suggested that the very careful and painstaking manner in which the lead had been cut all round, indicates the work of one who wished to examine the contents with the smallest possible amount of damage to the coffins themselves. As the site is within three or four miles of Camerton, the home of the late Rev. John Skinner, whose antiquarian researches are well-known, it may possibly have been examined by that gentleman. I have recently spent some hours in searching through the MSS left by Mr. Skinner to the Bath Literary and Philosophical Institution, in the vain hope of finding some record of the discovery of a Roman sarcophagus at Farmborough. It is however quite possible, so extensive were Mr. Skinner's operations in this neighbourhood,11 that a record may yet turn up, giving particulars of the first discovery and contents of these coffins. There are, I believe, some of his MSS in the British Museum which may throw light on the subject.

As to the date of the interment, I may say that both Dr. Bruce, and the Rev. Prebendary Scarth consider it to be late Roman, while Mr. C. Roach Smith, F.S.A., inclines to the opinion that the remains are "early post Roman." The last-named antiquary writes: "the leaden coffin is made not unlike the Roman, but void of any ornamentation. Moreover, Roman interments of this kind are usually accompanied with funereal vessels and other objects. The name of the field, Hobbs's Wall, is suggestive of antiquity. Is there any history or tradition connected with the place?"

I am not aware of any "history or tradition" that throws any light upon the name Hobbs's Wall, or Hobbs's Well as it is also called, but the place is close to the Barrow hills, near which some pre-historic interments were found by Mr. Skinner, and is only a short way from the great Roman road from Ilchester to Bath and Lincoln, the Foss. In the case of the Roman coffin discovered at Wemberham, near Yatton, considerable remains of a Roman villa were afterwards found 12 a few yards from the spot. It is not improbable that similar remains may be yet discovered not far from Hobbs's Wall.

" He found many Roman remains in the neighbourhood of Camerton (which he considered to be the site of Camerlodunum), including upwards of 1,800 Roman coins, most of which are now in the Bristol Museum.

Notes on Ancient Norwegian Wooden

Churches,

("STAVEKIRKER,") WITH

SOME NOTICES OF SIMILAR EARLY STRUCTURES IN GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND.

BY FRANCIS FOX TUCKETT, F.R.G.S.

(Read December 15th, 1886.)

DURING a journey in Norway last summer I was much interested in visiting for the first time several of the curious and very ancient wooden churches which, with occasional repairs and alterations, have been preserved for six or seven centuries, and still seem likely to outlive many far more recent structures of stone. But little is known of their origin, and, though referred to by Fergusson, Ruskin, Freeman, and possibly other writers, the work of Prof. Dahl1 is the only one specially devoted to them with which I have met, and I am mainly indebted to it for such details as I am able to lay before you in dealing with this part of my subject. I venture, however, to hope that, with the help also of the accompanying illustrations,3 I may be able to convey some idea of structures which, however different in construction and ornamentation, may remind us of, and perhaps throw some light on, the earlier but long vanished specimens of our native * Denkmale einer ausgebildeten Holzbaukunst aus den frühesten Jahrhunderten iu den innern Landschaften Norwegens, Dresden, 1837.

2

Passages quoted without special reference are from Prof. Dahl's book.

3 My grateful acknowledgments are due to A. H. H. Murray, Esq., for his great kindness in permitting me the use of the illustrations (from Mr. Fergusson's Handbook of Architecture), of the churches of Hitterdal and Urnæs (Plate I. figs. 2, 3, and 4), and to R. Lovett, Esq., on behalf of the " Religious Tract Society," for that of the church of Borgund (fig. 1), which appears in his charming volume, Norwegian Pictures. Those on Plate XV. are reproductions by photolithography, on a reduced scale, of some of the plates in Prof. Dahl's valuable work referred to above, and to which I am in other respects so largely indebted.

wooden ecclesiastical architecture, and prove not altogether unworthy of your attention.

"It is not often," remarks Prof. Dahl," that the use of wood in architecture for common purposes has developed into a higher and decorative style, and still more seldom have specimens of such development, dating from an early age, been preserved to our day.

"The Stavekirker,' of Norway, seem to have arisen from a combination of various elements. The influence of Latin Christian architecture in certain decorative details, such as the cushion capital, is not easily to be mistaken, whilst in others the design points to still earlier northern and heathen models. It is clear that the old Scandinavians had not only a poetry but a plastic art of their own, of which some notion may be formed from the appearance of the ancient wooden residences of the kings or jarls in the earliest times, if, indeed, this art be not imitated from a foreign and ancestral style. In the plan, Byzantine tendencies, which the intercourse of the Norsk Varangians, or body guards of the eastern emperors, through Russia sufficiently accounts for, are observable, but variously influenced by the special material made use of, which obviously both requires and permits much that is incompatible with the employment of stone or brick.

4

"These characteristics, however, are not only to be met with in public buildings, but are even more conspicuous, especially in remote districts, in the dwellings, furniture, and costume of the natives. Compare the curious interlaced patterns on the portals, and the carvings on the capitals of the pillars, as well as on the pillars themselves.

"In this way, then, a special style was developed which was peculiar to the northern lands; for though in Germany the earliest churches were built of wood, in the absence of undoubted examples it must remain uncertain whether they were similar in character.

"Most of these structures have undergone from time to time, by enlargement and repairs, some modification of their original form. In the more isolated districts, however, the inhabitants troubled themselves less about so-called improvements, and this has contributed to the maintenance of their ancient characteris

See Gibbon, Wm. Smith's edition, vol. vii. pp. 20, and 80-83.

tics. These buildings were often only chapels of ease in which service was performed but a few times in the year, and their maintenance was dependent either on the commune or private individuals. But little, therefore, or only what was absolutely essential, was done to maintain them, and this was often limited to an external coating of the boards with tar, which materially contributed to their preservation. During repair the leading features, partly from want of knowledge, partly from the force of habit, and partly, we may suppose, from superstition, were retained. Sometimes, in quite new buildings, the old boards with their carved work are nailed on, and made to do duty again; and also, when ancient churches have been enlarged and their former decorations removed, these have been subsequently replaced. It was in the interest, too, of the owner of the church to do as little as possible to it, because the sum to be expended was frequently larger than that which the building produced. For when, during the reformation, under the Danish rule, all church property was confiscated and the income reduced, the churches often became the property of private individuals. As a consequence, the proprietors were frequently changed, and thus it has happened that at sales where there were few buyers, an entire church, with altar, bells, and fittings, has been sold for 30 Norsk specie dollars (about £6 15s. sterling), and that, too, rather from religious sentiment than from any idea of profit. For, looking at the fact that the owner is under an obligation to maintain the fabric, its possession becomes a burden.

"The most closely allied structures are probably the Russian country churches, as Olearius observed them in the 17th century, but it is to be noted that differences in the form of worship and former restoration could not admit of true uniformity. In fact, the Russian village churches resemble in their construction ordinary log houses, as the beams lie horizontally, one above another, whilst, in the ancient Norwegian structures, the boards stand upright, and they are therefore named 'stave,' or 'brushwood' churches (Stave,' or 'Reiseverk,' Kirker.) "

Of the dozen or more existing specimens of the ancient "Stave-Kirker," one, that of Gol in the Hallingdal, has been removed to the grounds of the royal castle of Oscarshall near Christiania; a second is in the possession of Herr Gade, the