No people are so barbarous as to be totally destitute of the means of internal communication; and in proportion as they become more civilized and have more intercourse with other nations, these means are augmented and facilitated. By the early accounts of the Britons it appears that they maintained a considerable foreign commerce, that they had formed towns or large communities, and used chariots for warlike, and undoubtedly for civil purposes. Hence it is evident that their internal communications must have been free and numerous. We need not therefore be surprised, if, after the lapse of so many centuries, marks of such British roads appear even at present to a careful observer, differing in many respects from the roads subsequently made by the Romans, and traversing the island in every direction.
These ancient ways may be distinguished from those made by the Romans by unequivocal marks.
I. They are not raised nor paved, nor always straight; but often wind along the tops or sides of the chains of hills which lie in their course.
II. They do not lead to Roman towns, or notice such towns, except when placed on the sites of British fortresses.
III. They are attended by tumuli like those of the Romans; but usually throw out branches, which, after running parallel for some miles, are reunited to the original stem.
When the Romans obtained a footing in this island, they directed all their operations, according to their practice, by military principles. They civilized indeed as they conquered, but conquest was their principal object. Hence, as each tribe was successively subdued, they fortified such primary posts as were best adapted to support their future operations, established secondary posts to secure their communications, and connected the whole by military ways. From local circumstances, and the principles of war, their primary posts were either at or near the sites of the British towns, or on the principal rivers. If therefore the British towns and trackways were suited to their purposes, they adopted them; if not, they constructed others. But both their towns and roads differed materially from those of the original inhabitants. The Romans in their towns or fortresses followed the system of their own castrametation, in like manner as in modern warfare the construction of permanent and temporary works is guided by the same general principles. These towns are of a regular figure, bounded by lines as straight as the shape of the ground will permit, generally square or oblong, and consisting commonly in a single wall and ditch, unless in positions peculiarly dangerous, or where local circumstances rendered additional defences necessary. On the contrary the British towns, which were occupied by the Romans, although irregularly shaped, still partake of their original figure.
Specimens of the first kind, or perfect Roman towns, may be seen in Colchester, Winchester, Caerleon, Caerwent, Castor near Norwich, and all the military stations bordering on the wall of Severus. Of the latter, in Bath, Silchester, Kentchester, Canterbury, and other places.
Similar marks of difference between the original British trackways and the Roman roads appear in the Foss, and the Iknield Street;—the latter, during the greater part of its course, keeping along the chain of hills which lay in its way, not leading decidedly to Roman towns, throwing out parallel branches, attended always with tumuli, still bearing its British name, and appearing from its direction to have been made for commercial purposes.
On the other hand the adopted roads, but more especially those made by the Romans themselves, are distinguished by peculiar marks. Posts or towns are placed on them at nearly regular distances, seldom exceeding twenty miles, the length of a single march, and also at the point where two roads intersect each other, or where several roads diverge. These roads are elevated with surprising labour to the height of ten feet, and sometimes even more, instances of which may be seen on the heath near Woodyates Inn in Dorsetshire, near Old Sarum on the side of Ford, in Chute Park, Wilts, between Ancaster and Lincoln, and still more remarkably on Bramham Moor, near Tadcaster in Yorkshire. They were formed of materials often brought from a considerable distance, such as chalk, pebbles, or gravel; and the most considerable are paved with stones, which are visible to this day. Tumuli also, which seem to have been the direction-posts of antiquity, attended their course, and occur in almost every instance where a road descends a hill, approaches a station, or throws off a branch. Another peculiarity of the Roman ways is their straight direction, from which they seldom deviate, except to avoid a rapid ascent or descent, to throw off another road, or to approach a station, which, from the circumstances before mentioned, had been fixed out of the general line. Of this there is a curious instance where the Foss, in approaching Cirencester from the north, meets the Akeman Street, bearing to the same point from the north-east, and evidently bends out of its course to join and enter the station with it.
Of many of the Roman roads, not only in England, but in the greater part of the Roman empire, an account has been preserved under the name of the Itinerary of Antoninus, which specifies the towns or stations on each road, and shows the distances between them. This record was long supposed to be a public directory or guide for the march of soldiers; but if this were the case, it is extremely confused and imperfect. It often omits in one Iter or journey towns which are directly in its course, and yet specifies them in another, as may be seen in the first, second, sixth, and eighth Iters. It traces the same road more than once, and passes unnoticed some of the most remarkable roads in the island, namely a great part of the Foss, and the whole of the Via Devana (a road from Colchester to Chester.) Hence this Itinerary has been more justly considered as the heads of a journal formed by some traveller or officer, who visited the different parts of the empire from business or duty; and, as Mr. Reynolds conjectures with great appearance of probability, in the suite of the emperor Adrian. In this light it may be considered as copious, and the advantages which it has afforded to the antiquary will be gratefully and universally acknowledged. Still, however, from the incoherence which appears in that part relating to our island, and from the mutilated copies which have been found, there is reason to imagine that the whole of this interesting record has not escaped the ravages of time.