Roman name of it is unknown."—
Wellbeloved's Eburacum, or York under the Romans,
1842, p. ICO. The suggestion of Dr. Cortis (Rep. Phil.
Soc. of Scarborough, 1858, p. 24), that Maltón is Delgovitia,
and that Filey, where extensive Roman remains were discovered
in 1857, is Praetorium, has much to recommend it, and, that
which is most important, the accordance of the distances with
those in the Itinerary, viz. Eburacum to Derventio (Stamford
Bridge) VII., to Delgovitia (Maltón) XIII. to Praetorium
(Filey) XXV.
t See the highly wrought gold example discovered in Scot-
37.
land, represented in the Proc. Soc. Antiq., vol. ii. p. 85. Another
golden one found in Hampshire, now in the British Museum,
is figured in the Archaeological Journal, vol. ii. p. 46.
See also the figure of one of bronze found in Cambridgeshire,
ibid. vol. xi. p. 230.
X The Nortonfibnla resembled onefigured in plate 15, Journal
of the British Archaeological Association, vol. x., and found in
Ratcliff Highway, London, 1852. Other examples have been
discovered at Richborough, Kenchester (Antiquities of Richborough,
Reculver and Lymne, by C. Roach Smith, 1850,
figs. p. 81, 83), and in London (Illustrations of Roman London,
by C. Roach Smith, 1859, pi. 33. fig. 9). That found
at the Roman cemetery at Aniferes on the Seine has a Latui
motto on the bow.