As a child Hardy had walked the road from Upper Bockhamtpon to Dorchester hundreds of times.
And it was from this same road that Susan Newsome and Elizabeth Jane came into Casterbridge when they first arrived.
The layout of Dorchester was more or less identical with the ancient Roman city of Durnovaria
and when Hardy was building his new house at Max Gate he came upon a number of Roman graves that contained the skeletons of the inhabitants of the old city. The archaeology of the town fascinated him and the novel is punctuated with references to it.
The focus of the Roman city was the forum and the focus of the town of Casterbridge is the market both of which were located at the crossing of the major roads.
The most important buildings on the novel are grouped around or near this point, and it is here that Elizatbeth Jane find Henchard in his rich and imposing brick building.
Henchard's first appearance in Casterbridge occurs in an equally imposing building, The King's Arms where he is seen by the two women at the head of the town council.
Just a little along the High Street was another inn, The Three Mariners which is quite different in quality. The King's Arms is for the elite only; The Three Mariners is for the ordinary citizen. It is disorganized but homely, humbler, but more welcoming and as such is a microcosm of the town at large.
The residence of Lucetta Templeman, High Place Hall, Hardy moved from its position in Colliton Park to a point overlooking the market place.
It is double sided, with a rational front and a sinister area behind.
Moving further afield, the entertainments organised first by Henchard on Poundbury mound then by Farfrae in West Walks, take the action from the centre to the periphery of the town.
Here we have another temporary tent-like building, referring back to the tent from which Susan Henchard was first sold, and perhaps the sentiments that were associated with the tent in which Frank Troy performed.
Also on the periphery are the 'Rings' where Henchard first meets his wife Susan and later Lucetta. It is a secret place, hidden, and bodes no good. It carries with it memories of its violent Roman past and violent episodes of torture and execution in later periods. Boys will not play there because it has a brooding sinister quality.
Still further from the centre of Casterbridge life is Mixen Lane (Fordington) separated from the main town and the residence of the disaffected and the down and out. It is here that the 'skimmity ride' is hatched, a device to bring down Farfrae and Lucetta. It was a slum, which bred moral and physical contagion and disease.
The rejects from Casterbridge society find themselves, Henchard among them, passing time on one of the two bridges out of the town. The nature of their rejection is defined by the bridge they choose.
Moving round the river in an anti-clockwise direction we come to Friary Mill. A spot of darkness and desolation to which Henchard comes when he discovers that Elizabeth Jane is not his daughter and it is here that Jopp goes to live in a humble cottage after he loses his employment.
Further out in the water-meadows are the seven hatches, a sluice to control the flow of the river.
It is here that Henchard attempts suicide in the aftermath of the skimmity ride, but is prevented from jumping the appearance of his Doppelganger in the water.
Various characters have the notion that they will leave Casterbridge and begin new lives. Lucetta wants to do this with Farfrae but dies before she is able. Henchard also leaves, but is drawn back by the marriage of Elizabeth Jane and Farfrae. Finally he goes. But to leave is to enter the wilderness. He is eventually found by Farfrae and Elizabeth Jane in the most derelict and humble cottage of the novel, a building which reflects the dereliction to which he has been driven.
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