A1-The Great North Road
Braughing lies at the navigable extremity of the Rib, a northern tributary of the Lea, among the chalk hills of East Hertfordshire, which are capped here with boulder clay, flint, sand and gravel. The land was probably marshy in pre-Roman and Roman times, with any evidence of ancient occupation restricted to higher ground.
There is some evidence of the presence of Mesolithic, Neolithic and Bronze Age hunters and fishers in this area. Settled occupation seems to have begun in the Iron Age about the third century BC. Trade contacts existed between Italy and Gaul and the Braughing/Puckeridge area during the later years of the first century BC. Artefacts found at Gatesbury and Skeleton Green (north of Puckeridge) confirm this. The Roman settlement at Wickham Hill has never been completely excavated, but enough can be gleaned from crop marks and the minor excavations that have been done to tell us that Braughing was an important Roman town.
Close to the Icknield Way and at the junction of Ermine Street and Stane Street, both of which probably had pre-Roman histories, made Braughing a strategic Iron-Age centre. The Roman settlement covered an area of at least thirty-six hectares, the nucleus of which lies on a low chalk ridge between the River Rib and Ermine Street and the preceding Celtic settlement may have been even larger.
Ermine Street itself skirted the settlements western edge of the Roman settlement and both sides were lined with timber buildings. With open porticoes fronting Ermine Street they had tiled roofs and wattle and daub walls rendered with white wash.
Thanks to V High of the Braughing Community Web Site and Roman-Britain.org for most of this information. Follow the links for more. There is a sketch-map of the area in ancient times here.
Lincolnshire
©Biff Vernon 2002