ROMANO-BRITISH HEREFORDSHIRE At Letton ' in the parish of Lanterdin ' a gold coin of Tiberius was found about 1789," weighing 4 dwt. and in good preservation : obv. head of Tiberius and ti . caesar avg . f . avg . divi ; rev. a seated figure with lance and laurel branch, and pontif. maxim. Letton is a hamlet in Leintwardine parish, about 3 miles south of the village. (3) Weston under Penyard (Ariconium) About half a mile from the village of Weston under Penyard is the site of the Roman station of Ariconium, now marked by the estate of Bolitree.' Second only in importance to Magna in this district, it is mentioned in the thirteenth Iter of Antonine, where it is said to be 15 miles from Glevum (Gloucester), and 11 from Blestium (Monmouth).' Its very site was un- known at the beginning of the i8th century, and the earlier antiquaries, such as Camden and Stukeley, placed it at Kenchester, others at Hereford.* The credit of discovering the true site is due to Horsley,* and it is now gener- ally allowed to have been situated on Bury Hill near Bolitree, about 3 miles east of Ross, and i mile north of the road thence to Gloucester. Wright speaks of it as ' the centre of several great roads ; approached from Glevum by a road which seems to have run almost in the same line as the present road from that city to Ross, the road to Monmouth was probably carried through the valley, or passed to the south of Penyard, or crossed the Wye below Goodrich Castle.' * The survival of the name Ariconium in the modern Archenfield, an ecclesiastical division of South Herefordshire, is a point of interest." Fosbroke further defines the site as in a field east of the ' Wynchfurlong' towards Bromesash. He considers that the part already explored was merely the site of a manufactory (see below) by the dip of the ground at the Cindries, and that it was probably situated at the lower 'Praetorian' end of the station, where was what is described as a workshop for armour.^ The site is a not- able example of the skill with which the Romans chose their positions. Though it is situated at no greater height than 350 ft. to 400 ft. above sea level, the prospect is extraordinary, embracing as it does not only the hills of Penyard, but the more distant heights of the Forest of Dean, and the rich plains of central Gloucestershire.* The slope towards Weston on the west is called ' Cinder Hill,' and the surface has only to be turned up to show that it consists of an immense mass 0^ scoriae. Ariconium has in fact been described as the Merthyr Tydvil of the Romans, possessing extensive smelting furnaces and forges, and being thus '* y^rch. Surp. Index, with a reference to Gent. Mag. 1789, p. 740, which is not correct. ' O.S. 25-in. lii, 6. * See above, p. 173. ' Camden, Brit. (i6oo), 552 ; Stukeley, liin. Cur. i, 69 ; Price, Hist. Account of Here/. 10 ; and see above, p. 179.
- Horsley, Brit. Rom. 468 ; of. Duncumb-Cooke, Hist, of Herefs. i, 26 ; iii, 215 ; Fosbroke, Ariconensia
(Ross, 1 821), p. 22. ' Wanderings of an Antiquary, 27.
- Haverfield in Heref. Times, 7 Nov. 1896 ; Arch. Surv. 5 ; Woolhope Club Trans. 1896, p. 223 ; Arch.
Cambr. (Ser. 2), v, 99 ; Fosbroke, op. cit. 34. ' Finis Arcenfelde ' is given in Domesday as a division of the county, comprising several places near Ross (but not Weston) ; these are now included in Greytree Hundred, while the modern Deanery of Archenfield embraces the district about Dore and Pontrilas. ' Op. cit. 31, 37. ° Wright, Wanderings, 26. 187
