(33) Mr. Bushe-Fox's second Report on his excavations at Wroxeter (_Reports of the Research Committee of the London Society of Antiquaries_, No. II, Oxford, 1914) deserves all the praise accorded to his first Report. I can only repeat what I said of that; it is an excellent description, full and careful, minute in its account of the smaller finds, lavishly illustrated, admirably printed, and sold for half a crown. The finds which it enumerates in detail I summarized in my Report for 1913, pp. 19-20--the temple with its interesting Italian plan, the fragments of sculpture which seem to belong to it, the crowd of small objects, the masses of Samian (indefatigably recorded), the 528 coins; all combine to make up an admirable pamphlet. [Illustration: FIG. 27. THE PODIUM, AS SEEN FROM THE NORTH (The measuring staff to the right stands in the _cella_, the floor of which is slightly higher than that of the portico to the left of it)] [Illustration: FIG. 28. EAST WALL OF PODIUM, COURSED MASONRY WITH CLAY AND RUBBLE FOUNDATIONS] I will venture a suggestion on the temple. This, as I pointed out last year, is on the Italian, not on the Celto-Roman plan. But one item is not quite clear in it. All ordinary classical temples stood on _podia_ or platforms which raised them above the surrounding surface at least to some small extent. Mr. Bushe-Fox speaks of a _podium_ to the Wroxeter temple. But it appears that he does not mean a _podium_, as generally understood. The masonry which he denotes by that term was, in his opinion, buried underground and merely foundation. The floor of the portico of the temple (he says) was about level with the floor of the court which surrounded the temple; the floor of the _cella_, though higher, was but a trifle higher (see figs. 26, 27). This view needs more reflection than he has given it in his rather brief account. No doubt a temple in a Celtic land might have been built on a classical plan, though without a classical _podium_. But it is not what one would most expect. Nor do I feel sure that it was actually done at Wroxeter in this case. The walls which Mr. Bushe-Fox explains as the foundations of the temple are quite needlessly good masonry for foundations never meant to be seen; this will be plain from figs. 27, 28, which I reproduce by permission from his Report. Further, as fig. 26 (from the same source) shows, there was outside the base of this masonry a level cobbled surface, for which no structural reason is to be found. This, one may guess, was a pavement at the original ground-level when the temple was first erected; from this, steps presumably led up to the floor of the portico and _cella_. The 'podium', then, was at first a real _podium_. Later, the ground-level rose, and the walls of the _podium_ were buried. [Illustration: FIG. 25. TEMPLE AT WROXETER] [Illustration: FIG. 26. FOUNDATIONS OF WROXETER TEMPLE] _Somerset_