Akeman Street: Moving Through Iron Age and Roman Landscapes

This book examines the role of Akeman Street, the Roman road stretching from St Albans to Cirencester, in a unique and unusual way, choosing to look not at the technology of the Roman road, as more traditional studies do, but rather to look at the 'human' aspect of the road: the symbiosis held between the route and the wider human and physical landscape. Drawing on archaeological evidence from the route and surrounding sites and using social studies of the period, Copeland speculates on who might have travelled the road, who might have settled along its route and what experiences these individuals might have had. Seeing the road as a circulator not only of people but also ideas, goods and capital, he re-evaluates themes such as continuity and change, military use and social identity in the town and countryside against the historical backdrop of the 1st and 2nd ceturies AD.