THE GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE. MAY, 1831. ORIGINAL COMMUNICATIONS. NOTES ON THE EXCAVATIONS FOR THE NEW LONDON BRIDGE. (Resumed from p. 197.) LONDON was formerly furnished with a wall and towers on the south side, but the mighty fish-abounding Thames in its flux and reflux to and from the sea, has undermined and thrown them down. Such is the substance of Fitz Stephen's assertion relative to the ancient boundary of London on the river side. This early Chronicler of the City's fame was born in the time of King Stephen, wrote in the reign of Henry II. and died A. D. 1191, under that of Richard I. He was therefore likely enough to have heard by tradition that such a fortification of the southern side of the City had existed in the Roman times; and a massy vallum reared by that nation did certainly I believe exist; not, however, to be ruined and swept away by the assaults of Neptune and Father Thames, but to repel their insults, and confine their sway within due bounds. This vallum was not a wall in the accepted meaning of the latter word in our language. Vallum in the Latin tongue may be extended, I conceive, to mean any rampire formed by piles or stakes; in short, any bulwark (vallum), vallatum, vallis, between all which words there is an easy and obvious connexion. Now had Fitz Stephen's vallum or wall been of stone, it is natural to suppose, from the wellknown durability of ancient masonry, that some traces of its foundations would have been from time to time discovered in the prosecution of such public works as have necessarily made a section of the north bank of the Thames to the low water mark; nay, which have probed the very bed of the river, but without any such re sult. What then could be this wall, of which the honest monk so confidently speaks? The information which I have liberally received from an intelligent eye witness,† who has accurately noted every thing that appeared most worthy of remark in the progress of the works of the new London Bridge, and who may I hope one day give them in a detailed form to the respectable and useful Society of which he is a member, will I think enable us to draw a pretty strong conclusion concerning the nature of Fitz Stephen's wall. In the deep excavations which have been made for the land arches of the new London Bridge across Thamesstreet, and through the site of St. Michael's Church, Crooked-lane, three distinct lines of embankment have been discovered at about twenty feet depth below the present surface of the streets. The first, on the spot now occupied by the south abutment of the Thames-street land arch, was composed of piles of oak and fir, and was backed with a quantity of Madrepore, which had been brought, I suppose, by ships as ballast, and thrown against the piles in that situation as rubbish to fill up a vacant space. The second line of embankment was formed under the north pier of the same land arch, and consisted of huge trunks of oak trees, very roughly squared by the axe, against which had been nailed, or rather spiked, the sort of sheathing used in facing wharfs, usually I believe called camp sheathing, but of the most ponderous and substantial character. There was yet a third embankment seventy feet inwards of this Similiterque ab austro Londonia turrita et murata fuit, sed fluvius maximus piscosus Thamesis mari influo refluoque qui illàc allabitur, monia illa tractu temporis alluit, labefactavit, dejecit.-Gulielm. Stephanides, De Firmitate Urbis. + W. Knight, esq. F.S.A. sub-architect of the New London Bridge. 388 Excavations for the New London Bridge. last, that is still more northward, the structure of which was not so massive and substantial. Now the first line, from the circumstance of the Madrepore, was without doubt a comparatively modern work; the second was, I apprehend, constructed by the Romans, and no other than that very vallum or bulwark, of which a vague tradition had reached Fitz Stephen's time; the third or innermost constituted, I suppose, a yet earlier line of defence against the waters, which were reduced by degrees to their present bounds by the conquerors and civilizers of nations. Dugdale, indeed, in his Treatise on Embanking and Draining, with the strongest appearance of truth, surmises that the embanking of our principal rivers was an operation of the Romans, who were most enterprising engineers. Now Llyn Dinas, ancient Lyndun, or London, the Hill Town on the Lake, must before the embankment of the Thames have peculiarly justified that appellation,-I speak rather in confirmation of this idea than claiming it as original. On the east side it had low marshy grounds, which every flood tide must have submerged, and the southern boundary of the broad expanse of waters which lay at the foot of this slight eminence must have been the hills of Peckham, Camberwell, and New Cross near Deptford thus unconfined and unobstructed in its progress, the flood tide would not only spread over a large surface, but from having no deep and compact column of water flowing from west to east to contend with, would rise much higher than at present. As the Romans proceeded with the work of embanking the Thames, this resisting column was created; the channel of the river, confined to a smaller space, deepened itself by the action and reaction of its tides, and the waters, which had formerly at high floods nearly laved the site of the Monument now on Fish-street Hill, were gradually fenced out, which operation : [May, would necessarily require, as ground was gradually gained, successive embankments. A strong proof of this is that the soil of the present Thamesstreet is that of a quagmire, and that hundreds of loads of solid materials have been sunk in it,* before the able architects of the new London Bridge would venture to place their abutments upon such a suspicious foundation. ↑ It is very natural to suppose that the operations which have been carried on in the bed of the river Thames for the construction of the new Bridge, would bring to light some testimony of a circumstantial nature, of the sacking of London by the spirited Boadicea, or Bonduca, wife of Prasutagus, King of the Iceni. While the profligate, the impious Nero was celebrating his juvenilia on account of his first being shaved! causing the hairs of his beard to be put into a golden box, and consecrating them, ridiculously enough, to Jupiter Capitolinus, making the aged attend the feasts of this farce, and join in the dance with the young; whilst he was singing as a harper, the fable of Acis and the Bacchantes, applauded by five thousand soldiers, stationed for the purpose in the theatre, who saluted him incomparable Cæsar, Apollo Pythicus; ‡— whilst he was engaging the Imperial City in these diversions, the dishonoured and incensed Queen of the Iceni, at the head of one hundred and twenty thousand of her countrymen, advanced to the ravage of the principal Roman colonies in the neighbourhood of her dominions, by fire and sword.§ The historians Tacitus and Dio usher in their accounts of this insurrection with the relation of prodigies which occurred at Camelodunum precursive of the event, as if it were a matter of too fearful importance to be passed over in an ordinary way. Thus we hear of howlings and lamentations in the empty theatre, of phantom coursers, and the appearance of a destroyed colony in the neighbouring * Din, the same as Dinas, a city. Its primary signification is a fortified hill or mount; hence the Roman terminations Dinum, Dinium, and Dunum. Dun in the Irish signifies a fort. See Antiq. Ling. Britann. Thesaurus, by Thos. Richards. + Information of W. Knight, esq. F.S.A. Dion. Cassius, by Xiphilin. § Jam primum uxor Boodicea verberibus affecta et filiæ stupro violatæ sunt. Tacit. Annal. lib. xiv. p. 360. edit. Elzevir. 1831.] New London Bridge.-St. Saviour's Church. æstuary.* Shakspeare has finely amplified on similar circumstances in his Julius Cæsar : "A lioness hath whelped in the streets, Fierce fiery warriors fight upon the clouds, 389 This I cannot think they are justified In this revolt, which was at length subdued by the generalship of Suetotonius Paulinus, Camelodunum, Verulam, and London were sacked, and above seventy thousand Romans or their allies put to death with all the cruelty of studied tortures. Such of the af- Allow me, Mr. Urban, before I confrighted Romans as were able to re- clude, to say a few words with regard move would naturally seek refuge on to the rumoured removal of the Lady the opposite shores of the river, into Chapel § at the east end of St. Saviour's which much of their treasure and Church, which would be indeed an household goods was probably thrown; act of the grossest barbarism, and in accordingly the bottom of the Thames violation of every principle of taste or in the late excavations has afforded common sense. Had this appendage images of household gods, silver of the 13th century no other plea but keys, coins of Nero, and a closely its interior beauty, that would be sufparticular observation of the greater ficent to save it, but, added to this, it part of the relics and coins disco- has important historical associations, vered, † would I think be found which I need not particularize, dear further to confirm this suggestion. to every member of the Protestant This great calamity of the Roman co- community. The removal of the lonists may serve also to explain the Chapel of Bishop Andrews was judimarks of a dense population in the cious, let the traces of the aperture Roman times, which have been found which was broken through for that in the borough of Southwark; to edifice be effaced, and let the Lady such an extent indeed as to induce Chapel resume its primitive external some antiquaries to transfer ancient appearance of four high pointed roofs, Londinium to that side of the water. twelve lancet windows united in * I think I am justified in understanding that the Camelodunum mentioned by Dio and Tacitus, must have been some place in the immediate neighbourhood of an arm of the sea, and not very remote from the Straits of Calais. I apprehend it is rightly placed, by Camden and others, in Essex. Let any one examine the 9th Iter of Antoninus, from Venta Icenorum, the capital of the Iceni, to London, and he will see that Camelodunum would by that route be in the line of march of Bonduca from her capital on London. Notwithstanding the obvious pretensions of Maldon drawn from the affinity of its name, I should be inclined to agree with those who fix it at Colchester, where such numerous vestiges of Roman antiquity exist. There was certainly, I believe, another Camelodunum in the West, which may have increased the perplexity of antiquaries on this contested point. + I have in my possession one of Nero, 3d brass, found in the new Bridge works; obverse, Nero.. Reverse, the temple of Janus; a square building, one side seen in perspective, in which is a gate closed. Legend, JANVM CLVSIT PACE PR: (i. e. Populo Romano,) VBIQ. PARTA.-S. c. I have also a silver key, found deep in the bed of the river at the same place, which has been already engraved in your vol. xcvIII. i. p. 17. In the late excavations for the Southwark approaches of the new Bridge, one of the labourers told me they found Roman coins much more plentiful than on the London side, to use his own expression, "as thick as hops." § Mr. Knight, who has in the most friendly manner imparted to me several curious particulars relative to the excavations, has furnished me with a singular fact relative to the demolition of the old houses near this Chapel. Under the ground floor of one of these, they discovered four uncoffined human skeletons, probably of persons murdered in the notorious Winchester Stews. Mr. Knight possesses the jaw-bone of one of these, evidently of a young adult, being furnished with a most beautiful and perfect row of teeth. 390 St. Saviour's Church.-St. Martin's-le-Grand. threes, and separated by buttresses at the proper intervals, with as many corresponding shorter windows of the same class in an upper range,-all which may be done at a very small expense. To remove this building, would be to destroy the effect of magnitude given to the body of the Church by comparison with it, and to make the latter appear awkwardly short. In the interior of the Church I would point out the imperative necessity of opening the ceiling under the square tower, so that its internal sides should be made visible as high as the original architects intended; removing something which has now the appearance of a piece of old oil-cloth most improperly stopping up an elegantly designed aperture. The curious Saxo-Norman door near the west returning angle of the north transept, should certainly be restored; it is a specimen almost unique in its way, and the similarity of its honey-suckle pattern with that of the coffin of Gundrada, daughter of William the Conqueror, places its antiquity by indubitable characteristics at a coeval period.* Lastly, I again repeat, that, as connected with the effect of the entrance to the City of London over the magnificent new bridge, the complete restoration of this fine old building on principles of good taste, should be made a matter of public cost; it must otherwise be an undertaking as burthensome to the parish of St. Saviour, as the repair of a cathedral church; and as the architectural decoration of a conspicuous object in the Metropolis is concerned, the expense would be very unjustly thrown on so small a portion of the community. In allusion to what has been said by a Correspondent in your last number, concerning the antiquity of the ancient piers of the crypt which was demolished for the erection of the new Post Office, and which are delineated and described in my Historical Notices of St. Martin le Grand, 1 have only to observe, that I always clearly distinguished them from the vaultings of brick in connexion with them, which certainly were of the time [May, of Edward VI. being appendages of A. J. K. See Gough's Sepulchral Monuments for a plate of Gundrade's tomb, and the Gentleman's Magazine for April 1829, for one of the door at St. Saviour's. 1831.] St. Katharine's Hospital near the Tower. Mr. URBAN, May 5. AMONG the additional MSS. in the British Museum, are preserved three documents relative to the Hospital of St. Katharine's near the Tower, the history of which has become interesting from its removal to the Regent's Park. These papers were unknown to Dr. Ducarel, when he wrote his valuable work on the Hospital, nor have they been noticed in the recent account extracted from his volume, and presented to the public in a more accessible form. The first is entitled "St. Catherine's Hos pitall. A short State from Mich'as 1698 to Mich'as 1707," containing an account of the annual revenue of the Hospital, and its appropria 391 tion according to the decree of the "St. Catherine's Hospitall neare the Tower of London is an antient Royall foundac'on, composed of a Master, three Brothers [clergymen], three Sisters [widdows and gentlewomen] and tenne Beadeswomen [poore and aged people]. By the deprivac'on of Sr James Butler, late Master of the said Hospitall at Mich'mas 1698, on the visitac'on of the late Lord Chancellor So- "All the lands, tenemts, and heredit'ts, belonging to the said Hospitall, are in the places and (then were) at the ancient rents following (viz.): Middlesex and London.-Fryer Mead in Stepney Severall houses in and neare St. Catharine's precinct...248 8 4 £347 9 4 The improved vallue of all the estates (as in the hands of the tenants) belonging to the Hospitall, over and above the reserved rents, were computed to be per annum .£5239 7 3 "At present are-Dr. Verney, Mr. Bissett, and Mr. Ley, Brothers;—Mrs. Eagle, Mrs. Streete, and Mrs. Holloway, Sisters." ... The paper then proceeds to state the several sums paid by the Master out of the said reserved rent of 3471. 98. 4d. namely, to the Brothers of the Hospital 81. per annum each, to the eldest Sister 11., and to the two others 81. each, to the ten beadswomen 41. each, the High Steward a salary of 21., the High Bailiff 21., the organist 181., the organ bellows blower 21., the Chapel Clerk 21., the Surveyor General 10., the Receiver General 67. 13s. 4d. ; to the same for printed sermons, pens, ink, and paper 21., and the taxes 491. 10s., making a total of 1857. 38. 4d., "whereby the Master hath to himself the remaining 1621. 68." * MSS. Add. *5017, f. 79. "The History of the Royal Hospital and Collegiate Church of St. Katharine," &c. 4to. Lond. 1782. [No. V. of the Bibl. Top. Brit.] "History of the Royal Hospital and Collegiate Church of St. Katharine," &c. 4to, 1824. ... ... After this follow the directions of the Lord Chancellor, that the rents should be increased, and out of such increase. the salaries or stipends should be augmented, viz. the Beads women from 41. to 8., the Brothers from 81. to 401., and the Sisters to 201. a year each. This had been partly carried into effect. In addition, it was ordered that as all former Masters of the Hospital enjoyed the whole of the fines on the renewal of leases, so for the future they should only take a third part, and of the other two-thirds, one part should be shared by the Brothers and Sisters, and the other go towards the repairs of the building and incidental charges. It is then stated that the fines from Michaelmas 1698 to Michaelmas 1707, being nine years, amounted to the sum of 28251. 10s. 6d. of which the third part, 9411. 168. 10d. had been taken by the Master, another third by the Brothers and Sisters, and the last (together with about 2001. more, still |