188 Barbury Castle. 
the Saxon men had passed the forest barriers and the Bryts had 
given ground; perhaps step by step, perhaps of set purpose, they 
had evacuated the country and, having chosen their battle-ground 
at the chalk ridge, the Britons had awaited the northward march of 
their relentless enemy, and determined—or, in fact, were driven— 
to stake all upon a great battle. 
The position of Barbury Castle had a special importance from its 
neighbourhood to several ancient highways. Following the course 
of that most venerable of roads, the Ridgeway, from near Avebury 
to the defile at which the Thames breaks through the barrier of 
chalk hills at Streatley and Goring, it will be seen that where the 
road leaves the high ridge at Hakpen to cross the Og valley, it is 
scarped in the steep side of the hill on which Barbury Castle stands ; 
and where it leaves the valley to again reach the high level of the 
downs, the “Castle” of Liddington—or, as it should be more 
appropriately called, of Badbury—stands upon the hill close by. 
These twin hill-forts not only stood sentinel over the Ridgeway, 
they also guarded what had been a Roman road, a branch from the 
Western, so called Ermin Street, that led from Gloucester to 
Winchester, and, after cutting the Ridgeway nearly at right angles 
at Chisledon, still is a highway as it runs down the Og valley, in 
parts of its course from Nythe Farm, near Wanborough, by Chiseldon 
to Marlborough. The Old Roman Road, in fact, branched at the 
Nythe Farm, the other arm taking a direction through Wanborough 
by Speen (the Roman Spine), and near Newbury on to Silchester. 
Other roads converging on the gap, or pass, between Hakpen and 
Barbury led southwards. One still connects Wroughton (Elyngdun) 
with this gap. Hay Lane, too, is probably a subsidiary Roman or 
British road from Cricklade to (Marlborough or) Cunetio. Cricklade 
was in Roman times a place of importance.! It was the first Roman 
station on the Ermin Street after it left Corinium (Cirencester). A 
low rampart, that no doubt once carried a palisade, still may be 
traced round the present town of Cricklade. The continuation of 
Hay Lane would intersect the Ridgeway where it threads the gap 
1Jt must have been a (Roman) walled town as money was coined there in 
Saxon times. 
