Page:VCH Derbyshire 1.djvu/324

 A HISTORY OF DERBYSHIRE which offers very serious problems to the student, is that which lies north of Derby or, perhaps rather, of Clay Cross. From Bourton to Derby it can be easily followed with only brief spells of uncertainty, and its approach to Derby from the south is singularly plain. From the ' station ' at Wall (Letocetum) near Lich- field it runs unswervingly north-eastwards to the outskirts of Derby, and its line is throughout represented by modern roads and not seldom by parish boundaries. Crossing the Dove and entering our county at or close to Monksbridge l it traverses Egginton Common, where (we are told) it was visible in the early eighteenth century, and keeps its due course to Littleover. So far, it coincides with the present Burton and Derby high road, but as it approaches Derby this latter swerves away to the east, and the ancient line is lost across the town. If continued direct it would cut the golf links near the Pavilion, pass down the Uttoxeter Old Road in front of the prison and near the end of Nuns Street, and finally descend at Darley Grove to the Roman bridge over the Derwent. Scanty clues supplied by existing roads and fences suggest that this was the real line ; but amidst the buildings of a great city certainty is un- attainable. 2 On the east bank of the Derwent the road probably ran at first due east in front of the north face of Little Chester fort, where Stukeley's map shows a gravelled way (fig. 23 u). Then it turned north-eastwards past Breadsall Priory, and then, turning again, assumed the northerly direction which it keeps with slight variations so far as it can be traced. Till Hartshay its course lies slightly west of north; till Oakerthorpe slightly east of north ; finally, it seems to run due north till near Clay Cross. It is rarely a parish boundary. But it sometimes coincides with straight modern lanes, as between Horsley Woodhouse and Hartshay and at Oakerthorpe and Higham. Its remains have often been noted in the fields. They are said to be still visible between Morley Moor and Horsley Lodge, at Bottle brook near Denby, near Pentrich, and at Coneygre Farm, and earlier observers thought to see it at many places as far north as Clay Cross, and even though the evidence of this is less satisfactory between Egstow and Wingerworth, a little north of Clay Cross. 3 We may also cite the place names Streetlane, between Denby and Hartshay, and Stretton and Strathfield, a mile and a half north of 1 This bridge has been thought to contain Roman masonry encased in later work (Rye, Burton-on- Trent Nat. Hist, and Arch. Soc. Proc. iv. I. 34). But this needs to be proved, especially as the bridge stands on a tiny detour of the modern road out of the direct line and the ancient road may have run straight on. 8 The O. S. (six inch, XLIX.SE. and L.SW.) marks the Roman road as swerving with the Burton road. But for this there seems no reason at all. Others have suggested that two ancient roads existed, a Roman Rycknield Street and a British one, and that the two diverged at Littleover, the Roman running on to Darley Grove and the British taking the line of the Burton road and crossing the Derwent below Little Chester. But the British Rycknield Street is purely imaginary. 8 The road up to Clay Cross has been traced by many observers, first, perhaps, by Pegge in Sep- tember, 1760. For existing traces I may refer to Mr. Ward, the pieces marked on the O. S. XL. and XLV., and Firth, Highways and Byways of Derbyshire (London, 1905), pp. 431, 437. Pegge notices it very fully up to Egstow (Roads through the Coritani and B. M. Add. 6705). John Gratton, a correspondent of Glover, writing in 1829, asserts that he had traced it north of Egstow, but his account is not very satisfactory (Glover, i. 290). 244