Roman roads in Gwynedd
Segontium, the fort at Caernarfon, held the north-western corner of the empire for three centuries, and Sarn Helen ran south from it through the mountains. Some of the clearest surviving stretches of Roman mountain road anywhere in Wales are here, on the moors above Ffestiniog near the fort at Tomen y Mur, where the agger is plain as a raised band in the turf across empty ground.
- Mapped segments
- 19
- Surveyed length
- 230 km
- Named roads
- 1
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
Tomen y Mur is the outstanding site: a fort with an amphitheatre, parade ground and bath house in wholly empty moorland, with a Norman motte dropped into the middle of it. Caer Llugwy in the Lledr valley and the marching camps on the Migneint are for the determined; Caernarfon's fort is the easy one, laid out beside the road in the care of Cadw.
Named roads through Gwynedd
Sarn Helen
Segontium to Maridunum