History under our feet

Amateur archaeologists are being encouraged to take part in a series of bank holiday digs to unearth Hampshire’s Roman past

- Duncan Hall

It’s not often an amateur archaeologist gets the chance to excavate a Roman highway and a former quay.

But over the next three bank holidays Northeast Hampshire Historical and Archaeological Society (NEHHAS) is offering just that. The society has been investigating the course of a wide highway running between Winchester and Chichester since 2010, and over Easter will be exploring a machine-cut trench in Exton crossing two Roman Road lanes and the grid of a potential Roman site.

Further archaeological digs over the May and August bank holidays will explore a causeway west of the A32 which would have cut across the flood plain of the River Meon and is thought to link with a former quay.

Dr Richard Whaley, who is leading the digs, first came across evidence of a Roman road running between Winchester and Chichester through a document known as the Antonini Itinerary VII, which mentions distances and places between the two cities, including a settlement called Clausentium.

“The settlement was thought to be around Southampton,” says Richard. “But the itinerary gives Roman miles between various points which don’t agree with the road going down to Southampton. If there was a direct road from Winchester to Chichester then the itinerary would be correct.”