Old road to ruin

Charges were dropped against 6 people who were arrested in July, when they protested at a council meeting against the remains of the 4,000 year-old Rotherwas Ribbon being buried under a road.

The road building is going ahead. Hereford Council has a site with its news. It seems that, after unsuccessfully and half-heartedly trying to pass it off as a natural artefact, the council’s arguments are:

  • the roadbuilding uncovered it in the first place;
  • they’ve done everything they reasonably could to get it investigated;
  • covering it up won’t do it any harm;
  • moving the road would damage other nearby sites;
  • the cabinet office says go ahead with the road as fast as possible

All reasonable points. It still seems a pity that we have to discard irreplaceable treasures just to make yet another road.

There is interesting information on the Ribbon on the Megalithic Portal written by one of the people in our blogroll at the right, Alun Salt from clioaudio

He says:

Archaeologists believe this major find may have no parallels in Europe, with the closest similar artefact being the 2,000-year-old serpent mounds of the Ohio river valley in America.