Two weeks ago my car had its annual MOT inspection. The garage I have been using for 20 years had moved during Covid and me being a loyal type and the mechanic being amazing, I decided it was worth going to his new premises about 15 miles away.

When I arrived at the garage I realised that nearby was an old lane, at least I hoped there was. I had looked at a map about 5 years ago and apparently the lane is now the boundary between the counties of Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire. In fact it is called Old Shire Lane.

As interesting as that is, the same lane at one point used to be the boundary between the old kingdoms of Mercia and Wessex. You might remember from other posts, after the Romans England especially reverted to a number of smaller kingdoms, partially inspired by the pre-roman Tribes.

Over the centuries, these smaller kingdoms each had their moment in the sun before gradually power coelesced and England grew to have a national consciousness and identity.

I wanted to see if I could find this lane about a mile away on foot and see if I could see any evidence of, well anything. There was an additional problem of there being weeks of heavy rain and in fact it had rained heavily for about 26 hours up until breakfast time on my little venture.

I found where I thought I should be but evidently had picked the worse possible day for it and was wearing only normal jeans and trainer shoes whilst others in wellington boots were deterred.

The Kingdom of Mercia largely met its end as a result of ongoing struggles against the Vikings and it’s possible that for a time this lane was the boundary between Wessex and Danelaw.

Having traced my family tree back over 2,000 years and knowing my ‘foreign’ 33% comes from Danish Vikings around the 6th century, I wasn’t going to be deterred by a bit of water. However there was a distinct lack of long boats available and to be honest, there were any villages to pilfer or young damsels to carry off.

Despite at one point almost walking into a hidden stream, after a few minutes of wading through floods I had found what I was looking for.

The earth bank is the old border that I’d think would be about 1,300 years of age without doing any research on it whatsoever.

Half a mile or so down an increasingly muddy lane and I came across these two Sarsen stones, miniature versions of their bigger brothers you might find at Stonehenge or hundreds of other British stone circles.

Look at the stone above, it even has a line carved through it, a border. I was very impressed that my memory was so good and that it had been worth getting so thoroughly wet and muddy.

I made a bit of a detour in the woods on the way back, figuring that as I am going to get really wet anyway, it would wash any mud off me. Turns out that idea only worked on my jeans not my shoes.

Anyway I did find a few things that I later checked out. These woods and others the 15 miles or so to High Wycombe were once a hotbed of furniture making do to specific species of tress that grow here (not pictured above). Most of what is thought as traditional farmhouse furniture in the U.K. and Britain originated here.

If you look amongst the leaves and trees you can see some earth banks. These are the remains of enclosures that date back about 800-900 years of age.

I would have stayed longer but only had an hour and wasn’t really sure how I’d get back to the garage and car which incidentally passed its inspection with flying colours.

Two hours later when I got home, you can see how deep the water was that I waded through. Even got my bits wet!!

There is always something historic to see in the U.K. almost around every corner, you just have to know your history and what you’re looking at. Rather like a doctor or engineer doesn’t have to know everything before they see something new and interpret a problem or solution, it’s the same if you know your history really well.

Other people sit in the waiting room reading magazines or having a hot drink whilst their cars are repaired, me I go off on a wild goose-chase through floods to find post-Roman ruins!