At the Gloucester service station on the M5 motorway, travelers are taking a break and replenishing their energy, taking a break from the fatigue of the journey.

Just a few miles east, dozens of archaeologists are completing a two-year project that has unearthed the site's predecessor, a 2,000-year-old Roman gas station.

Roman version, a Change – or Horse Changing Station – will provide a break for travelers on the Ermin Street road linking Gloucester and Cirencester in Gloucestershire and Silchester in Hampshire.

Ironically, discoveries in and around the mutant include hundreds of Roman coins, brooches, animal bones and the remains of an oven.

Alex Thomson, project manager for Cotswold Archeology in Oxford, said: “We knew we were going to find good archeology, but what has been revealed exceeds all expectations.

"It's a rare opportunity to observe a Roman roadside settlement in such detail. It's clear that the building we recorded provided a service for passing trade on a busy Roman highway - it indeed may have been a 2,000-year-old service stand."

Up to 70 archaeologists have been working on the 40-hectare site, which is part of a £250m-£500m project to link Brockwall, Gloucestershire Two dual carriageway sections of the A417 at St. John's and Cowley.

It turns out that there was a Roman settlement on almost eight hectares of land, across Ermine Street, one of the main routes in the south-west of Roman Britain.

The team discovered the quarry pit used in the construction of Ermin Street, as well as hundreds of items that shed light on life there, including 460 Roman coins, 15 brooches, 420 kilograms of pottery and animal bones. The stone well contained a hobnail shoe, hairpins made of bone and copper alloy and a ring.

Perhaps the most spectacular find is a 60 mm (2 in) tall copper-alloy Cupid statue with a round face, hair in ringlets and a topknot. His right hand was raised, holding not the usual bow and arrow, but a club.

The main "service station" area is believed to consist of two buildings, in which horse bones, reins and hippopotamuses - the Roman predecessors of horseshoes - were found.

Thomson said: "I think it was a very simple building, made up of a few rooms. One was probably a studio and the other was more of a residence, probably for whoever was running the building. of.

"There may have been other buildings associated with it elsewhere for people to live in. It was a very good stopping point between Gloucester and Cirencester, about halfway up the arduous climb up from the Severn Valley to Cotsworth Halfway behind the cliff."

The settlement is thought to have first appeared around AD 160-180, and appears to have been inhabited until the fourth century AD.

Thomson said: "The road itself would have been very busy. Cirencester was the second largest Roman settlement in England outside London. Gloucester was a very important military centre. As they traveled along the road they could Always serving the passing legions.”

Thomson said he believed Cupid was a prized possession and was almost certainly lost by travelers. Other items may have been left behind intentionally as tributes to the gods to ensure a safe journey.

Most of the archaeological work has been completed, but as roadworks are due to end in 2027, the team maintains a small presence on site in case other sites of interest emerge. The findings will be on display at a local museum.

The project has been featured in an episode of BBC Two's Digging for Britain, which airs on Wednesday 15 January and is available to watch on iPlayer.