In the Northern Cemetery of Roman London. Excavations at Spitalfields Market, London E1, 1991–2007.

Abstract

This volume is one of three reports on excavations at Spitalfields Market, to the north-east of the historic City of London. The others describe the medieval priory and hospital of St Mary Spital, and the post-medieval developments on the site. These later uses of the area have meant that in some areas, for example on the street frontage of Bishopsgate, the Roman layers have been lost through medieval quarrying, while elsewhere grave cuts have been truncated and so none of them retain traces of surface markers, if they ever existed. The cemeteries of Londinium, as at other Roman cities, were spaced along the roads leading out of the pomerium, to the west, the east, south of the Thames (Southwark) and here to the north along Bishopsgate (Ermine Street). The cemetery came into use only late in the 1st century but continued until the end of the 4th century, and this report describes 169 inhumations and five cremations surviving or partially surviving from the area. As one might have expected from MOLA, the excavation was meticulous in execution for what must have been a difficult site, and the report is of the very highest standard. All concerned deserve our gratitude. After a general introduction describing the excavation, there follow chapters detailing the archaeological sequence, describing the interments as excavated, discussing funerary and burial practice, analysing grave goods and assessing what the bones of the people tell us about demography, health, disease and trauma. After a concluding section, a catalogue of the individual burials (with their associated finds when present) allows the reader to revisit what has been discussed in previous chapters in a far more focused way. Finally, there are specialist appendices, at least one of which (see below) is of extraordinary interest. Different readers will find particular points of interest, but each of the sections adds something valuable to our knowledge of Roman London and its heterogeneous and cosmopolitan population. The organisation of the graves themselves, probably originally set out within enclosures to the east of Bishopsgate, are almost all laid west to east, at right angles to the line of the road or of enclosure boundaries (p. 62). However, as the authors admit, cultural and religious factors must have been involved. There is no evidence for Christianity in this cemetery, even in the 4th century and, in any case, many of the graves are too early, but perhaps