“The Ickleton-way has been ploughed up across Wantage East Field till it enters Charlton (a hamlet of Wantage); it then passes through West Lockinge. It is lost across Mr. Bastard’s park in East Lockinge, but appears again from that park to Ginge Brook, in Ardington parish. It passes by White’s barn in Sparsholt-court manor, and is afterwards ploughed up for some way, but appears again, after crossing the Newbury-way, by Wiltshire’s and Halve-hill barns, in East Hendred parish; from thence through the parishes of Harwell, West Hagbourne, and the hamlet of Upton, to the village of Blewbury, and through the parishes of Aston Tirrold, and Cholsey, to Moulsford on the Thames, and thence to Streatley; from Upton to Streatley it forms part of the new turnpike road from Wantage to Reading.” From Upton station to the east edge of Lockinge Park this road is now an almost continuous series of cart-tracks known--at least, in the neighbourhood of East Hendred, which it leaves half a mile to the north--as Ickleton Street or Ickleton Meer. This evidence of 1911, confirming statements made a hundred and two hundred years ago, is sufficient to identify that portion of the road as Ickleton Street. Beyond Wantage, Wise’s description can be applied only to the modern road from Wantage to Bishopston, or as far as the “Calley Arms” at Wanborough. East of Upton the modern road to Streatley--the old Reading turnpike--has a rival in a series of cart-tracks through Blewbury and the Astons, and possibly to be connected with the “Papist Way” near Cholsey. [Illustration: “Ickleton Meer,” Hagbourne Hill, near Upton, Berks.] Thus there is traditional authority for giving the name of Ickleton Street or Way to a series of roads in Berkshire between Bishopston and Streatley, and the name of Icknield or Icnal Way to a road leading from Royston to Goring; and hence a probability that the two were united by the ford between Streatley and Goring. To this can be added a strong impression that this road came from a Norfolk port and went westward to Avebury, and thence or by another route into Devon or Cornwall; but not one writer, except perhaps Aubrey’s friend, proves or even implies a contemporary use of this road throughout its course; while Drayton and Plot suggest that it had fallen into decay in their time. Along with “Mr. Church, surveyor of Wantage,” in Lysons’ _Berkshire_, appeared a bishop, John Bennet (1746-1820), Bishop of Cloyne from 1794 until his death. Without any argument or evidence he makes the following pronouncement, heralded by the editorial opinion that “his researches have enabled him to speak with certainty on the subject”:--