Watling Street

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Watling Street
Saxon Britain
Margary number1
Major junctions
FromThe Kentish ports
Major intersectionsCanterbury, London, St Albans
ToWroxeter
Location
CountryUnited Kingdom
Road network

Watling Street is a

ancient Britons and paved as one of the main Roman roads in Britannia (Roman-governed Great Britain during the Roman Empire). The route linked Dover and London in the southeast, and continued northwest via St Albans to Wroxeter. The line of the road was later the southwestern border of the Danelaw with Wessex and Mercia
, and Watling Street was numbered as one of the major highways of medieval England.

First used by the ancient Britons, mainly between the areas of modern

defeat of Boudica
, though precisely where on the route is disputed.

The Roman

Birrens, Dumfriesshire) beyond Hadrian's Wall in modern Scotland
may have been part of the same route, leading some scholars to call this Watling Street as well, although others restrict it to the southern leg.

In the early 18th century, England's first

Great Dover Road
.

The route from London to Wroxeter forms much of the

A2 road
. At various points along the historic route, the name Watling Street remains in modern use.

Name

The original

Latin: via strata) referred to any paved road and had no particular association with urban thoroughfares. The Waeclingas ("people of Waecla")[1] were a tribe in the St Albans area in the early medieval period[1][2]
with an early name of their city being "Waetlingacaester", which would translate into modern English as "Watlingchester".

The original Anglo-Saxon name for the section of the route between Canterbury and London was Casingc Stræt or Key Street, a name still borne by a hamlet on the road near Sittingbourne.[3] This section only later became considered part of Watling Street.[3]

Used as a boundary

Watling Street has been used as a boundary of many historic administrative units, and some of these are still in existence today, either through continuity or the adoption of these as by successor areas. Examples include:

History

Watling Street near Crick in Northamptonshire

British

The broad, grassy

ford in the Thames at Thorney Island,[6] Westminster, to a site near Wroxeter, where it split. The western continuation went on to Holyhead while the northern ran to Chester and on to the Picts in Scotland.[7]

Westminster ford

There is a longstanding tradition that a natural ford once crossed the Thames between Thorney Island, (present-day

better source needed
] Its location means that it is possible that Watling Street crossed it.

Several factors may have slowed the river here, leading to the depositing of enough sediments to create a usable ford:[9]

  • The bend in the Thames near Vauxhall Bridge.
  • The two arms of the River Effra joining in that vicinity, depositing their own load, with the cross-flow causing the Thames to eddy and slow.
  • Similarly the southern arm of the Tyburn, once joined the Thames at this point, on the northern bank.
  • These factors mean the area is likely to have been the tidal head for some of the historic period.

Roman

The road at Richborough Castle, one of the Romans' Kentish ports and a Saxon Shore fort.

The

troops in 60 or 61.[10] The road ran straight from the bridgehead on the Thames[11] to what would become Newgate on the London Wall before passing over Ludgate Hill and the Fleet and dividing into Watling Street and the Devil's Highway west to Calleva (Silchester). Some of this route is preserved beneath Old Kent Road.[12]

The 2nd-century

MP from Hadrian's Wall to Richborough:[13][14]

Route II of the Antonine Itinerary
...from
the port of Ritupis
,
481 
Roman miles
,
thus:
From Blatobulgium [
Birrens
]
to the
Netherby
],
12
To Luguvalium [
Carlisle
]
12
To
Voreda
[
Old Penrith
]
14
To
Bravoniacum
[Kirkby Thore] 13
To Verterae [Brough] 13
To Lavatrae [Bowes] 14
To Cataractonium [Catterick] 16
Isurium
[Aldborough] 24
Eboracum [York], [6th Victorious Leg.], 17
To Calcaria [Tadcaster] 9
To
Cambodunum
[
Slack
]
20
To Mamucium [Manchester] 18
To
Condate
[Northwich] 18
To Deva [Chester],
20th Vict. Leg.
20
To
Bovium
[Tilston] 10
To Mediolanum [Whitchurch, Shropshire] 20
To Rutunium [Harcourt Park] 12
To
Viroconium
[Wroxeter] 11
To Uxacona [
Redhill
]
11
To Pennocrucium [Penkridge] 12
To Letocetum [Wall] 12
To Manduessedum [Mancetter] 16
To
Venonae
[High Cross] 12
To Bannaventa [Norton] 17
To Lactodurum [Towcester] 12
To
Magiovinium
[Fenny Stratford] 17
To
Durocobrivae
[Dunstable] 12
To Verulamium [St Albans] 12
To
Sulloniacae
[Stanmore] 9
To Londinium [London] 12
To Noviomagus [unknown] 10
To
Vagniacae
[Springhead] 18
To
Durobrivae
[Rochester] 9
To Durolevum [unknown] 13
To
Durovernum
[Canterbury] 12
To
the port of Ritupis
[Richborough] 12

Battle of Watling Street

Some site in the middle section of this route is supposed by most historians to have been the location of G. Suetonius Paulinus's decisive victory over Boudica's Iceni in AD 61.

Subsidiary routes

The two routes of the

Roman miles rather than 17.[13][14]

The more direct route north from

Epiacum (Whitley Castle) with its remarkable ramparts, and on to the Hadrian's Wall fort of Magnis (Carvoran)
.

Modern Watling Street in Canterbury

Saxon

By the time of the

Laws of Edward the Confessor.[15][16]

A number of Old English names testify to route of Watling Street at this time:

have a Watling Street but they are not on the route).

Viking

Following the

Viking invasions, the 9th-century Treaty of Alfred and Guthrum
mentions Watling Street as a boundary.

Map of London around 1300 AD, showing Watling Street running north-west from London Bridge past Newgate

Norman

It is assumed that the pilgrims in

Canterbury Tales used the southeastern stretch of Watling Street when journeying from Southwark to Canterbury.[citation needed
]

A paving stone on Kilburn High Road in London commemorates the route of Watling Street. (The date is incorrect.)

Modernity

The first turnpike trust in England was established over Watling Street northwest of London by an Act of Parliament on 4 March 1707 in order to provide a return on the investment required to once more pave the road.[17] The section from Fourne Hill north of Hockliffe to Stony Stratford was paved at a cost of £7000[b] over the next two years. Revenue was below expectations; in 1709, the trust succeeded in getting a new act extending the term of their monopoly but not permitting their tolls to be increased. In 1711, the trust's debts had not been discharged and the creditors took over receivership of the tolls. In 1716, a new act restored the authority of the trust under the supervision of another group appointed by the Buckinghamshire justices of the peace. The trust failed to receive a further extension of their rights in 1736 and their authority ended at the close of 1738. In 1740, a new act named new trustees to oversee the road, which the residents of Buckinghamshire described as being "ruined".[18]

The road was again paved in the early 19th century at the expense of

Great Dover Road
. The tolls ended in 1875.

Much of the road is still in use today, apart from a few sections where it has been diverted. The

A5 between London and Shrewsbury. At various points along the route, the A5 leaves the Roman road to bypass settlements,[c]
but its historic route invariably remains evident even where motor traffic is restricted or banned.

The name Watling Street is still used along the ancient road in many places, for instance in Bexleyheath in southeast London and in Canterbury, Gillingham, Strood, Gravesend, and Dartford in Kent. North of London, the name Watling Street still occurs in Hertfordshire (including St Albans), Bedfordshire (Dunstable), Buckinghamshire (Milton Keynes), Northamptonshire (Towcester), Leicestershire (Hinckley), Warwickshire (Nuneaton and Atherstone) and in Staffordshire (Cannock, Wall, Tamworth and Lichfield). (There are Watling Streets in Shropshire (Church Stretton)[20] and in Gwynedd (Llanrwst), but neither is on the original route.)

Other Watling Streets

Condate (Northwich) is also known locally as Watling Street.[22]

Gallery

  • A detail from a 1910 map displaying the Welsh "Watling Street"
    A detail from a 1910 map displaying the Welsh "Watling Street"
  • A detail from the same map displaying the Northwest "Watling Street"
    A detail from the same map displaying the Northwest "Watling Street"
  • A detail from the same map misattributing Dere Street as "Watling Street"
    A detail from the same map misattributing Dere Street as "Watling Street"

See also

Notes

  1. ^ The sign shown is actually on the A5 on a new route just to right of the picture.
  2. ^ About £1.3 million today.
  3. ^ For example, through Milton Keynes, the A5 is diverted onto a new dual carriageway while Watling Street proper remains and forms part of the Milton Keynes grid road system.

References

  1. ^ . Retrieved 13 September 2014.
  2. ^ John Cannon, A Dictionary of British History, 2009.
  3. ^ a b Margary 1973, p. 34.
  4. ^ Bishop 2014, p. 160.
  5. ^ "Policy 2.5, sub-regions", London Plan, chapter 2, Greater London Authority, 2016, archived from the original on 26 December 2018, retrieved 29 April 2020
  6. ^ "Loftie's Historic London (review)". The Saturday Review of Politics, Literature, Science and Art. 63 (1, 634): 271. 19 February 1887. Retrieved 21 October 2015.
  7. ^ Ditchfield, Peter Hampson (1901). English Villages. London: Methuen. p. 33.
  8. ^ Spence, Martin (8 January 2017). "The Lambeth Ford and Roman Watling Street". Penge Past.
  9. ^ "Vauxhall: excavation and discussion". Time Team. Season 9. Episode 1. Channel Four. (from 34:50)
  10. ^ .
  11. ^ Although it is possible the Romans used a ferry prior to the expansion of Londinium in the rebuilding following Boudica's sack of the city in the year 60 or 61.[10]
  12. ^ Margary, Ivan D. (1948). Roman Ways in the Weald (third ed.). London: J. M. Dent. p. 126.
  13. ^ a b c Itinerarium Antonini Augusti. Hosted at Latin Wikisource. (in Latin)
  14. ^ a b c "The Antonine Itinerary". Roman Britain. (in Latin and English)
  15. ^ a b "Leges Edwardi Confessoris (ECf1), §12", Early English Laws (in Latin), London: University of London, 2015, retrieved 20 February 2015
  16. Herningestrate" (Ermine Street).[15]
  17. ^ "House of Lords Journal". British History Online. University of London. Retrieved 3 June 2008.
  18. ^ Bogart, Dan (2007). "Evidence from Road and River Improvement Authorities, 1600–1750" (PDF). Political Institutions and the Emergence of Regulatory Commitment in England. University of California. Retrieved 3 June 2008.
  19. ^ Britain's hidden history – London's missing Roman road.
  20. ^ Victoria County History - Shropshire A History of the County of Shropshire: Volume 10, Munslow Hundred (Part), the Liberty and Borough of Wenlock, Church Stretton
  21. ^ "Bury Metropolitan Council—History". Archived from the original on 2 July 2010..
  22. ^ Ratledge, David; Buckley, Neil (August 2018). "The Roman Road from Chester to Northwich". Roman Roads Research Association. Retrieved 6 June 2021.

Bibliography

External links