SNN103888 - What the Romans did for Duston: Echoes in Todays Landscape

During 1996, the Roman Road (base) from Bannaventa was uncovered at the corner of Millway/Main Road, Duston in sewer workings at a depth of c 1 metre to 2 metres. The remains consisted of a double layer of hard limestone with lime mortar infill about 30cms thick. The alignment appeared to be in the direction of (today) Westbridge, Northampton to the east of duston. SLA then commenced an exploration of all the evidence with an anticipated completion date of 2006- ten years on. To date, 70 double-sided sheets of A$ paper containing everything known about Romano British Duston has been collated from 1847 to 2002. This production has been forced upon SLA due to the imminent development of the Sixfields site and the possible destruction of archaeological remians. In addition to the historical research, local residents have pointed out to SLA where open water leats ran, prior to the construction of British Timken. Other residents have spoken of walls revealed on the Borough refuse site (hastily to be buried again), of the amount of coins found on the allotment site and of other finds such as tesserae. SLA has made numerous field trips, as evidenced by the photographic examples produced here. There appear to be several phases of development from the Catelluvianni period. A possible short lived fort (not recognised by later RB road systems), a gravitation to the crossroads site (Ross Road embankments) and a spread south westerly in the Anglo Saxon period. The content is in rough form, based on our field notes. Questions can only be answered by sound archaeological principles.