Thornborough

Driving back on the A421, I stopped in a pleasant little parking area just off the main road. The place was Thornborough Bridge. I knew that the A421, for much of its route between Bletchley and Buckingham followed the course of a roman road.

British History Online (http://www.british-history.ac.uk/) – a website which provides masses of interesting information describes the bridge (now closed to traffic and superceded by a modern bridge just to the south) says –

A tributary of the Ouse is crossed on the road to Buckingham by Thornborough Bridge, which is an interesting structure dating from the 14th century. It is 12 ft. wide and spans the river by six low arches, of which all the four middle are moulded and two of them strengthened by ribs; the two outer arches are plain, and possibly of later date. There are three sterlings on the south side carried up to form refuges, and between the two western arches on the north is a rectangular recess probably for the same purpose. The bridge has been repaired and the parapets are modern. The division between the parishes of Buckingham and Thornborough is marked by a boundary stone in the middle of the bridge. Near the bridge on the north side of the road are Thornborough Mounds, two tumuli in which Roman remains were found in 1839.

From: ‘Parishes : Thornborough’, A History of the County of Buckingham: Volume 4 (1927), pp. 237-242.