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Publication Account

Date 1985

Event ID 1016239

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Publication Account

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1016239

The climb of Wo den Law (423m) is well worthwhile. The line of the Roman Road is quite well preserved alongside the gully rising from Tow Ford, but is even more distinct further east, towards Hunthall Hill- a linear mound some 8.2m wide and 1.2m high. It is but a short stretch to the Border, to the signal station on Brownhart Law (NT 79009G) and to camps at Chew Green (NT 7808-7908). A major highway throughout the later medieval period, and equally in pre-Roman times, to the Romans it was their crucial link between York and the Firth of Forth, crucial to their conquest of Scotland. Though the road fell into disrepair after Agricola's withdrawal cAD 100, it was reconstructed during the Antonine reoccupation in the 2nd century and played an important part in the 3rd century Severan Campaign.

Equally vital was control of Wo den Law, strategically situated just north of the watershed. Originally it was a native British fort, built in three stages (see section 8) a settlement surrounded by a single, oval stone dyke, to which was then added a double rampart and intervening ditch. Both ramparts were demolished quite soon after completion, probably as a result of Roman road-building and occupation, and the site was only reoccupied by native peoples after the Romans left. Then the innermost rubble dyke on the top of the hill was built and faced with boulders.

The Romans, however, seem to have used Woden Law for siege practice (if the so-called siegeworks are not simply part of the native defences). They dug a remarkable earthwork of two banks between three ditches at 12m-30m from the fort's defences: in other words, mostly beyond the killing-range for hand-thrown missiles. Several flattened platforms on the outer bank seem to have provided sites for siegeengines, protected by the inner bank and ditch, whilst beyond the main siegework, three further independent lines of earthworks were built in the customary Roman manner of short, separate sections. These are all incomplete.

A further feature, the series of five cross-dykes spanning the easy ridge between Woden Law and Hunthall Hill, is pre-Roman however, and part of the native British defence system. Such cross-dykes are not uncommon in relation to hillforts in the Cheviotsi here they guard access from the main Cheviot ridge and emphasise the importance of the site and the route.

Information from 'Exploring Scotland's Heritage: Lothian and Borders', (1985).

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