Old way gentle artist laboured to support wife (7,6)
I believe the answer is:
watling street
'old way' is the definition.
(ancient English road or route)
'gentle artist laboured to support wife' is the wordplay.
'laboured' is an anagram indicator (letters must work or labour into a new form).
'to support' means one lot of letters go next to another (in a down clue, some letters hold others up).
'wife' becomes 'w'.
'gentle'+'artist'='gentleartist'
'gentleartist' with letters rearranged gives 'atlingstreet'.
'atlingstreet' after 'w' is 'WATLING STREET'.
(Other definitions for watling street that I've seen before include "Old way" , "highway" , "Roman road (A5)" , "Roman road from Kent to Shropshire via London" , "Old Roman road" .)