54 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. CHAP. 



called Akeman Street, which connected the Vale of Gloucester with 

 the great western route called Watling Street. 



From Durocornovium parted the great road to Londinium, 

 through Spinse (Speen), and Calleva (Silchester), in the country 

 of the Atrebatii, a place signalized by the great range of its yet 

 standing walls, and the extent of its interior streets and houses, 

 lately explored with taste and liberality by the Duke of Wellington 

 and Mr. Joyce. 



From the road last mentioned more than one track leading to 

 the Icknield Way is traceable, across or at the foot of the chalk 

 downs to Durocina (Dorchester) and Wallingford on the Thames, 

 and thence by Camboritum (near Cambridge) to the camp of Venta 

 Icenorum, near Norwich. And from Durocina, northward, ran a 

 road now called the Portway, by Shotover Hill, to ^Elia Castra 

 (Alcester), Brinavse (Edgecot), and the station supposed to be 

 Bennavenna or Isanavatia, near Daventry. 



These are for the most part roads which connected considerable 

 military stations and towns of magnitude ; there are others which 

 seem to have just claims to equal antiquity, though not for the 

 same objects. Such are the continuous trackways which keep 

 along the higher ridges of dry land, and hold their course among 

 fortified hills and long mounds of tumuli, with occasional megalithic 

 remains. Such tracks may be followed from the deep Stroudwater 

 valley, along the edges of the hills, with glorious views over the 

 rich Vale of Gloucester to the mountainous regions beyond, by 

 Birdlip and Leckhampton, to the great gap at Andover's Ford; 

 from which again the hill-paths lead along the Stanway crest to 

 Broadway and the extended promontory of the Ilmingdon Hills. 

 Everywhere points of hills cut off by defensive dykes ; often small 

 inclosures or camps; frequent mounds, more suited for watching 

 living foes than inclosing departed friends. Everywhere the marks 

 of such a period as that which came to an end when the great 

 Silurian chief yielded to the Roman power. 



It is generally supposed that the numerous earth-mounds on the 

 edge of the oolites from Bath toward Edgehill were, if not 

 constructed, employed in the war of Ostorius against Caractacus. 

 The words of Tacitus, ' inter Aufonas,' are supposed to limit the 

 fortified line. Camps, like those of Sodbury, and Uleybury, and 

 Standi sh Hill, may readily be accepted as Roman works ; but many 



