Tag: Elmet

St Austin’s Stone, High Hunsley, East Yorkshire

megalithix

Legendary Rock:  OS Grid Reference – SE 93360 34443

Also known as:

  1. St. Augustine’s Stone
  2. St Austin’s Rock

Folklore

St Austins Stone on 1855 map

The folklorist John Nicholson (1890) wrote about this “block of natural concrete standing at the head of Drewton Dale, near South Cave” — which modern OS-maps call Austin Dale.  Legend told how it “derived its name from St. Augustine, who used to preach from this stone to the heathen, before Britain became christian.”  This obviously supplanted an earlier heathen site, but it’s difficult to work out what that may have been.  It could have been the lost ‘Rud Stone’ immediately west; or perhaps had some traditional relationship with the healing well which emerges a short distance away further down the valley.  Just above here as well, we find an ancient dragon’s lair at Drakes Hole, which could also hold a clue to this place.

A couple of years after Nicholson mentioned the site, John Hall (1892) published his excellent history of the township, in which he described St. Austin’s Stone thus:

“It’s a mass of rock projecting from the side of a hill and in its longest part, extending  from the hillside to the face of the stone, measures about 60 feet.  By some it is supposed to have formed a centre for druidical worship, and that the adjoining township took its name of Drewton (or Druid’s Town) from this fact.  When St. Augustine came to England…he is said to have visited this part of the East Riding; and that this stone took its name from his visit.”

St Austins Stone 1890 map

The site was also surmounted by a cross at some time in its recent history, but this has gone.  The earth mystery writer Philip Heselton (1986) told that the nearby Well was indeed a place connected to St. Austin’s Stone, in an early article in Northern Earth Mysteries, saying:

“St. Austins Stone near South Cave is a rock outcrop where Saint Augustine is said to have made converts, baptizing them in a nearby well. The site is used for church services.  Every seven years, part of the stone falls away, but it always grows again.”

The site should be examined for potential cup-and-ring markings; as well as reports on the status of the Well.  Any photos of the present situation of the site would be most welcome.

References:

  1. Gutch, Mrs E., County Folk-Lore volume VI: Examples of Printed Folk-lore Concerning the East Riding of Yorkshire, David Nutt: London 1912.
  2. Hall, John George, A History of South Cave and other Parishes in the East Riding of Yorkshire, Edwin Ombler: Hull 1892.
  3. Nicholson, John, Folk Lore of East Yorkshire, Simpkin Marshall: London 1890.
  4. Thompson, Thomas, Researches into the History of Welton and its Neighbourhood, privately printed: Kingston-upon-Hull 1869.

Links:

  1. St. Austin’s Stone (and Well) on “Yorkshire’s Holy Wells” website

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Adam’s Oak, Brierley, South Yorkshire

megalithix

Legendary Tree:  OS Grid Reference – SE 4280 1015

Also Known as:

  1. Adam & Eve’s Oak
  2. Wind-gap Oak

Archaeology & History

Highlighted on the 1854 Ordnance Survey map close to the township boundary line as Adam & Eve’s Oak, between Brierley and South Kirkby, I can’t find too much about this once great tree.  However the Wakefield historian W.S. Banks (1871) told us the following:

“Upon the common at Ringston Hill grows the remarkable ‘old Adam’ oak, much decreased in size in late years.  It is an ancient and large tree measuring twenty-seven feet in girth at a yard above the ground.  The trunk is hollow and the north side is broken away.  Most of the branches are also gone.  In 1868 a very large branch was blown off by the wind; but on the southerly side are still some very vigorous limbs.”

The old oak on the 1854 map
The old oak on the 1854 map

Even when Banks wrote this he said how the tree “must be many centuries old.”  In the time of King Charles II there used to be an old inn by Adam’s Oak at the foot of Ringston Hill, where the famous highwayman, Nevison (much-loved by many Yorkshire-folk because of his Robin-Hood-like character), used to stay.  The inn was owned by one Adam Hawksworth, but was ordered “to have his sign taken down for harbouring Nevison.”

Folklore

W.S. Banks also wrote of this once great tree:

“The people at Brierley tell of Nevison the highwayman lodging in it and hiding stolen treasures in it, things which probably did not happen, though Nevison’s name is connected with Ringston Hill.”

The treasure legend may have more to do with the adjacent stone circle, as we find ‘treasure’ a common motif at such places.

References:

  1. Banks, W.S., Walks in Yorkshire: Wakefield and its Neighbourhood, Longmans, Green  Co.: London 1871.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 


Hope Farm, Baildon, West Yorkshire

megalithix

Cup-and-Ring Stone (lost):  OS Grid Reference – SE 142 396

Archaeology & History

Listed in Boughey & Vickerman’s (2003) survey as ‘stone 186,’ I first came across a reference to this carving when I was young, in a short article by Sidney Jackson (1964) in his Cartwright Hall archaeology journal.  A letter was sent to Mr Jackson in 1963 by a Mr Bernard Stubbs of Baildon, who wrote:

“This morning I visited Hope Farm, Baildon, where Mr Jim Bell, the farmer, told me of a cup-and-ring boulder which he had discovered while digging a hole to bury a sheep, in the polt of land at the rear of the farmhouse… He stated that the hole was covered with cup-and-ring markings.  Unfortunately, the hole has been filled and concreted over.”

And no one has seen it since then!  Damn!  Recently we discovered a cup-marked stone carved on a now-upright stone in old walling in one of the fields immediately west of the farm, but it’s obviously a different one from that described in Mr Stubbs’ letter.  There are several other carvings in this region that are not in the official records, but this particular ‘lost’ stone remains lost for the time being!

References:

  1. Boughey, Keith & Vickerman, E.A., Prehistoric Rock Art of the West Riding, WYAS: Wakefield 2003.
  2. Jackson, Sidney, ‘New Cup-and-Ring Boulder,’ in Cartwright Hall Archaeology Group Bulletin, 9:1, 1964.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Ringstone Wood, Howden, East Yorkshire

megalithix

Stone Circle (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – SE 748 282?

Archaeology & History

I’ve looked and looked for info on this seemingly lost site, but have found very little.  It lent its name to the very woodland within, or on whose edges, it could once be found.  First described as early as 1284 in the ‘Calendar of Patent Rolls’ – where is appeared as ‘Ringestainhirst‘ – and then in the Testamenta Eboracensia in 1391, it is mentioned several other times before falling into nothing but literary memory in the middle of the 19th century.

We don’t know for sure where the circle was located, though one Latin reference describes it in proximity to a hermitage once known as St. Mary Magdalen’s Chapel at Howden: “heremitae de Ryngstanhyrste.”  The site would likely have been on the highest point in the locality, which may put it where the great church now stands, or perhaps on the more northern and western outskirts of the township.  Are there any Howden historians reading this who might be able to throw a bit more light on the issue?

The great place-name authority A.H. Smith (1937) thought that the Ringstone Hurst (woodland) at Howden got its name from a “wood near the circular stone”; but modern etymologists would place a  much greater likelihood that the woodland owed its name to the now lost stone circle that was once in this locality.

References:

  1. Raine, James (ed.), Testamenta Eboracensia; or, Wills Registered at York, J.B. Nichols: London 1836.
  2. Smith, A.H., The Place-Names of the East Riding of Yorkshire, Cambridge University Press 1937.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 


Ringstone Hill, Brierley, South Yorkshire

megalithix

Stone Circle (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – SE 426 099

Archaeology & History

On the southern outskirts of Brierley and the northeastern edge of Grimethorpe is the curiously-named site of Ringstone Hill.  I say “curiously,” as there are no physical remnants of anything which would presently tell us of there ever being such a ring of stones here — well, nothing authentic anyway!  Some doods stuck a modern ring of stones here, but it’s pretty obviously a recent construction (apparently 1990-ish); but sometime in the not-too-distant past another circle, very probably prehistoric, could be found here…

First mentioned in 1591, the original stone circle which gave this place its name has seemingly gone; but the hill which preserves its name is a prominent place in the landscape, and this was very probably of some relevance to the builders.  On the eastern side of the hill were two large oak trees known locally as Adam & Eve, or the Well-Bred Oaks: the first name implying a creation-myth story which may have related to the ring of stones.  It also stands at the edge of the old boundary line along which, somewhere, was another tree called the Gospel Thorn, “where the gospel was read when beating the bounds.” (A.H. Smith 1961: 1:269)

This was a theme explored and developed in Mr Gomme’s (1880) old work on ancient meeting, or moot spots.  He told:

“Ringston Hill, an eminence partly natural and partly artificial, is near a point at which meet the three wapentakes (district boundaries, PB) of Strafford, Stancross and Osgodcross.  This mound appears to be connected in some manner with the early political state of this district.  It was a place of rendezvous in the time of the Civil War; for in the accounts of the township of Sheffield in 1645 occurs this entry: ‘In money, coats and the charging of a guard which went to Ringston Hill with five men that were pressed, £4, 13s, 3d.’ (Hunter’s South Yorkshire ii, 407)”

References:

  1. Gomme, G.L., Primitive Folk-Moots, Sampson Low: London 1880.
  2. Smith, A.H., The Place-Names of the West Riding of Yorkshire – volume 1, Cambridge University Press 1961.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian