King Street
King Street is the name of a modern road on the line of a short Roman road in the Great Fen. It runs on a straight course between the City of Peterborough in Northamptonshire and southern Kesteven in Lincolnshire.
The English-language name "King Street" has long been applied to the part which is still in use and which lies between Ailsworth Heath, in the south and Kate's Bridge, in the north. The old road continued to Bourne thence north-westwards to join Ermine Street south of Ancaster. This part of Ermine Street is called High Dike. In the south, King Street joined Ermine Street close to the River Nene, north of Durobrivae (Water Newton). The whole is I D Margary's 'Roman road number 26'.[1]
The Roman road's route
Archaeological work has revealed more of its length than is in use nowadays. Its course is regarded as having run from the boundary between Ailsworth and Castor, at the north-west corner of Normangate Field, just north of the River Nene (TL113980). This is where it left the Roman Ermine Street, north-west of Durobrivae in what was by the end of the 2nd century, an extensive industrial region producing tiles, metalwork and particularly, pottery.
To the south of this point, Ermine Street runs along the edge of The Fens; but to the north, lies further inland. King Street continued the course nearer the fen edge. While Ermine Street crossed the Welland near the natural ford at Stamford, King Street crosses at Lolham Bridges, which required much more engineering.
At Kate's Bridge, the road crossed the River Glen. Until the 1820s the road still used the same crossing point despite the river's having moved from it at some time, probably well over a thousand years before. At Park Wood, the road appears to have come close to the Car Dyke but this is not well supported by evidence. From near Thurlby crossroads, the Roman line headed straight for the point at which Bourne Abbey was later built on it.
In this length, there are points where the road seems to show in the modern landscape - for example, here. In the south, the modern road lies on the Roman one which continued through Elsea Wood and along the field boundary to its north. The Car Dyke lies to the east and the boundary between Elsea wood and Math Wood seems to lie along the edge of the 2nd century road verge, which was cleared for security. The carriageway, the Car Dyke and the Math Wood boundary are all parallel here. When allowance is made for the now-missing outer works of the Car Dyke, the carriageway lies half way between the other two features.
North of Bourne, little of the road is still in use but it has left its mark in the form of property boundaries and soil marks. This section is sometimes called the 'Long Hollow Road' because some of it runs along the bottom of the Long Hollow, a broad, shallow valley which is the upper part of the basin of the River East Glen.
From Bourne Abbey, it passed along Meadowgate, then by Cawthorpe to Clipseygap Lane, Hanthorpe and the Roman town at Stainfield. On the boulder clay ridge, it forms boundaries of woods before, in the East Glen valley, its line is picked up by a minor road at Hanby. It passed through the small Roman town at Sapperton and up the Long Hollow to Ropsley Heath whence it is more-or-less closely followed by a modern road to its junction with Ermine Street, less than a mile south of the Roman town of Ancaster.
Outside links
References
- ↑ (Margary pp.232-234)
- Margary, I D: Roman Roads in Britain (1973) ISBN 0-212-97001-1
- Phillips, C.W. The Fenland in Roman Times Royal Geographical Research Series No. 5. (1970)
- Bennett, S. & Bennett, N. An Historical Atlas of Lincolnshire (1993) ISBN 0-85958-604-9
- Hayes, P.P. & Lane, T.W. The Fenland Project Number 5: Lincolnshire Survey, The South-West Fens. (1992) ISBN 0-948639-07-5
- Lane, T.W. The Archaeology and Developing Landscape of Ropsley and Humby, Lincolnshire. (1995) ISBN 0-948639-14-8
- Simmons, B.B. Sapperton, an interim report Lincolnshire Hist. & Archaeol. Vol.11, 5-11 (1976)
- Anon Institute of Geological Sciences One-Inch Series, Sheet 143, Bourne. Drift Edition (1971).
