I Philip Kinaston y bu dwy verch un... a briododd Robert Corbed o Stanart; a'r llall ododd... Cliff o Averton.

Cais Ferched Iankyn Kinaston dalen yn ol.

(To be continued.)

a bri

ROMAN ROADS IN ENGLISH MAELOR.

BY THE REV. CANON M. H. LEE.

ON the west side of Croxton Pool, in that detached part of Flintshire which is called English Maelor, and three-quarters of a mile north-east of the village of Hanmer, there is a Roman way, to which Mr. Thompson Watkins thus refers in his Roman Cheshire, cap. iii, p. 52: "This is certainly the main road from Chester southward. A fine fragment of it I lately detected, 56 feet in width, counting from the depression marking the fosse on each side, and 6 feet in height. It is about 200 yards in length, and adjoining it, on the west side, is a mound (mons exploratorius) 226 feet from east to west, and 182 feet from north to south. The preservation of this fragment of the road, pointing almost exactly north and south, is evidently due to the fact that it at this point crossed a slack or hollow which was formerly a morass, Croxton Pool being the sole remnant of the latter." Acting upon Mr. Watkins' suggestion I had the mound and its surroundings carefully probed, in the hope that some milestones might be found, but without success.

The name of this causeway is Sawerdek, and it seems to have belonged to William le Yonge in the time of Edward I. Perhaps he may have come with the English army. His daughter and heiress, Margaret, married a Welsh magnate; but they preserved the English surname, their son being called Morgan Yonge of Sawerdek. This word must certainly be allowed to stand to the account of etymology, and of history by induction. Before it was known that there was any such place a Welsh interpreter of border names suggested that this one was from sarn and têg the beautiful causeway. From here a footpath goes east to Cadros, a point to

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be noticed afterwards, while the road is for the present lost; but on crossing a field to the south we are met by a steep, wooded bank about 100 feet wide, called after Joan, the wife of Llewelyn, "Cae-Shoned" Janet's Field. In front of this wood, within which there is quite a collection of fera natura,-rabbits, rats, badgers, and foxes occupying the ground, and brown owls, wood-pigeons, and pheasants the upper stories,-there is a long meadow, which was till lately a pool, the water being dammed up by a causeway 16 yards wide, which was removed a few years ago by the farmer. Some of the stones are still lying about at the place, but do not seem to have any marks upon them.

In an exact line with this sarn is a deep cutting through the bank, the woods trending inward to that point; and at the top we find a wide plateau, called the Caer Gwyn, covering many acres. The rampart on this northern side is about 500 yards long; the northeast angle being an especially fine one, and well preserved. The west side has been guarded by a fosse, now filled up. On the south there is also a steep bank, while on the east it is very irregular. Within these boundaries we find the name "Ty Prophwyd"=Prophet's House; supposed to mark the abode of the eremitical person mentioned by St. Bede, lib. ii, cap. 2, who was consulted by the Abbot of Bangor when withstanding Augustine.

Another name is "Cae Wilkin". As this word is found beside almost every camp in this neighbourhood, it is supposed to be the Welsh word gwalchan=a watch-post.

Entering a field across a road on the south side of the Brook House, we pass a small camp of construction", of which the eastern angle and two sides are preserved. Mr. Watkins thus describes the innumerable rectangular elevations which are found, generally without a name, on the course of the road. They are supposed to be the places of defence which the road-makers used during its construction.

Still going south, a strong position is reached called "Arabenlock" in the parish map, but written " Plas Arabi ap Karwet" in a deed of Edward II. Here again there is an angle to the south-east, and two lengths of moat; and on the west the bank is scarped, with pools at the bottom. Karwyd was a member of the Monastery of Bangor Is y Coed circa 500 A.D.; and that his son Arabi had occupied an earthwork upon the great road is established by our finding the name "Cadlys" (W. a temporary camp) close by, this being the well known name for a British work, in this instance. one that had fallen into the hands of the Romans.

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The modern road from Eglwys y Groes may here be on the line of the old one. It keeps on the east side of Llyn Bedydd (=lake of baptism), and away from it by two zigzags, thus reaching the Smithy on the Ellesmere Road. Some old people have heard that there had once been a road much nearer the lake, and following the course of its bed; but this cannot have been the ancient via, because, as we shall show, the lake was not at first drained when the road was brought there, but at some later date. The point now reached was called "Batebruggemore" circa 1284, when the Ellesmere and Whitchurch road was made; and we shall return to it again.

From a house just to the west of the Smithy the via may now be easily tracked for more than a mile to the south-west, by a depression and by abundance of gravel and flaky stones. There are here, on the north of the via, two houses called Lane Farm. One of them is marked by an old yew and a large angular camp, to which probably the name "Kigwenit" (=? wheat-field) formerly belonged. At the other Lane Farm a small branch from the ancient via once dropped in; and we find the name "Ox Close", which occurs in several other places in this neighbourhood beside Roman roads.

The via now reaches the "Old Lane Coppy", and runs the whole length of it, with a kind of earth wall on the south side; its course being known by a depres

sion. The meaning of this, of course, is that the materials were utilised in making new roads. At the east end of this wood there is a fragment which may, perhaps, represent the original via. If so, it is the first that occurs since Sawerdek, showing how complete has been the absorption of the ancient road.

On leaving the wood a gravel-pit indicates the course, which is the same as the modern road for 200 yards; and then it passed, at the west of the Railway Station, through a field called "Brandas": there is a tradition of burnt houses here. To the east of Market Drayton there is "Burnt Wood". There is also an oozy place extending for some distance to "the gate"-road, and so by Rotten Row (? Sax. rotteren to gather together) to Eachleys or Yetchley (?=gate, i.e., road, meadow), and by "Bun-chough" (ban clawdd=high embankment), where there is a wet place, and a choked up well with white stones in the shape of a cross, to Blackhurste Ffordd (Black Forest Road). There is here a stream which might be forded; but as the ancient via has been tracked through Salop up to this point (Archæologia Cambrensis for July 1874) it is probable that the word refers to the road and not to the water.

Returning to Eachleys, we find a branch road through Welshampton towards Penley, and so by Halghton Hall to Bangor. "Bal-mur" (wall of the high place) occupied the site of the modern Hampton. The wall is supposed to have consisted of mounds made of gravel, some 12 ft. high, and 50 yards apart from one another, the intervening space being stockaded. Only one of these mounds now remains. A similar one that was removed in 1873, to make way for a new house, was said to be composod mostly of gravel. Holmur Pit, a little to the east, shows that Hole i' th' Wall is not a name confined to Northumberland. We shall have occasion to notice several places called Gwallia, a Wallington, etc., in all of which the wall may have been made on this plan.