Excavations at Hembury (Devon) in 1980–83 have revealed a new Neolithic earthwork to the north of the causewayed enclosure excavated by Miss D. M. Liddell in 1930–35. The eastern defences of the Iron Age hillfort have been examined for the first time and a sequence of box rampart followed by dump rampart demonstrated. The latter phase of construction is datable to the second or first century b.c. On the Roman conquest of the region the northern end of the hillfort was occupied by Roman troops who constructed a series of regular planned timber buildings, including a structure identified as a fabrica. This occupation probably ended in the 60s a.d. and thereafter the hillfort remained in disuse.

Two La Tène I swords found in the River Thames more than a century ago are in the remains of iron scabbards decorated with dragon-pairs. These designs, which have only recently been revealed, are similar to those on La Tène scabbards throughout Celtic Europe from France to Romania: ninety examples can now be listed, and half of them have been added in the last decade. The discovery of dragon-pairs in the Thames emphasizes the links that must have existed between Britain and the rest of the Celtic world in the decades around 300 B.C.

G. E. Fox's reconstruction of fragments of painted plaster found in house XIV, I at Silchester is subjected to new scrutiny, and it is argued that, rather than belonging (as Fox thought) to a dado, they derive from two separate all-over patterns of the type described by German writers as Tapetenmuster. It is suggested that the decorations come from the adjacent rooms 22 and 29, and, by comparison with other examples of similar patterns in other parts of the Roman Empire, that they probably adorned the walls rather than the ceilings.

Conservation in 1980 of the wall-paintings in the upper chamber of the south porch at Breamore church, where the notable Anglo-Saxon stone rood is sited, led to an archaeological study of the associated parts of the building. It was established that the rood is not in its primary location over the south door, but was only erected there in the fifteenth century. It is argued that the rood originally occupied a position over the western arch into the nave of the Saxon church, being enclosed within a chamber, now demolished. The Norman south doorway and added porch appear to be a refurbishment of an original entrance to the nave, although probably not the principal one, which, it is argued, lay at the west end. In the fifteenth century the church was repaired piecemeal, and this involved the demolition of the Saxon north porticus and western chamber, the partial reconstruction of the south porch and a lowering of its roof pitch, and the resiting of the displaced rood sculptures in the south wall of the nave above the porch. In the early sixteenth century the walls of the porch were raised, creating an upper storey which functioned as a chapel, probably dedicated in honour of St. Mary the Virgin. The rood then became a devotional object within the porch chapel, and an elaborate scheme of landscape painting was applied as a background, and was continued on the west wall of the chapel. The remaining areas of wall plaster in the chapel were painted with guttée-de-sang and sacred monograms. Later in the sixteenth century the Anglo-Saxon sculptures were deliberately defaced and their remains hidden by a layer of plaster. The re-exposure of the rood and paintings took place at an unrecorded date in the nineteenth century; the upper floor of the porch was removed in 1897, revealing the chapel to view from below.

Ten medieval ribbed mortars from British collections, only three with known provenances, are described, and their relationship with the Hispano-Moresque and Islamic series of such vessels discussed. They have been sampled for analysis of the alloys used in their manufacture, most being found to be alloys which would today be referred to as ‘leaded bronze’ or ‘leaded gunmetal’. The Deptford mortar, however, was found to be made from an impure copper, and the Coity vessel from a ‘leaded brass’.

York cathedral shows virtually no signs of the existence of chantry chapels or shrines, although there is documentary evidence for as many as sixty altars, dedicated to a bewildering variety of saints and often serving as multiple chantries. There are the remains of a shrine of St. William and possibly also of shrines at the tombs of Archbishops Richard le Scrope and Henry Bowet, but there are no stone chantry chapels like those found at St. Albar's Abbey or Winchester Cathedral, while any wooden parclose screens have long since vanished. This paper is an attempt, based on documentary and physical evidence, to show the location of altars within the cathedral church. Many of these altars were originally founded in the great Romanesque choir which was rebuilt after 1360, and they were suspended in 1364 until repositioned in the new building.

William Morris owned a volume, bound in red morocco and now preserved at Kelmscott Manor, which contains copies of four early printed Italian writing-manuals of the sixteenth century, i.e. La Operina and Il modo de temperare le Penne by Vicentino (Arrighi), Lo presente libro by G. A. Tagliente, and Thesauro de Scrittori by Ugo da Carpi. The article depicts the technical and social environment in which Italian writing-manuals originated, traces the complex printing history of the works mentioned above, and identifies the editions and dates to which they belong. It then shows how the ‘Kelmscott volume’ influenced the contributions of Morris, Emery Walker, Edward Johnston and, more recently, Alfred Fairbank in the fields of manuscript copying, type-design and italic handwriting.