ABSTRACT
The Romans who made their first reconnaissance to Britain in 55 bc had already established a road system from Italy to the Channel. Before the Romans came there were some roads, for Caesar refers in his account of the campaign against Cassivelaunus to the British king sending his chariots ‘by all the well known roads and tracks’. The army which used roads in Britain may have numbered 60,000 at the height of Roman power, far larger than any force assembled by an English medieval or Tudor sovereign. The survival rate of low-value Roman coins is such that they suggest there was considerable commercial business. By the third century Christianity had become established in southeast England and when Romans started their withdrawal it was to be the provider of culture and education. The oysters that are typically found in profusion on Roman sites imply their fairly rapid distribution, for unless they were carried in water tanks they would have quickly deteriorated.
