During the excavation of the Roman Villa at Snodland by the Maidstone Archaeological group, the stone coffin, previously located during the building of the Lead Wool factory in the 1930s, was rediscovered.
The rectangular coffin, which is well constructed of Lower Oolitic Limestone four inches thick, had unfortunately been badly damaged by the factory foundations. It could, however, probably be reconstructed from the surviving fragments if this was thought worthwhile.
There is a full report on the skeleton of the occupant in Arch. Cant. XLVI (1934) p.202. He was a man of about 50 who had evidently made a full recovery from a most serious injury, which had crushed the whole of his chest, breaking his collarbone and no less than fifteen of his ribs, all of which had healed some years before his death - they surely were tough in those days!
A. C. Harrison
