Way pit

Fosse Way is important a Roman Voie 354 km long which connects Exeter to Lincoln, in England. It crosses in particular Bath, Corinium Dobunnorum (Cirencester) and Leicester.

It joined the ways of Akeman Street and Ermin Street with Cirencester and Ermine Street in Lincoln and crosses Watling Street in High Cross, in the south of Leicester. It is particularly remarkable for its extreme straightness.

The word Fosse is derived from Latin fossa meaning ditch . During the first decades following the Roman conquest of the Brittany in 43, Fosse Way formed the Western border of the province. It is possible that the road was in the beginning a defensive ditch then having been filled and having been transformed on the way, or that a ditch côtoyait the road. Fosse Way is the only Roman way of Great Britain to have preserved its Latin name, the others having been indicated under a name Saxon, after the departure of the Romans.

Many cities and villages bear a name pointing out the original military function of the way, as the suffixes testify some - cester or - chester , formed starting from Latin Castrum , meaning camp strengthened . Others bear a name pointing out the way itself with the forms - one-Pit or Fosse- or with the generic forms Street , Strete , - le-Street , Stratton , Stretton , Stratford , and Stretford , derived from strata , meaning paved way . Certain villages, like Stretton-under-Pit, cumulate the two forms.

Several sections of the way are today modern roads or ways and form administrative borders.

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