Car Dyke

The Car Dyke was, and to large extent still is, an eighty-five-mile (137 km) long ditch which runs along the western edge of the Fens in eastern England. It is generally accepted as being of Roman age and, for many centuries, to have been taken as marking the western edge of the Fens. There, the consensus begins to break down.

Likely purpose

In the eighteenth century, William Stukeley described it as a canal used for transporting goods and his idea is still promulgated: For example, excavations at Waterbeach in the 1990s by the archaeology unit of Cambridge County Council found what were seen as the remains of a Roman-era boat and cargo of pottery from Horningsea. This stretch has been protected as a scheduled ancient monument. Other archaeological investigations have found coal from the Midlands in use at a cluster of Roman-era coal-burning forges sited between Cambridge and The Wash and these provide evidence of trade and transport along the Car Dyke. Return cargoes were grain to supply the garrison at York, prepared for transport and storage by drying in coal kilns, and pottery. At its northern end accounts of Roman Britain describe it as an extension of the Foss Dyke, an accepted transport route. Near Morton, Lincolnshire, a boatload of dressed quarry stone, identified with the mediaeval period, has been discovered in the canal bed.