Icknield Way

It is generally said to be, within Great Britain, one of the oldest roads the route of which can still be traced, being one of the few long-distance trackways to have existed before the Romans occupied the country.

The charters refer to locations at Wanborough, Hardwell in Uffington, Lockinge, Harwell, Blewbury and Risborough, which span a distance of 40 miles (64 km) from Wiltshire to Buckinghamshire.

The Leges Edwardi Confessoris gave royal protection to travellers on these roads, and the Icknield Way was said to extend across the width of the kingdom.

The Icknield Way is depicted by a straight line from Salisbury (i.e., Old Sarum) to Bury St Edmunds which intersects the other three roads near Dunstable.

[1] In support of the western route, a road at Dersingham near Hunstanton was named Ykenildestrethe and Ikelynge Street in the 13th century.

The Hobhouse Committee report of 1947 suggested the creation of a path between Seaton Bay and the Chiltern ridge, and in 1956 Tom Stephenson proposed a longer route to Cambridge.

[12][13] The first section to be officially designated as a Long-Distance Footpath (as National Trails were then known) was that from Overton Hill to Ivinghoe Beacon, and it was declared open as the Ridgeway in 1973.

[16] The author Ray Quinlan calls a similar route the Greater Ridgeway, with a length of approximately 584 kilometres (363 mi) from Lyme Regis to Hunstanton.

Spencer Gore, the founder of the Camden Town Group of artists, painted the route in 1912 while staying with his friend Harold Gilman at Letchworth.

[20][21] One of the best known literary travellers of the Icknield Way is the poet Edward Thomas, who walked the path in 1911 and published his account in 1913.

[24] The first episode of the 2016–17 documentary series Britain's Ancient Tracks with Tony Robinson was about the Icknield Way and included drone views of the trail.