(48) The excavation of the Roman fort at Gellygaer, thirteen miles north of Cardiff, was brought in 1913 to a point at which (as I learn) it is considered to be for the present finished. I referred to it in my Report for 1913; Mr. John Ward's full description of the results obtained in 1913 is now issued in the Transactions of the Cardiff Naturalists' Society (vol. xlvi). The principal finds were a supposed 'drill-ground' on the north-east of the fort, a bit of another inscription of Trajan, a kiln in the churchyard, and a largish earthwork on the north-west of the fort. This last is a regular oblong of not quite five acres internal area, fortified by an earthen mound and a ditch; trenching across the interior showed no trace of buildings or indeed of any occupation, but the search was not carried very far. Several explanations have been offered of it?that it was a temporary affair, thrown up while the actual fort was abuilding; that it was intended for troops marching past and needing to camp for a night at the spot; that it was an earlier fort, begun when the first invasion of the Silures was made, about A.D. 50-2, but never finished. This third view is Mr. Ward's own. Without more excavation, it is rash to pronounce positively, and perhaps even a minute search might be fruitless. Analogies somewhat favour the first theory, but there will always be room for difference of opinion in explaining these excrescences (so to speak) of permanent forts, which are slight in themselves and slightly explored.
As the exploration of this site appears to be closed for the present, and indeed is nearly complete, it may be convenient to give a conspectus of the whole in a small plan (fig. 29).
(49) The fourth volume issued by the Welsh Monuments Commission (Inventory of Ancient Monuments in the County of Denbigh, H.M. Stationery Office, 1914) enumerates the few Roman remains of Denbighshire. The one important item is the group of tile and pottery kilns lately excavated by Mr. A. Acton at Holt, eight miles
