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(1) The preservation of the Watling Street as an example of a continuously used Roman road for several days’ march north-west of London is due to various causes.
In the first place, it was very little interrupted by marsh. It ran everywhere on dry land, and the main cause of breakdown—the swallowing up of a causeway after the destruction of its bridge—did not affect it. But this is the least of the causes which have preserved this piece of road.
Second, and more important, was the establishment along it of set stations which remained inhabited, and the chain of which was not interrupted by active warfare. Watling Street here presents very interesting evidence of what really happened during those early pirate raids which are generally, but erroneously, called the Anglo-Saxon Conquest. They did not so seriously disturb the life of the country as to break down this main artery of communication. It lies transverse to the raids, and yet it was maintained. And in this connection we must also note the continued importance of London.
Great Roman towns suffered, of course, from the pirate raids between (somewhat before) the year 500 and the year 600, as did all the rest of the island. They suffered not only from those raids of pirates across the North Sea, but also from the raids of pirates from Ireland, and also from the raids of Highlanders coming over the wall from the north. But though they suffered they kept their place in the national scheme. No province in the Roman Empire lost less of its town sites in the Dark Ages than did England. No part of Europe has so large a number of old towns based upon Roman foundations: and London was the chief of them all. London may have been disturbed by the raids—it probably was. There was probably a certain amount of looting from time to time, and a good deal of fighting outside its walls, but it always maintained its permanence, its character of being the economic centre of the island. It is particularly noticeable that every great Roman road out of London has remained intact, and Watling Street beyond others.
The third cause of survival was probably the excellence of the original construction, though here we must hesitate a little because we cannot but note that the Great North Road to York, which was quite as important and which was twin to the north-western road, has suffered very grievous modification indeed. But there can be no doubt that the construction of the Watling Street was very thorough, and that this expenditure of economic effort preserved it through the Dark Ages as much as anything did.
Oddly enough, what is in most cases the strongest motive of all for the preservation of a road was here entirely absent, and that is what I have called the “potential” between the two terminals. When there is a long and continued motive for joining up two terminal points the Road has a cause of survival superior to any other. There was, and remains to this day, an extremely strong “potential” of this kind between the ports serving the Channel straits, with their nucleus at Canterbury, and the economic capital inland at London. It therefore, as the Roman road between the one terminal and the other, remained permanent throughout the centuries, with the exception of the deflection towards the Thames which grew up in the Dark Ages to serve the landing places at Gravesend. But such a “potential” is entirely lacking for the north-western road communication—so far as we know—to go between London and Chester. The trade with Ireland ceased almost during the early Dark Ages. The north-western road led nowhere. If it was preserved, therefore, as it has been preserved, it must have been due to other causes which escape us. There it runs, however, still almost uninterruptedly used, from the Marble Arch in London to Oakengates in Shropshire, and in places still acts as part of the main artery leading from south-east to north-west.