The Road: A Story of Romans and Ways to the Past

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It's not perfect, and there are definitely moments when Hadley loses control of his prose and both he and you get a bit lost. Publication dates are subject to change (although this is an extremely uncommon occurrence overall). Although this book stuttered and stumbled at times - a bit like a traveller on The Road itself - I nevertheless found it of the greatest interest, full of information that would be hard to gain elsewhere. This kind of energy to a piece of writing, or a ‘posher than the queen’, deliberately obtuse Brian Sewell quote, always reminds me of the infamous tale recounted in Sir Kenneth Dover’s autobiography where, when walking in the Italian hills, he was so overcome with the beauty and poeticism of the moment that he proceeded to masturbate to completion.

Hotjar sets this cookie to know whether a user is included in the data sampling defined by the site's pageview limit. Some of the data that are collected include the number of visitors, their source, and the pages they visit anonymously. As the Britons fell back to the Thames, the road pursued them to the river’s edge, carrying troops, supplies and military despatches. In the beginning was Watling Street, the first road scored on the land when the invading Romans arrived on a cold and alien Kentish shore in 41 CE.For two thousand years they have determined the flow of ideas and folktales, where battles were fought and where pilgrims trod. Readers would be better served with the images printed on better paper bound into the centre of the book. Whilst a portion of Hadley’s road appears at start of each new section, a fold out version which showed the entire road in a broader situational context would have been useful. For all ebook purchases, you will be prompted to create an account or login with your existing HarperCollins username and password.

We all think we know about Roman roads because they are straight, but this book shows there is far more to them than that. Great book, engaging, thought provoking, interesting, informative and poetic - a connection with the past at a time when we need to remember that the past is still with us.For two thousand years, the roads the Romans built have determined the flow of ideas and folktales, where battles were fought and where pilgrims trod. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.

Year after year the heavy clay swallowed whole lengths of it; the once mighty road became a bridleway, an overgrown hollow-way, a parched mark in the soil. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others.

The shock and awe experienced by the bewildered Britons that the construction of a rapid troop transport system by a supremely organised and skilled group of soldiers can only be imagined. There is equal pleasure in following him through the countryside in all seasons, sharing his reflections on how echoes of past millennia continue to be part of our present experience. Thought there'd be more to it, but there are some interesting historical asides here and there, even if, for some reason, I felt it'd be a lot more focused on the attempt to follow a forgotten Roman road than it was. Ebooks fulfilled through Glose cannot be printed, downloaded as PDF, or read in other digital readers (like Kindle or Nook). Gathering traces of archaeology, history and landscape from poems, church walls, hag stones and cropmarks, oxlips, killing places, hauntings and immortals, and things buried too deep for archaeology, The Road is a mesmerising journey into two thousand years of history only now giving up its secrets.

I found the author's interpretation of a Boudican war origin for the fort at Great Chesterford of particular interest. This book deserves to be read at least twice, first to appreciate what it reveals and then to luxuriate in its effervescent voice. Drawing on the findings of years of work by dedicated archaeologists, aerial photographers and historians, Hadley travels the length of a spur of Ermine street in the direction of Great Chesterford pondering how and why it was built and the lives of the people who travelled or lived along it.I admit that my pitch barely sounds any better but, well, I'm glad Hadley made it, his agent touted it and William Collins accepted it.