Archaeologists hoping to find Roman road in dig

Archaeologists are hoping to find proof of what they believe to be a 2,000 year old Roman road at the Devon site

Archaeologists from the University of Exeter are hoping to find evidence of a Roman road buried beneath parkland in East Devon.

A dig is under way on the National Trust's Killerton estate, near Broadclyst, where remains of a medieval village have previously been unearthed.

Dr Sue Greaney, who is leading the dig, said the possibility of a Roman road at the site had been "suggested for years".

She said it would be "really exciting" to find physical evidence to show the true age of the road.

Dr Sue Greaney is leading the dig on the National Trust's Killerton estate near Broadclyst

Dr Greaney told BBC Radio Devon: "It will be really exciting because it's been suggested for many, many years that this was a Roman road, and there are some sections of it still today which are now lanes that are quite straight - but we've actually got no physical evidence.

"So, it will be the first time that we've got proof that this is an earlier origin to this road."

Dr Greaney said archaeologists had so far excavated a lot of "post-medieval demolition rubble".

"That doesn't sound very exciting, but actually there's lots of glazed pottery, glass bottles, clay pipes - all evidence for the lives that were living here in this little settlement next to the road, which is also cleared away."

Trenches are being investigated by archaeologists from the University of Exeter

The latest dig at Killerton comes after a discovery of a medieval village along the site of an ancient road in Killerton's front park by archaeologists from the University of Exeter.

Dr Greaney said the latest dig was "an important piece of the jigsaw puzzle" in trying to figure out what Roman Devon was like, and how Exeter was connected to its surrounding region.

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