Roman Roads

p. 26

ROMAN ROADS.

The exact relation of Roman roads to the earlier leys is a matter for future investigation, but our co-member Mr. Jack is on the right lines when investigating the surface construction to find whether a road can be called Roman. It is not easy to realise that many British roads were as ancient to the Roman invaders as the Roman remains are to us.

My general impressions from observed facts are that the Roman surveyors used the sighting system; that they utilized the old trackways, imposing greater width and their far superior road surface and foundations; also that working during the degeneration of the ley system, they did not appreciate the long distance primary points, but working on short distance hills and points their roads are not so consistent and individual. I find evidence that they established their stations on the original leys, and that these were then so numerous as to form the boundaries of stations or towns, and thus decide their polygonal shape. It is also probable that a great many Roman roads of which portions remain were never completed, although the sighting points of the original ley continue on the line.

The road from Aymestry to Mortimer's Cross comes down to the Wye in the cutting at Bridge Sollars.

The "Roman" straight road from Leintwardine through Paytoe and Wigmore Moor (the subject of recent digging) continues as a ley through Lucton and Kingsland Churches.

I consider the existing maps of Roman roads to have little value as being based on the assumption that there were no straight sighted roads before the Romans came, and that (quite illogically) such a road could go round corners, and had to follow the tracks over which some old writer had travelled. I find the so-called straight Roman roads, as from Kenchester to Lugg Bridge, to be really on several slightly diverging leys, three in this case.