evident that the whole four pieces had been completely covered with leather on the outside. Where the leather remained on the depending peaks, it seemed to have been turned back inside for a distance of 38 of an inch.

Objects of this character do not appear to have been met with before on any Roman site in Britain. Abroad they have occurred at least twice,—once in the early fort of Haltern, where a single piece corresponding to one of the smaller members of the set has been found, and again at Novaesium, where two pieces corresponding to the smaller size and a fragment of a depending peak, which had evidently belonged to a piece of the larger size, came to light in one of the buildings identified as cavalry barracks. It should be noted that they were associated with the bronze discs already mentioned. There is nothing in the monuments that throws any light on the purpose of these curious objects, on which SENECIO has marked his name. But it seems just possible that it is to the idea of tournament armour that we must look for an explanation of them as well as of two curious circular discs of bronze, one of which, like them, was found along with the helmets, while another came from Pit XCII (Plates XXXIII. and LIV., Fig. 5). These discs measure 9¼ inches and 978 inches in diameter respectively. The edges of the metal, which is thin, are turned back as though the discs had been fastened to wood or leather, while on the back of each of them are three metal loops, as if for lacing them to the backing. These loops will be seen in Fig. 18 p. 181), which shows the back of the disc reproduced in Plate XXXIII. In the disc found with the helmets in Pit XXII (Plate LIV., Fig 5) there rises in the centre the outline of a human head and shoulders. Surrounding the head, as though to bring it into higher relief, is a halo-like concavity. In the example from Pit XCII (Plate XXXIII.) the central feature of the design takes a less definite form, but the surface of the concave band which surrounds it is broken by a series of raised lines radiating from the centre and giving a fan-like appearance to the whole. The discs do not appear to be substantial enough for shield bosses of the ordinary character. Were they, like the helmets, destined to figure on parade? In the description from Arrian, already quoted, we are told that above the horsemen, as they rode, were borne Roman standards and Scythian pennons. Just as the smaller bronze discs resemble in form the phalerae of the monuments, but yet differ from them in their absence of decoration, so these larger embossed plates, on one of which we have a clear suggestion of the imago clypeata, recall the discs that, decorated with imperial heads in high relief, formed part of a Roman standard.

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