Roman roads in Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire's Roman roads are shaped by water. The fens were drained and farmed on a large scale under Rome, crossed by causeways and by the Car Dyke, a major artificial watercourse. Ermine Street ran north through Durovigutum at Godmanchester to Durobrivae at Water Newton, a pottery town whose kilns supplied much of the province. The road east from Cambridge toward Colchester is the best-attested part of what antiquaries later named the Via Devana.
- Mapped segments
- 89
- Surveyed length
- 530 km
- Named roads
- 4
Measured from the Itiner-e survey within the modern county boundary, which for Yorkshire, Cheshire and the other counties broken up in 1974 means the traditional area reassembled from its present-day parts. The survey maps far more road than it attributes to a named route, so the segment count counts everything, and the named roads below are only those with a history recorded here.
Where to see it
The Roman town at Godmanchester sits under the modern one, but the Car Dyke is traceable north of Cambridge, and the road over the Gog Magog hills survives as a chalk track with long views. The Water Newton treasure, the earliest known hoard of Christian liturgical silver from anywhere in the Roman empire, was found beside the road here and is now in the British Museum.
Named roads through Cambridgeshire
Ermine Street
Londinium to Eboracum
Via Devana
Camulodunum to Deva
King Street
Durobrivae to Ancaster
Icknield Way