APPENDIX
ON RECENT EXCAVATIONS AT ALL
HALLOWS (fn. 1)
The following discoveries were made in the course of excavations
carried out from 1928 to 1933 in connection with the underpinning of the
nave and chancel of the church. Remains of structures of two periods—Roman
and medieval—were found and demolished during this work.
(a) Roman
Part of a pavement was found at a depth of 6 feet beneath the floor of
the tower. The fragment measures about 7 feet by 4 and consists of plain
red tesserae about 1 inch square. Across the middle, in an east-to-west
direction, the pavement is cut by a gutter 12 inches wide and 6 inches deep,
possibly a sleeper-trench for a wooden partition. There is no edge on the
portion of pavement now preserved in situ, and it may have extended some
8 to 12 feet further to the east, where a large number of loose red tesserae
were found. These have now been relaid where found, but 1 foot 3 inches
below the level of the pavement under the tower. The date of this pavement
must remain uncertain until the material under it has been excavated. However, the tesserae have the same direction as the third-century walls next
described, so that the pavement is probably of this date.
As excavation proceeded further to the east under the nave, occupation
debris of the Roman period was found to extend over the whole area. The
layers contained a quantity of pottery, some pre-Flavian, but mostly of the
period Flavian to Antonine, and also fragments of painted wall-plaster and
brick. It seems clear that the site was first occupied, probably by timber
houses, about the middle of the first century, and that occupation became
denser in the second century up to the Antonine period.
In 1930 part of a stone-built house was uncovered near the centre of
the church. Three sides of a long narrow room or corridor remained,
running in a N.N.E. direction, and measuring 9 feet in width and at least
20 feet in length. The side walls were 3½ and 2½ feet thick, and the crosswall at the north end 2 feet thick. The walls were preserved to a maximum
height of 6 feet above the base of the foundations, which were of large squared
blocks of chalk, with wide joints set in hard yellow mortar. Four feet above
the base of the walls was a single bonding-course of flanged tiles, and above
this the walls were of Kentish rag and a few flints. The foundation trenches
for the walls were cut down through the occupation layers containing pottery
of the Antonine period, so that the walls are of later date than this, and probably of the third century. The structure is thus one of the few dated buildings
in Roman London, and it is, moreover, the most easterly building yet known
inside the Roman town-wall.
(b) Medieval
During 1933 three walls were exposed and partly destroyed in digging
under the chancel. One of them ran north and south at a distance of 10½ feet
west of the present east wall of the chancel, and is thus apparently the east end
of an earlier church which was one bay shorter than the present building.
The present east wall is probably of the same fourteenth-century date as the
east window. The two other early walls were lateral, and ran west from the
north and south ends of the first wall. The inner faces only of these walls
were exposed, and even these had already been to some extent cut away in
making vaults. Where best preserved towards the west, the distance between
the lateral walls was found to be 14½ feet. This width is a common one for
small twelfth-century chancels, and the thickness of the old east wall, 3½ feet,
suggests the same period. (fn. 2) The south wall was 3 feet thick. The evidence
for the thickness of the north wall is not so clear; the northern faces of the
dressed blocks in it (see below) were 3 feet from the inner face of the wall,
which may give the original thickness. It was found, however, that rubble
masonry of similar character extended at least another foot to the north
throughout the eastern 10 feet of the wall, but this may represent subsequent
thickening.
The foundations of the walls were at a depth of about 8 feet below the
present church floor. Roman debris (pottery, oyster shells, and other occupation material) was found against them and also under them, and the south
ends of the Roman walls described above had been cut down in laying the
foundations of the south lateral wall. The walls were of rubble masonry,
consisting of blocks of chalk and ragstone, bedded in hard yellow mortar.
The footings of the east and south walls also contained flints and fragments
of Roman brick. Part of the inner face of the north wall was well preserved
from 1½ to 3½ feet below the underside of the church floor; it consisted of
coursed rubble with some fragments of Roman brick.
The cores of the north and south walls consisted very largely of
re-used worked blocks, some of considerable dimensions. These are probably
all of Roman date, and some are of architectural character. One slab, 2½ feet
wide and 1 foot thick, with mouldings along one side, was found lying loose
near the south wall, but there were traces of mortar on the mouldings, and it
had probably been built into the wall. Lying in position against the remains
of the wall, and probably once included in its core, were two other longer
blocks, the east end of the more easterly block being 6 feet from the angle of
the east wall. One block has three plane faces, and the ends are also plane;
the dimensions are 4 feet 4 inches by 2½ feet by 1 foot 9 inches, and a patch
of hard white Roman mortar containing crushed tile still adheres to it. The
other block has two plane faces and plane ends, and measures 5 feet 3 inches
by 2 feet by 1 foot 7 inches. Two other worked blocks remained in the core
of the south wall nearer the angle, their exposed faces measuring 15 by 9 inches
and 9 by 9 inches. Immediately to the west of the angle was a dressed block
measuring 2½ feet by 1 foot, with a lewis hole 1½ inches by 1 inch in it;
below this block was a layer of mortar 6 inches thick, separating it from a
slab 2 feet long and 4 inches thick, laid horizontally.
No worked blocks occurred in the east wall.
As the demolition of the north wall proceeded, two large dressed
blocks were removed from its core, the end of the first being about 10 feet
from the east wall. The first block is 2 feet long, 2 feet 4 inches deep, and
1 foot 2 inches high, and has on the front two horizontal sets of mouldings
above a geometrical design. The second block, 2½ feet long, is of similar
character, and the blocks would appear to have formed part of the cornice
of a Roman building. West of these blocks was another, which was not
removed; its exposed end was plane, and measured 1 foot 9 inches wide and
1 foot 6 inches high.
Thirty feet west of the inner face of the east wall of this early building
was the face of a fragment of rubble masonry set in yellow mortar, running
north and south. Presumably this belonged to a wall which has been almost
entirely destroyed, but which may have marked the west end of the early
chancel. It seems reasonable to suppose that this was a sleeper-wall, but it
has been given the same thickness as the lateral walls. As thus restored, the
chancel measures 14½ feet in width and 27 feet in length internally. An
objection to regarding this structure as the twelfth-century chancel lies in the
fact that the south wall has been traced westwards for more than 10 feet in the
same line, whereas the south wall of the nave should be further to the south.
However, the fact remains that this structure is earlier than the present church,
and it may well be part of the Norman church given by Riculf to the monks
of Rochester. (fn. 3)
In the southern half of the space between the early east wall and the
end wall of the present chancel were found a number of interments in stone
coffins, with heads to the west. One of them was completely excavated; the
coffin was constructed of chalk slabs 4½ inches thick and about 15 inches long,
set upright and mortared together, with a round recess for the head. Along
the top of the slabs was an edging of mortar with a rebate for a lid, of which no
other traces remained. The internal depth of the coffin was 1 foot. The
interment was that of a woman aged about thirty. Three feet to the south was
another similar interment, which lay partly under the north wall of the fourteenth-century crypt under the south chapel, the wall being carried over it
on a roughly constructed arch. To the east were two other coffins, one above
the other, with the greater part of their length under the chancel wall, which
was also carried over them on an arch. These interments must therefore have
been made to the east of the small early chancel, and previous to the building
of the present chancel in the fourteenth century.