ROMANO-BRITISH NOTTINGHAMSHIRE 



roads is given by the mediaeval chroniclers, in particular by Henry of Hun- 

 tingdon 12 and by Higden, 13 the latter of whom wrote that from Leicester it 

 proceeded ' per vasta plana versus Newark ' and ended at Lincoln. It has 

 been suggested that the name itself originated in the fossa or covered drain 

 which the Roman road-makers are alleged to have made to remove the 

 surface soil and receive the gravel, but this is altogether improbable. 14 



Its course through Nottinghamshire is traced in the sixth and eighth 

 routes of the Antonine Itinerary, the former giving the stations from London 

 via Venones (High Cross) to Lincoln, the latter those from York to Lincoln 

 and thence in the reverse direction from Lincoln to London. With one 

 exception the same names appear between Leicester and Lincoln in both 

 routes, and in each case the sum total of the distances amounts to fifty-two 

 Roman miles. 15 



The following table shows the stations with their modern names and 

 the distances as given : 



Iter VI 



Ratis (Leicester) .... 

 Verometo (Willoughby) 16 

 Margiduno (East Bridgeford) 18 

 Ad Pontem (Thorpe or 



Farndon ?) w 



Crococolana (Brough) 20 

 Limlti (Lincoln) .... 



Iter 



M.P.M. vii 

 M.P.M. xii 



It will be seen that there are trifling discrepancies in the mileage of the 

 two routes. The identification of the three intermediate stations may be 

 considered as certain ; the question of Ad Pontem is fully discussed later on 

 in this section. 



Even among Roman roads the Fosse is remarkable for the directness of 

 its course, which is marked in a straight unbroken line on the maps of the 

 Ordnance Survey for this county. It enters it from Lincoln at Potter Hill, 

 1 20 ft. above the sea, in the parish of North Collingham. After a slight 

 turn, a stretch of six miles continues in a straight line through Newark, 

 intersecting the parishes of South Collingham, Langford, and Winthorpe. 

 The road appears near Coddington to have been fenced in originally, twenty 

 to thirty yards wide, and to have been since narrowed in many places, by 

 which the general straightness is disguised. 21 At a distance of two miles from 

 Potter Hill we reach the station of Crococolana, the modern Brough, which 

 is described elsewhere. 22 At Langford, Dickinson claimed to have found 

 traces of a camp, 23 and at Winthorpe the foundations of a Roman bridge over 



11 'Hist. Lib.' Rerun Angl. Script. i, 199. " Polychronuon, Lib. i (Hist. Brit. [ed. Gale], Hi, 196). 



14 Guest, in Arch. Journ. xiv, 101 ff. On this road and its course generally see Codrington, Rom. Roads 

 in Brit. 245 ff. ; also Nichols, Hist. Leic. i, cxlvii ; Arch. Journ. xiiii, 42. 



15 Wesseling, Vetera Rom. I tin. 476 ff. ; Horsley, Brit. Rom. 388 ; Codrington, op. cit. 21 ; Forbes and 

 Burmester, Our Rom. Highways, 208 ; Raven in Antiquary, xxxviii, 294. 



" Gale, Anton. Iter. Brit. 96 ff., gives Charnley ; Salmon, Leicester. 

 " M.P.M. as noted above, indicates millia plus minus, or approximate mileage only. 

 18 Gale and Salmon, New Surf, of Engl. i, 288 ff., Willoughby. 



" Gale and Salmon, E. Bridgeford ; Reynolds, Iter. Brit. 264 ff., Farndon. " Salmon, Newark. 



" Codrington, op. cit. 248. But deviations to avoid holes in the roadway may perhaps better explain 

 this feature. 



" See p. 1 1. " Antij. in Notts, i, 104. 



