Roman Roads

I'm sure I've heard that line somewhere before

Good answer. Pretty much covers it. 'Let's have it this wide.' 'Naw, needs to be narrower than that mate.' 'What are we building it of? 'Where do you want these forts/towers putting?'

Which are all reasons it's such as fascinating thing.

Yeah, but Sardinian warbler. That's pretty good

That is exciting news indeed

PS Don't forget Saint Valentine (possibly two of the many) was buried next to the Via Flaminia. See, romance and Roman roads all together.

It's sunshiny and mild. Get outside. Stop looking at the your phones/laptops/other electronic devices talking to people online you've never met but have the same niche interests as you. Go and find some snowdrops.

Note to self.

Love a bit of Mercia

For anyone who's interested @waterstones.bsky.social is running a special pre-order offer (no pun intended) on my new book about King Offa of Mercia, valid from Friday 20 Feb. eur03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com?url=https%3A...

True though. Thursdays can be weird

So treacherous round Lincoln. Can never predict what's going to go wrong next

Yes

It's likely I think. Common enough occurrence historically

Yesterday I mentioned our next talk was Feb 19th. That's currently postponed. More when I have more info.

Meanwhile feel free to speculate why as that is apparently what the internet is for. Free reposts for the most imaginative suggestion based on no facts whatsoever.

Barnsley often crosses lines. Its well known for it.

That doll would be more convincing with a Barnsley accent

We've got another talk coming up. Conquest and Change in the Hinterland of Roman Alchester: impact, development and legacy from Becky Haslam of the AOC Archaeology group

Thursday 19 Feb at 7.30 online.

Tix: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/conquest-a...

What a useful document.

(Hang on, is that the right phrase, just let me check)

Utterly.

About 750 m from RR21a. Up in Sandridge. I don't know the area so am going off Google maps and Mike's Marvellous Map™

And (one of?) their cycling clubs is called Verulam. Race in a pale blue kit - some pretty handy riders in there as well, certainly on the off road scene.

That's got me down another rabbit hole. Hadn't realised there were southerly brochs.

Good point, well made.

Stuffed as well, presumably

Guinea pig Guinea pig mounted on a historic wooden base in natural standing position. Head is held in line with the body and facing forward. Fur layer is thick and prominent.

If you look at the catalogue, there's very little difference between front and back view. Talk about a wild night out. Not a mouse, but worth sharing, I feel
otagomuseum.nz/collections/...

A stuffed domesticated guinea pig in a museum glass case. Forget any notions of smooth, sleek fur - this one has been on a wild night out and is doing a walk of shame home three days later

Don't have a mouse but have a guinea pig from Tuhura, Otago Museum, NZ. Domestication clearly didn't suit

(This had me and my sister in law in utter hysterics

And was that quarried solely in Shropshire or are there outcroppings closer?

It splits apart really easily now. I have absolutely no expertise in splitting stone, or any tools with which I could have a bash so I don't know how you'd cut it. It's a rather nice goldenish colour when new. There was a huge Elizabethan fancy house nearby built of it.

A small pile of badly photographed carboniferous sandstone as found in the Pennine Coal Measures. Now three separate pieces these were once stuck together with mud - presumably weathered shale. They differ slightly in thickness. Because the photographer is a numbnuts there is no useful scale, but the top one is the depth of a thumb. A middle-aged woman's medium sized hands thumb.

A picture of a muddy piece of sandstone with a crack running diagonally across it. It's one of the pieces from the previous picture attempting to show some detail of the rock but failing miserably. Again no scale.

I live south of Leeds so it's all carboniferous round here. The pictures are what came out of our cellar during building works. The top layer is about the width of my thumb, so just over 10 mm. But you can see here how it's easily falling into sheets - it was bonded by mud which is now dry

My thoughts as a non-specialist amateur rock licker is that depending on the bedding of the sandstone it could certainly be the right depth straight out of the ground. So if you found an area that had the right thickness you were after, surely you'd use it?

That's a fine and splendid thing

There's a shed load of bridleways/tracks along the chalk ridge I note. Need a nice, mild dry day. I dream of nice, mild dry days and long rides. I bet it's a really old track, too. Folk must have been using that for as long as they've been in the area