itelliam ab Janiculo ad mare usque, item coloniam
ejusdem nominis._" Or, "Some monuments of the family continued a long
time, as the _Vitellian Way_, reaching from the Janiculum to the sea,
and likewise a colony of that name." From the abovementioned extracts,
it seems not improbable that one of the thirty battles mentioned by
Suetonius, might have been fought during the time the Romans were
forming this road through the Forest of Arden, which extended from
Henley, in Warwickshire, to Market Harborough, in Leicestershire; and
that it was called in compliment to Vitellius, the _Vitellian Way_,
afterwards corrupted to the _Watling Way_.

This road from the Avon, which it passes at Dove Bridge, to the Anker,
near Atherstone, forms the boundary between the counties of Leicester
and Warwick. In the month of June, 1824, numerous skulls and bones
were discovered in a line from the intersection of the road that leads
from Rugby to Lutterworth, with the Watling Street to Benones or
Bensford Bridge, the distance not being more than half a mile. These
bones were lying about two feet below the surface of the ground. Many
fragments of shields, spear heads, knives, and a sword,[3] placed by
the side of a skeleton, and at one end touching a funereal urn,[4] and
likewise several drinking cups, or small vessels, apparently formed of
half-baked clay, with clasps both of silver and brass, were found
within the abovementioned distance. On the contrary side of the road
were discovered beads, glass, and amber, but neither urns,
spear-heads, or fragments of shields; these relics, therefore,
probably belonged to the Britons, who fell encountering the Romans, to
prevent their forming a road through the Forest of Arden. There can be
little doubt of a battle having been here fought, from the bones,
urns, and tumuli discovered here and in the adjacent neighbourhood.
"In this parish (Church Over,") says Dugdale, "upon the old Roman Way,
called Watling Strete, is to be seen a very great tumulus, which is of
that magnitude, that it puts travellers beside the usual road," and a
_Letter_ from Elias Ashmole to Sir Wm. Dugdale,[5] states, "that about
a mile from hence (that is from Holywell Abbey, now the site of Caves
Inn,) there is a tumulus raised in the very middle of the high way,
which methought was worth observing." This tumulus, in an ancient
deed, is called the Pilgrim's Low. It was removed in making the
turnpike-road from Banbury to Lutterworth