The course of the road from Dover to
Canterbury, a distance of 14 miles according to the Antonine Itinerary, is
by River and Temple Ewell to Lydden, where the modern road branches to the
west. Harris, in 1719, saw the Roman road in several places north
of Lydden, and the route can then be traced by alignment and parish
boundaries to Barham Downs, where Stukeley described it as a high ridge of
flint and chalk in use as the common road. Beyond Mile— stone Farm, the
modern road bends eastward, and the course of the Roman road, followed by
a parish boundary, continues past the ‘Gate’ Inn to Canterbury, where
it entered probably on the site of the Riding Gate.
Dover and Richborough were in communication by a road running
almost in a straight line through Pineham, Napchester, Studdal,
Betteshanger, Eastry and Woodnesborough. For the most part of the way it
is now just a track, followed for long stretches by parish boundaries, but
for a mile at Eastry it coincides with the main road. North of
Woodnesborough the road disappears (except perhaps for a short stretch
near Fleet Farm); possibly it joined the Richborough to Canterbury road
near Cooper Street, close to the causeway or bridge that ran between the
island of Richborough and the mainland (see p. 35).
This causeway carried a road from Richborough to
Canterbury, passing eastward of Ickham. Its line cannot definitely be
traced, though the road is indicated in the Antonine Itinerary, but it
seems likely that the straight stretch of road, west of Littlebourne, from
Oldridge Wood past St. Martin’s Church to Canterbury is part of it.
There are traces of an earthwork in Fishpoolhill Wood on the south side of
the road and close to Oldridge Wood. It has been suggested by Mr. S. E.
Winbolt2 that at Ash the road branches north—east to
Cooper Street, meeting the Richborough causeway at Fleet Farm.
Another road that is now hard to trace ran from Canterbury to
Reculver; its course may have been via Fordwich3 (there
is now a footpath from Fordwich to Canterbury that may represent it),
where the Stour was crossed, Buckwell, Maypole, and Hillborough to
Reculver. It would not have been impossible for the Romans to have
constructed a road between Richborough and Reculver, but it would have
been an enormous task and scarcely worth the trouble; the only practicable
route would have been by way of Chislet, Upstreet, and Grove on the banks
of the Wantsum Channel, and then at least three waterways would have had
to be negotiated.
The course of the Stone Street from Lympne to Canterbury, a
distance of 16 miles according to the Itinerary, is uncertain for the
first part, but its line can be found at Shipway Cross in a footpath to
New Inn Green; it then proceeds by Westenhanger Racecourse to the junction
of the road to Postling. Here it leaves its straight alignment and bends
eastward, apparently to secure an easier gradient up a hill rising to 6oo
ft., and more protection from any attack from the high ground to the
north. For the next 10 miles it runs in a
cont'd from page 134b the only
road really entitled to be called Watling Street, doubtless being so
designated (or Wading) in the Saxon Age. All other ‘Wading Streets’
have been so named by different generations of antiquaries. The ancient
name of the Kentish London Road seems to have been Casincg Street. See F.
Haverfield, Chester Arch. Journ. vi, 40, 249, Encyci. Brit.11th.
ed. s.v. ‘Wading Street,’ and The Roman occupation of
Britain (1924), p. 64. Hist. Mons. Comm. Inventory of Roman London,
p. 51.
2 Roman Folkestone, p. 154
3 The present road from Sturry, by
Upstreet, Sarre Wall, Sarre, and Monkton, to Ramsgate is sometimes said to
be on the line of a Roman road; but such a road, even if it kept to the
north bank of the Great Stour as far as Upstreet, would have had to
negotiate the Wantsum Channel, a mile and a half wide. It is worth noting,
however, that this road was called ‘Dunstret’ in 1414.
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