One of the eight bronze Roman Bowls found at Irchester in 1874.
19th century drawings of the Irchester bowls by British antiquarian and archaeologist Henry Dryden
The Irchester bowls were discovered in 1874 by ironstone diggers about 1.5 km (one mile) south of Wellingborough close to Chester House. They were found to the east of substantial earthworks described as ‘an important walled camp of the Romans’.
The diggers discovered hundreds of graves and recovered three stone coffins and one lead coffin. The Reverend Robert Sibley Baker of Hargrave reported that a ‘pack of eight bronze vessels’ was found about 15 inches (38 cm) below the surface in an area ‘thick with graves’. The bowls were stacked inside a ninth container described as a ‘pail’. They were entrusted to Mr Arkwright of Knuston Hall for safekeeping.
The bowls sparked local and national interest. Their purpose and age were debated, and experiments were carried out to understand how they might have been used. The bronze was analysed at Mr Butlin’s Wellingborough ironworks, and they were compared to similar finds in Britain and beyond. Sir Henry Dryden of Canons Ashby, a renowned antiquary and artist, made detailed drawings of them.
The Northants Roman Exploration Committee raised £103, nearly £7,000 today, in subscriptions from the local community to fund the first archaeological excavations at Irchester in 1878. We now know that it was a walled town (or vicus) in the Roman era with extensive suburbs and cemeteries.
Number 27 of the objects selected for the A History of Northamptonshire in 100 Objects exhibition 2025.
This Jewish tombstone fragment is one of two surviving medieval inscriptions in England; indicating a thriving medieval Jewish community living in Northampton at the time.
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