Droving roads

Now that the bracken is dying down its easier to see the archaeological features in the landscape. This land has never been ploughed or settled so major traces of the medieval past remain largely intact. These huge parallel ridges and furrows dominate the woods and heath landscape and can be traced, more or less continuously, for miles across the commons. They tend to be oriented south to north or (like these) south-west to north-east and all heading to one point - the crossing of the river Ouse at Sheffield Bridge. Although they are now largely colonised by birch trees its easy to see that these are ancient droving roads. Each year livestock were herded off the South Downs moving north across the Low Weald to markets in places like East Grinstead and then on to London. Over centuries of use these routes became imprinted on the landscape.