The tree is at Templeton on the west hand side of the Newtyle to Balkeerie Road travelling north, just before the bend in the road at Templeton Farm.
Archaeology & History
The only written record of the tree is in Strathmore Past and Present by the Reverend J.G. M’Pherson (1885):
Standing Proud
“After driving two miles eastward from the village of Newtyle along a most excellent level road, we enter the united parishes of Eassie and Nevay. The time-honoured boundary-mark is a conspicuous old ash, which popularly goes by the name of the Temple-tree. Tradition cannot guess its age. It is of considerable diameter, but quite hollow from the ground upwards for twenty feet. The bark is stripped off in several parts, and the thin shell of wood exposed is quite worm eaten; here and there being quite worn through, forming a rude door and rugged windows for the weird like interior.
“Large branches spread out, half dead-and-alive, with some foliage, scantily furnished with the life-giving root-sap. Could it speak it would tell of many a strange incident in its vicinity or underneath its arms. Its appearance might almost take one back to the time when the Templars left the neighbourhood; thus fixing its curious appellation”.
Sadly the tree described in the above quotation from 1885 has perished, but, just as it was not growing at the time of the Knights Templars’ local involvement, it is not unreasonable to speculate that it was a daughter of an ash tree that had formed a parish boundary marker of the original estate at the time of the Templars or even before. And now a daughter tree of that venerable 1885 tree grows in its place, the Temple-tree of the present day.
Various writers have attested to the Templar presence in Meigle, indeed M’Pherson writes:
“When the Knight Templars were in pomp…they had considerable interest in Meigle, several lands in the parish still being known as the Temple Lands. We prefer this derivation to the common one of templum, any religious house”.
In describing the now famous Meigle Pictish stones in the New Statistical Account, the Reverend William Ramsay (1845) writes;
“…A more satisfactory account of them has been suggested by Captain T.P. Mitchell, …He considers them as neither more nor less than the monuments of the Knights Templars, who unquestionably had a burying-ground at Meigle”.
While Mitchell was wrong in his attribution of the carved stones, he was clearly aware of the continuing memory of the Templars.
Modern research has shown that many of the Templar estates and lands in Scotland remained as separate fiscal entities within the Hospitaller lands up until at least the Reformation, which may explain the enduring Templar nomination of our tree.
Note: The tree formed the 19th century boundary of the parishes of Eassie and Nevay to the north, and Newtyle, both in Angus. We must assume the Templar lands boundary has been incorporated into the later parish system.
Note: This is not a clooty tree – please treat her with respect.
References:
Rev William Ramsay, Parish of Alyth, The New Statistical Account of Scotland, 1845.
Rev J.G. M’Pherson, Strathmore Past and Present, S. Cowan & Co: Perth, 1885.
Robert Ferguson, The Knights Templar And Scotland, The History Press: Stroud 2010
Along the A134 in Horkesley Heath, turn west along Coach Road and after a half-mile where it veers right, keep going for another half-mile where you’ll reach the woodland on your left. A path goes into the trees just before Pitchbury Lodge. Go along here and near the very far (southern) end of the trees, just before the open fields, you’ll see the large undulating ramparts of earth. Keep your eyes peeled. You’ll see them!
Archaeology & History
Stukeley’s 1759 map
This once large hillfort was described in the Colchester township perambulations of 1671 and cited in Philip Morant’s classic work. (1748) He told how the boundary line ran “under Chesterwell along the Rampiers by Horkesley Heath,” and which P.H. Reaney (1935) tells was our wooded hillfort. In Morant’s day, the place was all but complete and so would have been well recognised by local people. Certainly it came the attention of the great antiquarian William Stukeley who, in 1759, came to Colchester and met with Morant. Stukeley mainly surveyed the area south of here, at Lexden Heath, but one of his sketch maps clearly highlighted a place he called “a circular work on Horkesley Heath”, i.e., Pitchbury Rings. The site seems to have remained relatively intact until the middle of the 19th century when a local land-owner took it upon himself to plough over and vandalise much of the site, leaving only a small proportion of the earthworks that we can still see to this day.
The ruins were described in I.C. Gould’s (1903) piece for the Victoria County History, where he told, at Great Horkesley,
Gould’s 1903 sketch of the remains
Royal Commission’s 1923 ground-plan
“are some remains of an earthwork known as ‘Pitchbury’ or ‘Pitsbury Ramparts.’ When the late Rev. Henry Jenkins described the camp in 1841, he stated that it was of oval shape, and contained about 6 acres. Most of it was levelled for agricultural operations about fifty years ago, but there are still some remains, consisting of two banks with their accompanying ditches. The lines moreover of that part which was destroyed, can be partially traced in the adjoining fields.”
When the Royal Commission (1922) doods wrote about the site nearly twenty years later, things hadn’t changed too much and they simply reported how the “ramparts have nearly disappeared, except for the north section.” In this “imperfect” condition, as they called it, they gave the following brief description:
“Pitchbury Ramparts, in Pitchbury Wood, about 2 mile south of the church, are the north end of a large camp, roughly oval in shape, and defended by a double rampart and ditch. The defences are well preserved in the wood, the inner rampart being 10 ft. above the ditch, which is 60ft wide from crest to crest, but the greater part of the work has been almost obliterated by the plough, and is now only faintly discernible in a large field S. of the wood. The camp appears to have been 800 ft. long and 600 ft. wide.”
Thankfully there seems to have been no real increase in damage to the site since then. It was excavated in some detail in 1933 and again in 1973 and the finds were published by the highly reputable Colchester Archaeological Trust, whose subsequent report by Hawkes & Crummy (1995) is required reading for anyone wanting to know the detailed archaeology of this and other sites in the area.
Folklore
An intriguing piece of folklore was described in John Round’s (1882) history of the early battles around Colchester Castle. During the time when the Roman Empire was starting to crumble, the great Pictish tribes of Scotland ventured here and, we are told, took control of the Pitchbury Rings where they stayed before attacking Colchester Castle.
“Traces have been discovered of some violent catastrophe, possibly the first capture of the Colony by the marauding Picts from the North. Allured, in one of their Southern raids, by the wealth of the goodly Colony, they swooped down like eagles on their quarry from the wooded heights of ‘Pictsbury’.”
References:
Gould, I. Chalkley, “Ancient Earthworks“, in Victoria History of the County of Essex – volume 1, Archibald Constable: Westminster 1903.
Reaney, P.H., The Place-Names of Essex, Cambridge University Press 1935.
Watson, J.Y., Sketches of Ancient Colchester, Benham & Harrison: Colchester 1879.
Acknowledgements: Big thanks for use of the 1st edition OS-map in this site profile, Reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.
The exact location of this site seems to have been lost. One possible candidate is on the south-side of the village where remains of a large moat exists, meaning that there was a good water supply here to maintain its existence. But this is pure guesswork on my part. The well was mentioned briefly in R.C. Hope’s (1893) classic book where he told us:
“There was a holy well or spring in the village of Holwell, on the borders of Bedford and Hertfordshire; unfortunately both history and site have been forgotten by the villagers at Holywell.”
The site was mentioned as far back as 1086 CE in the Domesday Book as ‘Holewelle’. The place-name authorities Gover, Mawer & Stenton (1938) tell us this derives from a “spring in the hollow” and not a holy well as subsequent writers profess. The only thing that could perhaps fortify the ‘holy’ element is that in some instances early citations of holy wells are written as holi- wells, which this may have been. As all historians know, early spellings of sites are far from accurate.
References:
Gover, J.E.B., Mawer, Allen & Stenton, F.M., The Place-Names of Hertfordshire, Cambridge University Press 1938.
Hope, Robert Charles, Legendary Lore of the Holy Wells of England, Elliott Stock: London 1893.
Smith, A.H., English Place-Name Elements – volume 1, Cambridge University Press 1956.
Cist (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – SE 1192 4759
Archaeology & History
Urn found below Cowpasture Rd in 1874
In a lecture given by Frank Hall at the Ilkley Library in February, 1910, he described a number of prehistoric remains found in the area—including the remnants of a “cinerary urn, containing calcined human remains” and more, as illustrated in the old photo here. He contextualized the findings as being typical of the remains found “under a large heap of earth and stones which we now call a ‘barrow’, ‘cairn’ or ‘tumulus'” and believed that one must have existed here in bygone times. The urn, he told us,
“was found within a few yards of these premises, for it was dug up when the excavations were being carried out for the erection of Messrs Robinson and Sons’ buildings on the opposite side of Cowpasture Road, in March 1874.”
Although we list this site as a cist, we don’t know for sure; but due to the lack of descriptive and historical data about a mound of any form in this area, it is most likely to have been a cist burial and not a tumulus or barrow which Mr Hall inferred. Its location near the valley bottom is unusual when we consider the huge number of cairns on the moors above here; but a cist was found in a similar low-lying geographical position on the south side of the moors near Bingley, 5.8 miles due south, when construction of local sewage works were being done.
References:
Hall, Frank, The Contents of Ilkley Museum, William Walker: Otley 1910.
Various ways to get here, but probably the easiest is to start from Cow & Calf Rocks, walking up the steep slope onto the moor-edge. Paths veer left and right once you’re on the level, but you wanna head straight forward, west(-ish), for about 350 yards till you reach the stream. Cross over and then take the path that runs parallel with the stream, uphill. Nearly 200 yards up, where the moor begins to level out, you cross a path running east-west; keep going past this for about another 50 yards (as if you’re heading to the Backstone Circle) and you’ll notice some small sheep-paths leading you into the heather to your right and, some 40-50 yards into the heath you’ll see this large flat stone!
Archaeology & History
This carving seems to have been rediscovered in the 1950s by Michael Walker and Stuart Feather. They were amongst a small group of people who visited this and some other carvings in June 1956, when the first (known) sketch of the carving was done by Mr Walker. His sketch of the stone is somewhat more elaborate than the one in John Hedges’ (1986) later archaeological survey. Indeed, in some ways the two drawings seem to show little resemblance to each other. (not uncommon with these things!)
Walker’s 1956 sketch
Hedges’ 1986 sketch
Walker shows nine cup-and-rings in various states of completion, with several clusters of singular cups at different places on the rock—more than forty in all, some of which are connected to each other by short lines. This is in contrast with the later archaeological description, which saw far fewer of the primary symbols. When John Hedges (1986) described the carving in his inventory, he informed the reader:
“Fairly smooth, medium sized grit rock standing up in heather, crowberry and grass, sloping SW to NE with the hill, its almost triangular flat top covered with carvings, some very clear, interesting patterns. About thirty-five cups, seven surrounding a small ring with cups on the circumference and at centre. Two long grooves with a cup at one end, running down to the edge of the rock. ‘Peck’ marks noticeable in one groove and in one ring round a cup. Three other grooves going half round cups, or leading from a cup. Slice of rock apparently removed.”
Boughey & Vickerman (2003) added nothing new in their later survey.
Although we have an uninterrupted open view of the landscape to the north and west from here, it might not have been like this when the carving was done 4-5000 years ago. The scattered woodland covering these heaths may have impeded the views. However, immediately west of this carving are the broken remains of a small Bronze Age settlement, some of whose walling is traceable some 100-150 yards away and any tree cover that may have been here may have been cut back. We may never know for sure…
References:
Boughey, K.J.S. & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS: Leeds 2003.
Hedges, John (ed.), The Carved Rocks of Rombald’s Moor, WYMCC: Wakefield 1986.
Jackson, S. & Walker, Michael J., “Ilkley Boulders Tour,” in Cartwright Hall Archaeology Group Bulletin, 2:1, 1956.
When the Ordnance Survey lads visited this area in 1860, they stood upon this small knoll that was known as Torrnacloch – or the Knoll of the Stone. They were informed that a ring of stones had stood here, but had been destroyed about 1840, apparently by a local farmer. The stones were described as being about 3 feet high. They subsequently added it on the earliest OS-map of the area, but also made note that a cist was found within the site. The circle was included and classed as a stone circle in Aubrey Burl’s (2000) magnum opus, but had previously been classed as a cairn with “a kerb of large boulders” by the Royal Commission doods. (1983) They based their assessment on the appearance of some of the stones found on a gravel mound behind the farm which had apparently been removed from the circle when it was destroyed. Andrew Jervise (1853) gave us the following account:
“The Chapelry of Dalbog was on the east side of the parish, due west of Neudos. The time of its suppression is unknown; and though no vestige of any house remains, the site of the place of worship is still called the “chapel kirk shed” by old people, and, in the memory of an aged informant, a fine well and hamlet of houses graced the spot. This field adjoins the hillock of Turnacloch, or “the knoll of stones,” which was probably so named, from being topped in old times by a so-called Druidical circle, the last of the boulders of which were only removed in 1840. Some of them decorate a gravel mound behind the farm house; and, on levelling the knoll on which they stood, a small sepulchral chamber was discovered, about four feet below the surface. The sides, ends, and bottom, were built of round ordinary sized whinstones, cemented with clay, and the top composed of large rude flags. It was situate on the sunny side of the knoll, within the range of the circle; but was so filled with gravel, that although carefully searched, no relics were found.”
The emphasis on this place being where a stone circle stood is highlighted in the place-name Torrnacloch, or the hillock of stones/boulders. Both Dorwood (2001) and Will (1963), each telling it to be where a stone circle stood; with Will adding that parts of the circle “may yet be seen in rear of the steading of Dalbog.” If this had been where a cairn existed, some variant on the word carn would have been here.
References:
Burl, Aubrey, The Stone Circles of Britain, Ireland and Brittany, Yale University Press 2000.
Dorwood, David, The Glens of Angus, Pinkfoot: Balgavies 2001.
Jervise, Anrew, The History and Traditions of the Land of the Lindsays in Angus and Mearns, Sutherland & Knox: Edinburgh 1853.
MacLaren, A. et al, The Archaeological Sites and Monuments of Central Angus, RCAHMS: Edinburgh 1983.
Will, C.P., Place Names of Northeast Angus, Herald: Arbroath 1963.
Acknowledgements: Big thanks for use of the 1st edition OS-map in this site profile, Reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.
Tumulus (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – SE 1676 1504
Archaeology & History
The only thing we know of this long lost site comes from a tradition narrated by the Canon Hulbert (1882) in his definitive history of Almondbury parish. High up the hill near the very top of the village where All Saints Church was built, he told how tradition said,
“that a tumulus or mound existed at the west end where now the Clerk’s house stands; which may have been an ancient British site and led to the erection of the church.”
Sadly, there seems to be no further information about the site.
References:
Hulbert, Charles A., Annals of the Church and Parish of Almondbury, Longmans: London 1882.
Tumulus (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – SE 3222 5211
Archaeology & History
Site of tomb on 1894 map
We are thankful that the antiquarian James Wardell (1881) gave us some details of this long lost site in his survey of prehistoric remains, otherwise information about it would certainly have been lost. Prehistoric burial mounds are rare in this part of Yorkshire, but on the rise of land behind Follifoot Ridge house could once be seen “a large barrow measuring 50 feet in diameter.” Believed by Challis and Harding (1975) to have been a late Bronze Age structure, the story of its demise was told by Wardell as follows:
“This monument of a former age…exists no longer, owing to the ignorance and cupidity of the surveyors of the highways of the township in which it was situate; by whose orders the stones, of which it was partially composed, were carted away at intervals, during a period of some five or six years, to keep in repair a neighbouring road. At the base were several very large stones, probably a kistvaen, and at the same time were found fragments of urns, bones and ‘pieces of brass’, which immediately became dispersed. Some of the latter articles came into the possession of the village smith, from whom this information was obtained, and were disposed of by him to a brass-founder as old metal, and in due time, doubtless, found their way to the foundry. From the description given of them by this person, there seems to have been amongst them some spear-heads and a palstave, but after a most diligent inquiry, there could not, as might be expected, anything whatever be recovered. I should say that from weapons of bronze being found in this huge sepulchral mound, it was not one of the most ancient kind, but has perhaps covered the remains of British warriors slain in conflict with the Roman invaders… I am indebted to Mr John Dixon of Leeds for the information relating to the demolition of this barrow, which was only obtained by him after a lengthy enquiry; and he states that on his visit to the site, it could distinctly be traced by the grass there being of a darker hue than in other parts of the field.”
A mile to the northwest, one would have been able to see the Stone Rings of Pannal, also destroyed, and the two sites may have served some geomantic relationship with each other.
References:
Challis, A.J. & Harding, D.W., Later Prehistory from the Trent to the Tyne, BAR: Oxford 1975.
Wardell, James, Historical Notes of Ilkley, Rombald’s Moor, Baildon Common, and other Matters of the British and Roman Periods, Joseph Dodgson: Leeds 1869. (2nd edition 1881).
Acknowledgements: Big thanks for being able to use the 1st edition OS-map for this site profile, Reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.
Follow the directions to reach our superb Swastika Stone from Ilkley, visible due to the iron railing that surround and protect the carving on the cliff edge. From here, keep walking west along the Millenium Way footpath, over the stile of the first wall, then the second wall—six in all—for ⅔-mile (1km), where you’ll see another small crag of rocks on your right, just yards from the footpath. You’re damn close!
Archaeology & History
When the great J. Romilly Allen (1882) visited the Ilkley petroglyphs in 1878, the Piper Stone was one that he wandered over to see—and he had this to say of it:
“At the edge of Piper’s Crag is a horizontal rock-surface, and on a portion of it, measuring 5ft by 7ft, are carved a series of fifteen cups varying in diameter from 2 to 3 ins. Of these, one is surrounded by a single ring, four by a double ring, and one by a triple ring.”
Hedges 1986 sketch
Cowling’s 1940 sketch
This type of description, whilst accurate on the whole, rarely does justice to the carving. It was echoed more than 100 years later in John Hedges’ (1986) survey, when he described the large rock jutting out to possess merely, “a complicated design of cups, rings and grooves.” When Boughey & Vickerman (2003) did their follow-up survey, they added nothing more.
In an attempt to give some sort of meaning to the carving (and many others), the late great Eric Cowling (1940; 1946) placed it within Henri Breuil’s (1934) classification system, which assigns all carvings different degrees of complexity and form, from Classes 1-4. The Piper Stone entered Breuil’s Class 3A, being one “with deeply cut and smoothed down grooves.” Whilst this may sound good on the surface, in truth such classifications are utterly meaningless outside of the tables and graphs of statisticians and the boring. They give the appearance of quantitative research, but they have as much bearing on the nature of the carvings as an energy dowser healing the place with crystals.
In the flesh, in the real world—so to speak—from the Piper Stone we are looking, not just at the carving, but its place in the landscape: an ingredient that more and more emerging archaeologists are recognizing has a synergistic relationship with some petroglyphs. And here we have an impressive landscape that reaches out ahead of us for many miles. We look primarily to the north: the Land of the Dead in many traditional northern cultures. But our panorama here is 180º, with east and west horizons having the potential for measuring equinoctial periods in the cycle of the year. But in truth this is sheer speculation.
It’s a worthwhile carving to see, both for its views and its excess of non-linearity. In its form, Rorscharch impressions of early humans emerge; the usual solar and lunar symbols can be seen; star systems seem apparent; maps or settlement ground-plans could be there. We know that somewhere within it is the animistic ‘spirit’ of the rock itself, but the forms it exalts are, once again, all but lost on us modern folk…
References:
Allen, J. Romilly, “Notice of Sculptured Rocks near Ilkley,” in Journal of the British Archaeological Association, volume 38, 1882.
Allen, J. Romilly, “Cup and Ring Sculptures on Ilkley Moor,” in The Reliquary and Illustrated Archaeologist, volume 2, 1896.
Anonymous, Walks around Cup and Ring Stones, TIC: Ilkley n.d. (c.1990).
Baildon, W. Paley, “Cup and Ring Carvings: Some Remarks on their Classification and a New Suggestion as to their Origin and Meaning,” in Archaeologia, volume 61, 1909.
Bennett, Paul, “Cup-and-Ring Art”, in Towards 2012, volume 4, 1998.
Bennett, Paul, The Old Stones of Elmet, Capall Bann: Milverton 2001.
Boughey, Keith & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS: Wakefield 2003.
Breuil, Henri, “Presidential Address for 1934,” in Proceedings Prehistoric Society East Anglia, 7:3, 1934.
Collyer, Robert & Turner, J.H., Ilkley: Ancient and Modern, William Walker: Otley 1885.
Holy Well (lost): OS Grid Reference – SW 6602 2053
Archaeology & History
The old church at this headland just above the sea was, said Padel (1988), dedicated to Saint Gunwalloe or Winwalloe in 1332 and is thought to have been the character (a hermit by all accounts) who deemed this well to be ‘holy’. In Alfred Cummings (1875) history of Gunwalloe parish, he devotes a short but singular chapter to this holy well which, according to most accounts, has fallen back to Earth. It was found, said Cummings, “close to the church porch, only a few feet over the precipitous rock…and (was) doubtless the resort in former days of many a lad and maiden.”
Yet even in his day, he lamented its loss, telling that.
“The spring that once bubbled up in its rocky basin is no longer there; sand and stones fill up the well at each high tide, and though occasionally cleaned out for the satisfaction of the wayfarer’s curiosity is yet only an imperfect semblance of its former self.”
Yet remnants of practices and traditions of the well were thankfully remembered:
Gunwalloe church in 1885
“That Gunwalloe was considered by the country folk a well of some importance there can be little doubt, for one day in the year, which was called Gunwalloe Day, was set apart for cleaning out this holy well — it was quite at a different time of year to this parish feast — and now only remembered by two old men out of the whole population of the place.
“They fix the time in their memories as the period of tilling barley, for they recollect that on this Gunwalloe Day it was the custom for the men to mend all the cliff roads (doubtless these were useful in days of smuggling when a successful run was a desirable thing), and so strictly was it kept that, if any were found labouring in the fields, a party would go and take them by force, and press them into the service of the holiday makers, who, having mended the roads and cleared the holy well at Gunwalloe, wound up the day with merriment and revelry.”
Such practices are long since gone of course and, so most modern accounts would tell us, the holy well with it. But when J. Meyrick (1982) came looking for the site on the summer solstice of 1980, he seemed a little more fortunate than his predecessors. Located just a few yards from the detached church tower, he spoke with a
“Mrs Wilson, a churchwarden (who) told me that in heavy rain the tower continues to be flooded so the spring is still somewhere about, and curiously enough by the stile to the beach is a small granite trough with rainwater put there by someone no doubt in lieu of the Well and who is to say that the water is not holy! The stream across the dune still meanders a few feet beneath the tower and into this the water from the well would have run, but there seems now no sign of an originating spring in the rocks around.”
Folklore
The church itself possesses a folktale found up and down the land. “It is said,” wrote Blight (1885),
“that the builders intended to erect the church on higher ground, nearer the centre of the parish, at Hingey; but as fast as materials were brought to the place they were, by some mysterious agency, removed during the night to the present site. And here the church was built, it being found useless to contend with a supernatural power.”
The supernatural agencies that are nearly always responsible for such actions tend to be the devil, fairies or other types of little-people.
References:
Blight, J.T., Churches of West Cornwall, Parker: London 1885.
