Bannaventa or Benaventa was a Romano-British fortified town which was on the Roman road later called Watling Street, which today is here, as in most places, the A5 road. Bannaventa straddles the boundaries of Norton and Whilton, Northamptonshire, England, villages highly clustered and double that away, respectively. Iter II (Watling Street) The road on which Bannaventa lies is thought to be the first built by the Romans in Britain. It begins in Portus Ritupis (Richborough in Kent) and runs in successive north westerly directions – via many Roman towns. Bannaventa was a small fortified town on this road north-northwest of the Roman town of Lactodorum (now Towcester). The other way, by , was the Roman settlement of Venonis (Wigston Parva), a crossroads town – of this street which there for several miles marks the Leicestershire-Warwickshire boundary – with Fosse Way (road from Lincoln to Britain's south west). Name Bannaventa is derived from Brittonic *bannā "peak, hill" (as in Modern Welsh ban, "top, tip, point, summit, crest, peak, beacon, height, pinnacle, turret, hill, mountain, bare hill") and *wentā, of obscure origin, but perhaps "place of sacrifice" or simply "place, field" (as in Welsh cadwent "battlefield") Brief mention of the settlement is thrice found in Emperor Antoninus Pius’s Itinerarium, Iter Britanniarum (The Road Routes of Antoninus Augustus):<ref>Borough Hill (Daventry) and its History', William Edgar, Page 53 ASIN: B001075ZNY</ref> Iter 2, Venone XII, Benaventa XVII, Lactodorum XII. Iter 6, Lactodorum XVI, Isannavantia XII, Tripontium XII. Iter 8, Venone XII, Benaventa XVIII, Magiovinter XXVIII. The sites of these names are as follows: Venone = High Cross, Wigston Parva, Leicestershire Lactodorum = Towcester, Northamptonshire Isannavantia = Bannaventa – assumed. Tripontium = Cave's Inn, Warwickshire Magiovinter = Dropshort, Buckinghamshire This emperor died in 161 CE. Description Bannaventa was a staging post for Romano-Celtic travellers and would have operated along the lines of the coaching towns of a later period along Watling Street. The town would have been a vital part of the road infrastructure of Roman Britain. The fortified town would provide a safe, warm resting place where provisions for the journey could be bought and horses and other livestock could be safely stabled overnight. The town would also provide some protection for the wider local allies in times of danger. Close to the town are other Roman sites, connected in time. These include the remains of a villa on the summit of nearby Borough Hill,