When
these roads became tolerably dry in summer, they were ploughed up, and
laid in a half circle to dry, the only amendment they ever had. In
extreme dry weather in summer, they became exceedingly hard, and, by
traffic, so smooth as to seem glazed, like a potter's vessel, though a
single hour's rain rendered them so slippery as to be very dangerous to
travellers." The roads in fact were and are, little more than lanes
between the isolated woods across the low scrub of the old Weald.
The church of Bethersden is dedicated to St Margaret. It follows the
local type having a nave with north and south aisles and a chancel with
north and south chapels, vestry, south porch and western tower. The
place is not mentioned in Domesday Book, but about 1194 we find
Archbishop Herbert confirming the church of St Margaret of
Beatrichesdenne, with the chapel of Hecchisdenne (Etchden) to the
Priory of St Gregory in Canterbury. No sign of this Norman church
remains, the building we see in Bethersden being mainly Perpendicular;
but the double lighted windows at the west end of the north aisle are
Early English and there is a Decorated niche under the entrance to the
rood left.
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