424 PROFESSOR HtTGHES 



VI. ON THE SECTION SEEN AND THE OBJECTS FOUND 

 DURING EXCAVATIONS ON THE SITE OF THE OLD 

 BIRD BOLT HOTEL. 



In working out the history of any town or district it is of 

 great importance to watch carefully all the indications which 

 may be brought to light in the course of excavations, or any 

 documentary evidence which may be forthcoming, respecting 

 the position and character of the outlying stations or buildings, 

 as these have often a direct relation to the principal thorough- 

 fares in the town arid the routes and roads outside it. 



The site to which I would now call the attention of the 

 Society is interesting from this point of view. It is situated 

 outside the town ditch, beyond the Barriwell Gate on St 

 Andrew's Street, the road which is claimed as the Via Devana, 

 and also on Downing Street, the road which now runs across the 

 King's Ditch by Pembroke to the King's Mill, where there is 

 the greatest interruption in the course of the river which 

 occurs anywhere in Cambridge. Here was the place where it 

 is most probable that the earliest river crossing was situated, 

 but, if Downing Street ran as now into Pembroke Street, it 

 must have crossed the King's Ditch obliquely not far from the 

 Trumpington Gate, a most improbable supposition. 



Now when we examine the section along the north edge of 

 Downing Street in front of Emmanuel we find that down to 

 the 17th century at any rate there was no road there. 



In fact we have here evidence that we are quite on the 

 outskirts of the inhabited area. A road probably ran out by 

 Christ's College a,nd the monastery of Dominicans or Black 

 Friars, afterwards Emmanuel College. West of this road, now 

 St Andrew's Street, was open country, the lower part of which 

 was full of springs and liable to floods. Just as on the out- 

 skirts of an Italian town you see the Trattoria dei Cacciatori, 

 so here was a convenient house of call for sportsmen in the 

 Bird Bolt Hotel. 



