Ask Arbury: The Roman Villa in Arbury

    

E-mail to Arbury Cambridge blog:

Was a Roman villa found at King's Hedges? I recently saw an outside display in North Arbury/King's Hedges Ward called 'The Roman Landscape in King's Hedges' which claims there was one. And is King's Hedges Road Roman? 

We've seen that display. Electoral wards are not historic areas and local historians really do need to be mindful of that fact.

The answer to your questions regarding the Roman villa and King's Hedges Road is no. The Roman villa was found on the site of King's Hedges School, which is not part of the historic King's Hedges acres. Historically, King's Hedges was simply a named property, a farm, of fifty eight acres, and is now north of the guided busway. It was never a district.

King's Hedges School is dearly loved by many of us and we treasure it, but those in the know accept it's not actually in any historically meaningful King's Hedges district, and the site it was built on had nothing to do with King's Hedges. The school was named by the council in 1968, which then had a bit of an obsession with the name. King's Hedges School pupils and teachers made many contributions to the Arbury 1980 project and the 1981 Arbury Is Where We Live! book.

'Kinges Headge' was named by local manorial landowners the Brackyn family, first appearing in print in 1588. The name points to a royal hedged hunting warren, used to trap and kill animals for 'sport' in the days of the old Royal Manor of Chesterton. These were the 'King's Hedges' and the king would watch the sport from his royal box. The 'sporting' use of the site was also current in the early 1800s - with local pugilists slugging it out - for the 'enjoyment' of Town and Gown. 

Take a look at our map below. The Roman villa was not at King's Hedges.

The Arbury or Harborough Meadows and Furlongs superimposed on our 1904 map. The names were a variation on each other, interchangeable, and derived from the earthwork which was a visible landscape feature for over two thousand years. Ring Fort Road at Orchard Park (originally Arbury Park and Arbury Camp Farm before that) has preserved part of the outline of the ancient earthwork.

'Cambridge Evening News', 1969: the Roman villa and much earlier finds in a North Arbury barley field. The road built on the site is called Northfield Avenue. Click on image for readable view.

The King's Hedges Estate is purely a product of mid-to-late 20th Century council planners' imaginations and the 'King's Hedges' name has no historical weight in that area, which is also, and far more appropriately, known as North Arbury.

What is particularly vexing about this is the way planners and local councils ignore the work put in by historian Sallie Purkis and the local community in the early 1980s for Arbury 1980 and the Arbury Is Where We Live! book, and wilfully rewrite history with no regard for that work. 

If the work had been carried out by people in a more affluent area of the city, we daresay it would still be fawned over to this day - and seen as important. But in an area like Arbury - it seems to be a matter of ignoring the historical truth uncovered by the local (largely working class) community, and forking out for what is actually nonsense - like the display below.

We do hope that we, the public, are not paying for misinformation on outside - or other - displays like this.

The Roman Landscape at "King's Hedges", that towering entity built on council planners' whims, is actually about the Roman landscape elsewhere - namely the old Arbury/Harborough Meadows/Manor Farm, north of Arbury Road.

Of course, the old map doesn't call the area of the Roman villa 'King's Hedges'. We can't imagine why (tongue in cheek).

For your final question, no King's Hedges Road is not Roman. It was originally a dead end farm track, leading to the original King's Hedges (see map at the top of this blog post). The majority of King's Hedges Road dates from the late 1970s, when it was redirected and extended across the old Arbury/Harborough Meadows as part of the Cambridge Northern Bypass/A14 development. The new road actually lopped off the end of the original Arbury Road, and is actually on a totally different course to the original King's Hedges Road.

From 'The Story of Cambridge', Stephanie Boyd, Cambridge University Press, 2005. The Roman villa was found in the old Harborough/Arbury Meadows and Furlongs, now Northfield Avenue, not far from Arbury Camp (see map at top of post) - and was quite luxurious, including a hypocaust (underfloor heating).

As far as we are concerned, the King's Hedges thing is rather a cuckoo in the nest, and shows that council planners have no regard for local history, or the efforts of the public in producing works like Arbury Is Where We Live! The history of King's Hedges should be about the historic King's Hedges - the farm and hedged hunting warren - not constantly pinching bits of Arbury. 

If it was King's Hedges it would be, without protest, query, or old maps and documents saying otherwise.

We love to receive your emails, but please remember we are not the only ones producing local history work and we have nothing to do with anybody who proclaims King's Hedges as anything other than King's Hedges historically. We know there is a 'King's Hedges Estate' Arbury sub-district on the old Arbury Meadows, created by council planners in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, and we love King's Hedges School, but historically the name is meaningless in that location.

We spend so much time on the subject answering puzzled enquirers, yet we don't even find the history of King's Hedges very appealing. Hedged hunting warrens for royal entertainment and 'sport' and vast 1970s road extensions really do not interest us much.

This is our last word on the subject. We had several emails from readers believing that we, as local historians, wrote it. Please do not blame us for the outdoor display. We had absolutely nothing to do with it.

The majority of King's Hedges Road appeared in the late 1970s, across the old Harborough/Arbury Meadows by the Arbury iron age camp - and lopped off the original end of Arbury Road.