Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Home
  • Home
EnglishFrançais
Antiquity Antiquity

Article contents

Pathways to past ways: a positive approach to routeways and mobility

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 September 2020

Martin Bell  and
Jim Leary [Opens in a new window]
Martin Bell
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeology, University of Reading, UK
Jim Leary
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeology, University of York, UK
Corresponding
E-mail address:
jim.leary@york.ac.uk
Get access
Rights & Permissions[Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Past trackways and the mobility associated with them have long been a neglected topic of research in Britain—a lack of attention attributable to the publication of Alfred Watkins's The old straight track in 1925. Yet, new interdisciplinary approaches, including from the perspectives of social theory and the sciences, can allow us to move forward. Here the authors offer the first steps towards a positive approach to understanding past mobility.

Keywords

Britain trackways routeways mobility landscape archaeology
Type
Debate
Information
Antiquity , Volume 94 , Issue 377 , October 2020 , pp. 1349 - 1359
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd, 2020

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below.
If you should have access and can't see this content please contact technical support.

References

Adey, P. 2010. Mobility. Abingdon: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203875483Google Scholar
Allen, M.J. 2005. Considering prehistoric environmental changes on the Marlborough Downs, in Brown, G., Field, D. & McOmish, D. (ed.). The Avebury landscape: aspects of the field archaeology of the Marlborough Downs: 77–86. Oxford: Oxbow.Google Scholar
Bakker, J.A. 1976. On the possibility of reconstructing roads from the TRB period. Berichten van de Rijksdienst voor het Oudheidkundig Bodemonderzoek Jaargang 26: 63–91.Google Scholar
Bakker, J.A. 1991. Prehistoric long-distance roads in North-West Europe, in Lichardus, J. (ed.) Die Kupferzeit als historische Epoche: 502–28. Bonn: R. Habelt.Google Scholar
Bang, J. 2013. The route to a history of the cultural landscape: a Danish record of prehistoric and historic roads, tracks and related structures, in Bergerbrant, S. & Sabatini, S. (ed.) Counterpoint: essays in archaeology and heritage studies in honour of Professor Kristian Kristiansen (British Archaeological Reports International series 2508): 703–15. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports.Google Scholar
Bell, M. 2007. Prehistoric coastal communities: the Mesolithic in western Britain (Council for British Archaeology Research Report 149). York: Council for British Archaeology.Google Scholar
Bell, M. 2020. Making one's way in the world: the footprints and trackways of prehistoric people. Oxford: Oxbow.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bell, M., Black, S., Maslin, S. & Toms, P.. 2020. Multi-method solutions of the problems of dating early trackways and associated colluvial sequences. Journal of Archaeological Science Reports 32. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jasrep.2020.102359CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Booth, P., Champion, T., Foreman, S., Garwood, P., Glass, H., Munby, J. & Reynolds, A.. 2011. On track: the archaeology of High Speed I section I in Kent. Oxford: Oxford & Wessex Archaeology.Google Scholar
Bradley, R. 1997. Rock art and the prehistory of Atlantic Europe. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Bradley, R., Rogers, A., Sturt, F. & Watson, A.. 2016. Maritime havens in earlier prehistoric Britain. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 82: 125–59. https://doi.org/10.1017/ppr.2015.22CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brunning, R. & McDermott, C.. 2013. Trackways and roads across the wetlands, in Menotti, F. & O’ Sullivan, A. (ed.) The Oxford handbook of wetland archaeology: 359–85. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Casparie, W.A. 1987. Bog trackways in the Netherlands. Palaeohistoria 29: 35–65.Google Scholar
Chadwick, A.M. 2016. Foot-fall and hoof-hit agencies: movements, materialities and identities; and later prehistoric and Romano-British trackways. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 26: 93–120. https://doi.org/10.1017/S095977431500027XCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coles, J. 1984. Prehistoric roads and trackways in Britain: problems and possibilities, in Fenton, A. & Stell, G. (ed.) Loads and roads in Scotland and beyond: road transport over 6000 years: 1–21. Edinburgh: John Donald.Google Scholar
Crawford, O.G.S. 1922. The Andover District: an account of Sheet 283 of the one-inch Ordnance Survey Map. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Cresswell, T. 2006. On the move: mobility in the modern Western world. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Curwen, E. & Curwen, E.C.. 1923. Sussex lynchets and their associated field ways. Sussex Archaeological Collections 64: 1–65.Google Scholar
Evans, J. 2003. Environmental archaeology and the social order. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203711767Google Scholar
Fleming, A. 2012. Devon's early roads: Devon Archaeological Society Presidential Lecture 2011. Proceedings of the Devon Archaeological Society 70: 1–23.Google Scholar
Fowler, P. 1998. Moving through the landscape, in Everson, P. & Williamson, T. (ed.) The archaeology of landscape: studies presented to Christopher Taylor: 25–41. Manchester: Manchester University Press.Google Scholar
Fox, C. 1923. The archaeology of the Cambridge region. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Haughey, F. 2013. Rivers and lakes: a network of wetland highways, in Menotti, F. & O'Sullivan, A. (ed.) The Oxford handbook of wetland archaeology: 385–97. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hauser, K. 2008. Bloody old Britain: O.G.S. Crawford and the archaeology of modern life. London: Granta.Google Scholar
Ingold, T. 2004. Culture on the ground: the world perceived through feet. Journal of Material Culture 9: 315–40. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359183504046896CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ingold, T. 2011. Being alive: essays on movement, knowledge and description. Abingdon: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klassen, L. 2014. Along the road: aspects of causewayed enclosures in South Scandinavia and beyond. Aarhus: Aarhus University Press.Google Scholar
Leopold, E.B. & Boyd, R.. 1999. An ecological history of old prairie areas in south-western Washington, in Boyd, R. (ed.) Indians, fire and the land in the Pacific Northwest: 139–63. Corvallis: Oregon State University Press.Google Scholar
Leary, J. 2014. Past mobility: an introduction, in Leary, J. (ed.) Past mobilities: archaeological approaches to movement and mobility: 1–20. Farnham: Ashgate.Google Scholar
Leary, J. In press. Roam: an archaeology of movement. London: Bloomsbury.Google Scholar
Miles, D., Palmer, S., Lock, G., Gosden, C. & Cromarty, A.M.. 2003. Uffington White Horse and its landscape: investigations at White Horse Hill, Uffington, 1989–95 and Tower Hill, Ashbury 1993–4. Oxford: Oxford Archaeology.Google Scholar
Müller, S. 1904. Vei og bygd i sten-og bronzealderen. Aarbøger for Nordisk Oldkyndighed og Historie 1904: 1–64.Google Scholar
Olding-Smee, F.J., Laland, K.N. & Feldman, M.W.. 2003. Niche construction. American Naturalist 147: 641–48. https://doi.org/10.1086/285870CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Raftery, B. 1990. Trackways through time. Dublin: Headline.Google Scholar
Sherratt, A. 1996. Why Wessex? The Avon route and river transport in later British prehistory. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 15: 211–34. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0092.1996.tb00083.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, C. 1979. Roads and tracks of Britain. London: Dent.Google Scholar
Tilley, C. 1994. A phenomenology of landscape. Oxford: Berg.Google Scholar
Urry, J. 2007. Mobilities. Cambridge: Polity.Google Scholar
Watkins, A. 2014 [1925]. The old straight track. London: Head of Zeus.Google Scholar
Williams-Freeman, J.P. 1915. An introduction to field archaeology as illustrated by Hampshire. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Williamson, T. & Bellamy, L.. 1983. Ley lines in question. Tadworth: World's Work.Google Scholar

Altmetric attention score

Full text views

Full text views reflects PDF downloads, PDFs sent to Google Drive, Dropbox and Kindle and HTML full text views.

Total number of HTML views: 904
Total number of PDF views: 247 *
View data table for this chart

* Views captured on Cambridge Core between 01st September 2020 - 18th January 2021. This data will be updated every 24 hours.

2 Cited by
Hostname: page-component-77fc7d77f9-fgqm6 Total loading time: 0.348 Render date: 2021-01-18T01:29:05.134Z Query parameters: { "hasAccess": "0", "openAccess": "0", "isLogged": "0", "lang": "en" } Feature Flags last update: Mon Jan 18 2021 00:55:41 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time) Feature Flags: { "metrics": true, "metricsAbstractViews": false, "peerReview": true, "crossMark": true, "comments": true, "relatedCommentaries": true, "subject": true, "clr": true, "languageSwitch": true, "figures": false, "newCiteModal": false, "shouldUseShareProductTool": true, "shouldUseHypothesis": true, "isUnsiloEnabled": true }

Send article to Kindle

To send this article to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about sending to your Kindle. Find out more about sending to your Kindle.

Note you can select to send to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be sent to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Pathways to past ways: a positive approach to routeways and mobility
Available formats
×

Send article to Dropbox

To send this article to your Dropbox account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your <service> account. Find out more about sending content to Dropbox.

Pathways to past ways: a positive approach to routeways and mobility
Available formats
×

Send article to Google Drive

To send this article to your Google Drive account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your <service> account. Find out more about sending content to Google Drive.

Pathways to past ways: a positive approach to routeways and mobility
Available formats
×
×

Reply to: Submit a response

Your details

Conflicting interests

Do you have any conflicting interests? *