Monument record 8652 - 2nd Century Roman road and ditch at St Martin's Lodge

<1> Archaeological Research Services Ltd, 2013, St Martin's Lodge, Chester, Cheshire Archaeological Excavation and Watching Brief, R3503 (Client Report). SCH7203.

Evidence of an mid second century road with roadside ditch was encountered during archaeological investigations at St Martin's Lodge in 2013. Located in the canabae legionis, this area is currently poorly understood with limited archaeological remains discovered from a small number of sites. The evidence here suggests a new layout was introduced to the area in the mid second century that survived into the late Roman period at least.

The evidence consisted of a roadside ditch [223] on a northwest to southeast alignment measuring approximately 1.5m in width. It was excavated to a maximum depth of 0.5m but the base was not reached on this occasion. There were several successive fills in the ditch suggesting a long period of use, finds recovered suggest it remained in use for the remainder of the Roman period. To the northeast, a road agger was constructed on a base gravel deposit [250] that sealed the earlier Roman activity. The agger comprised a 0.3m thick layer of silty clay with rubble, cobbles and river gravel inclusions and sealed by layer [230] interpreted as a turf horizon within the agger. This was subsequently sealed by several layers of clay, sand and gravel and a final road surface [218] of cobbles, gravel and crushed ceramic buildng material. Post medieval truncation had removed any deposit overlying this, however.