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The Holyhead Road: the Chirk Embankment and earlier trackways is a post-medieval and modern road monument in Wales. The route carries a long history of travel and communication, with earlier trackways underlying the later engineered roadway. The monument preserves evidence of different periods of transport infrastructure, from informal routes to the formal road construction that characterises the modern highway. It is located above bedrock of the Pennine Lower Coal Measures Formation and South Wales Lower Coal Measures Formation, comprised of mudstone, siltstone, sandstone, coal, ironstone and ferricrete laid down during the Westphalian period. The Chirk Embankment itself represents significant civil engineering, built to improve the route's effectiveness as a major thoroughfare. The monument is protected by Cadw under reference DE288 and remains an important example of Welsh transport heritage, illustrating the evolution from ancient trackways through to modern road engineering.
The Holyhead Road: the Chirk Embankment and earlier trackways is a scheduled monument protected by Cadw under reference DE288. View the official record →
The Holyhead Road: the Chirk Embankment and earlier trackways is a post-medieval and modern road monument in Wales. It is designated a Scheduled Ancient Monument by Cadw under reference DE288.
The Holyhead Road: the Chirk Embankment and earlier trackways dates from the post medieval/modern period, and is classified as a road. It is one of over 32,000 scheduled monuments protected across the UK.
The Holyhead Road: the Chirk Embankment and earlier trackways is a Scheduled Ancient Monument, legally protected by Cadw — the body responsible for designating and safeguarding heritage sites in Wales. The official designation reference is DE288.
Several scheduled monuments lie within 10 km, including Offa's Dyke: section 400yds (370m) long, E of Llawnt (7.4 km), Wat's Dyke:80m long section and adjacent cultivation terraces 540m east of Oswestry Castle (7.5 km), Oswestry Castle: motte and adjoining section of the town wall immediately north east of Christ Church (7.6 km).
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 13 strands of The Holyhead Road: the Chirk Embankment and earlier trackways's history, each drawn from the record and mapped to the exact spot:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
The Holyhead Road: the Chirk Embankment and earlier trackways stands on Pennine Lower Coal Measures Formation And South Wales Lower Coal Measures Formation (Undifferentiated), bedrock that formed in the Westphalian. The rock here is mudstone, siltstone, sandstone, coal, ironstone and ferricrete.