Wade's Causeway is a Roman road, or possibly a Neolithic structure, located in the North York Moors national park in North Yorkshire, England. It was excavated in mid-20th century and dated to the Roman period, but 21st century re-interpretations have suggested a possible Neolithic origin. Its origins, age, purpose and extent are subject to research and debate and have not been reliably established.
The name may be used to refer specifically to a length of stone course just over long on Wheeldale Moor and protected as a scheduled monument. It may be also be applied more broadly to include an additional postulated extension of this structure, two sections of which are also scheduled monuments, and which extend to the north and south of Wheeldale for up to . The visible course on Wheeldale Moor consists of an embankment of soil, peat, gravel and loose pebbles in height and in width. The gently cambered embankment is capped with un-mortared and loosely abutted flagstones. Its original form is uncertain since it has been subjected to weathering and human damage.
The structure has been the subject of local folklore for several hundred years and possibly for more than a millennium. Its construction was commonly attributed to a giant known as Wade, a figure from Germanic mythology.
Description Situation and geology The area through which the Wheeldale structure runs is predominantly uncultivated heather moorland. Hayes believes the area has remained fundamentally unchanged in appearance since the Bronze Age, when its forest cover was removed to permit cultivation and grazing. Wheeldale Moor is poorly drained in places making it susceptible to flooding in the ancient and modern eras. The underlying geology consists of patches of sand and gravel on top of mixed sandstone and oolitic limestone, known as Ravenscar Group strata.; ;
Construction
The causeway's visible section on Wheeldale Moor shows the remains of a continuous surface metalled with closely fitted slabs of sandstone with flat upper surfaces. The average size of a slab is square, but some examples are in breadth. One section of the causeway has a central ridge but the purpose of this feature is unknown. The stone flags are seated on a cambered base of mixed gravel, clay and either rubble, peat or soil, that forms a raised embankment. The embankment is from wide at its raised surface. Its width in some sections is increased by of ditch to either side, which may or may not be associated with its original construction, making an approximately uniform total width of . Its height above surrounding soil level is approximately .
Hayes and Rutter state that such an embankment's primary purpose would have been to provide good drainage for a road surface. Archaeologist David E Johnston states that the structure is crossed by numerous perpendicular drainage culverts with small becks trickling through them since the ground is often boggy. This could suggest a reason for the embankment, and its early attribution as a causeway—a route across the wetland, normally supported on earth or stone in the form of a raised embankment. Roman roads were commonly built on embankments which helped with drainage. Placenames that include 'causeway', and other elements such as 'ridge', may refer to the prominence of the road relative to the surrounding area. Some historians translate Livy's phrase for Roman military construction of roads, via munire, as "making a causeway".
Johnston, historian Nikolaus Pevsner and landscape historian Richard Muir all agree that an original gravel surface dressing was once present on top of the stone of the Wheeldale structure. Whereas Johnston and Pevsner believe that the gravel was washed away through weathering,; Muir states that human agents were primarily responsible for its removal. Both agree that the stonework remaining does not represent the original road surface. Statements by the eighteenth-century antiquary Francis Drake and nineteenth-century topographer Samuel Lewis that the writers found it to be "paved with a flint pebble" may support this theory, and although Hayes and Rutter cast doubt on the accuracy of Drake's reports. Nineteenth-century antiquarian Thomas Codrington states that in 1817 the causeway consisted of a "strong pavement of stones ... [with] above these another stratum of gravel ...", Hayes and Rutter state that "traces of a surface layer of gravel and small stones" remained visible in the 1960s, and professor of structural engineering John Knapton states that there remained some evidence of smaller surface-dressing pebbles as late as 1996.
Codrington and archaeologist Frank Elgee consider the structure was flanked in a few sections by lateral parallel ditches, but Hayes is doubtful whether they were part of the original construction or if they even existed.
Extant course
The excavated portion of the Wheeldale structure—the only section of a postulated greater extent that remains clearly visible to the naked eye—consists of a section on the eastern edge of Wheeldale Moor, facing Howl Moor. It runs in an approximately north-northeasterly direction between and SE 81077 98697 and is approximately above sea level. The presence of large quantities of stone on a raised agger, and the absence of much vegetation on its surface make the presence of the structure indisputable along this section. The causeway's course is linear along its visible section on Wheeldale Moor, consisting of several short, straight sections that occasionally pivot onto new alignments in a way not clearly demanded by the landscape. In 1855, several overgrown fragments of the structure were also reported visible at several points in the vicinity: near Morley Cross; east of Keys Beck; near Hazle houses; at July Park; and Castle Hill.
Possible extended course The structure is believed by several writers to extend far beyond its visible portion,; ; ; ; but no significant sections of its conjectured course remain visible to the naked eye or have been excavated or extensively surveyed, and there is little agreement on an exact course that an extension may have taken. The total original length of the structure is therefore unknown but may have been up to .
To the north Early records of the causeway's course to the north—when its remains were apparently more readily visible than today—differ considerably from one another: the early geologist and natural historian George Young, who wrote concerning the causeway in his History of Whitby, makes no clear mention of the route of the structure north of Wheeldale Moor; it is unmarked on the 1854 Ordnance Survey map of the area, and eighteenth-century historian Thomas Hinderwell's mention of it passing near Hunt House suggests a greatly differing route to that marked on 2012 Ordnance Survey mapping. At least one source states that a "conjectural" continuation to the north is visible in vertical aerial photography. Hayes reports that in his survey in the 1950s, he found a "trace of the embankment" in one short section and "a patch of the metalling" in four additional sections along a route past Hazle Head and Julian Park.
Beyond Julian Park, it has been conjectured that the structure originally continued to the Roman garrison fort at Lease Rigg, southwest of Sleights, based on reports from antiquarians in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries that fragments were visible at numerous points along this course. Hayes and Rutter appear confident of the structure's extent as far as Lease Rigg, but admit that its extent is conjectural from well short of that point, from Dowson Garth Quarry northwards.
Numerous authors have conjectured that the structure was a road that continued past Lease Rigg all the way to Roman coastal fortifications or signal stations somewhere near Whitby, but this is debated. Drake reports in 1736 that an associate had followed its course from Wheeldale Moor to the coast at Dunsley Bay. Still, Codrington is dismissive of his account, and it is unclear whether Drake meant to imply that a visible structure had been followed, or simply that the associate had followed a proposed route without encountering it. In either case, the author did not verify sight of the structure along this course himself. Several sources after 1805 report the same endpoint for the road,; ; ; but it is unclear whether they are echoing Drake or had visited the site themselves. Several authorities state that any termini beyond Lease Rigg are "doubtful" and "unproven", and Elgee states that the causeway's northern course "is obscure and its termination unknown". Hayes and Rutter in 1964 found no evidence for a continuation of the structure any further north than Lease Rigg. Other authorities argue for possible courses extending northwards to Goldsborough, Guisborough, or Sandsend Bay.
To the south
It has also been suggested that the structure originally extended southwards from Wheeldale Moor to link up to the Roman Cawthorne Camp (sometimes spelt 'Cawthorn'). In the twentieth century English Heritage identified two sections of ground on Flamborough Rigg and Pickering Moor as extensions of the Wheeldale structure. Hayes states that the Flamborough Rigg section remained "clearly visible" as late as 1961, and that additional sections near Keys Beck were visible in aerial photography from 1946. The accounts of Hinderwell, Young, and Hayes & Rutter, as well as the 1854 and 2012 Ordnance Survey maps, appear to corroborate the stated course of the structure along this section.
There is further conjecture that the original structure's course may have continued beyond Cawthorne Camp to a Roman settlement recorded as Derventio Brigantum (possibly corresponding to the modern-day settlement of either Stamford Bridge or Amotherby near Malton). Any postulated extension further south than Cawthorne is contested. Hinderwell reports in 1811 that the late Robert King had found evidence of a continuation of the causeway between "Newsom-bridge" and Broughton (a former township located near Appleton-le-Street). Hayes and Rutter failed to find any trace of the causeway south of Cawthorne along a route via Amotherby, Barugh or Newsham in their survey in the 1950s, and note that its course could not be determined as early as 1726.
Beyond Malton, there is a postulated stretch of Roman road leading towards York, which may be an extension of the causeway. Evidence for it is very slim: Drake mentioned it in 1736, but Codrington could find no trace of it in 1903, and writes that there is "some uncertainty as to the connexion". Archaeologists Philip Corder and John Kirk reported a possible section of Roman road at Brandrith Farm () in 1928, but it is unknown whether this relates to the same structure as Drake observed, or has any association with the Wheeldale structure.
History of interpretation In the 1720s, the causeway was mentioned in a published text and as a result became more widely known for the first time. Within a few years, it became of interest to antiquarians, who visited the site and exchanged commentary on its probable historicity. They interpreted the structure as a causeway across marshy ground, attributing its construction to the Roman army, an explanation that remained largely unchallenged throughout the remainder of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.