Monument record MDO3429 - Roman Road Exeter-Bridport-Dorchester, Winterbourne Steepleton

'Approach road 3. The road approaching Dorchester from the W. from Exeter via Bridport (Margary's route 4, op.cit., 113-6) enters the borough near the first milestone S.E. of Poundbury Farm. The allignment, aimed at the S.W. quarter of the town, was the last but one of a series of straight lengths following the ridge from Eggardon; it was described in 1709 as 'a raised causeway coming directly from the west' (Warne, Ancient Dorset (1872), 221), and is plainly represented by the present Bridport Road which masks any remains of Roman construction. In 1774 it was said to be 'in perfection, high and broad, paved with flint and stone', from the W. end of Dorchester (Hutchins 1, vi)>
A final E.N.E. alignment of some 1100 yds. Required to bring the road in by the W. gate, is doubtless also masked by the modern road, although, as with Approach Road 2, a certain latitude is possible. Reasons are given below (p.550
) for suggesting that the W. gate was not quite at the head of High West Street, and may have been a few yards to the S. In 1965, however, a single thin layer of flinty gravel 27 ft. wide, resting on what was supposed to be natural Chalk, was seen in a cable trench dug N. to S. across the top of High West Street at a distance of some 10 ft. E. of the traffic island (as enlarged subsequent to the 1956 edition of the O.S plan SY 6890). The exposure was thus slightly outside the line of the town wall and could be the remains of the approach road (Dorset Procs. LXXXIX (1967), 144). There were signs suggesting the presence of the inner lip of the ditch both N. and S. of the supposed ,etalling, corresponding with the exposure a few feet to the N. in 1955 (Dorset Procs. LXXVII (1955), 129; see also Defences (174 h)). If correctly interpreted, these discoveries imply a causeway across the ditch, and a Roman gateway at the traditional site, but a made causeway could have been of more recent date'. (1)

<1> Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), 1970, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume III (Central) Part 1, 541 (Monograph). SDO146.

Record last edited

May 22 2012 11:05AM