At The Edge No 04 1996 12

48 Pages·1996·13.7 MB·English

Exploring new
interpretations of
past and place in
archaeology, folklore
and mythology
l\la.4 December 1 996 E i!.50
Exploring new
interpretations of
past and place in
archaeology, folklore
and mythology
Issue No.4 December 1996 ISSN 1361-0058
Editor: Bob T rubshaw
Contents:
}eremy Harte
2 Cross Hill Close, Wymeswold,
How old is that old yew? 1
Loughborough, LE1 £ 6VJ
Phi/ Ouinn
Telephone: [phone]£5
Sacred trees in the Bristol landscape 1 0
E-mail: [email protected]
Paul Wain
WWW: http:// www.gmtnet.co.uk/
Tree veneration in the Peak District 17
indigo/edge/atehome.htm
Ruth Wylie
The Cireen Man - variations on the theme .20
Published quarterly
Bob Tru bsh aw
The facts and fancies of the foliate face .25 Please note new rates!
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Editorial afterword 45
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© 1996. All articles, illustrations and
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:. I ( .
'Dark yew that graspest at the stone And dippest towards the
dremnless head . . .' wrote Tennyson in a fw1ereal 1nood. The
hwnan race is born and dies, but yew trees live forever. You do not JEREMY HARTE needs
have to be a Tennyson to respond to their deep, disturbing, 110 introduction to regular
w1calculated age. William Watson certainly was not poet laureate readers of At the Edge.
1naterial, ·but the silent presences of Merrow Down's yew wood New 1·eaders might like to
inspired him all the sa1ne:- know he is the Curator of
Bour·ne Hall Museum,
Old emperor Yew, fantastic sire, Ewell and a contributor to
Girt with thy guard of dotard kings all previous issues.
What ages hast thou seen retire
Into the dusk of alien things?
A profound question. Let us girth half as fast as other forest It is growth itself which 1nakes
spoil the poetry by answering it. trees, because it is laying down the1n vulnerable. Each year a
There was once a man who hard, closegrained wood. That fresh ring is added to the trwlk
was called up to join the anny. i1nparts i1n1nense strength to and branches, drawing on the
They asked hi1n all the usual the trwlk and branches and - energy provided by the canopy
questions, down to the last one frmn the viewpoint of 1nortal of leaves. Each successive ring is
on the fonn: what was his 1nen- provides durable wood for therefore larger than the last,
religion? 'Methuselahite', he carving and turning as well as while the crown of leaves stays
replied. Cmne again? 'It 1neans', 1naking those fa1nous bows. the smne, having reached a
said the reluctant soldier, 'that With age the yew becmnes point beyond which the
I'1n going to stay alive as long as I less straight, 'an WlSinooth tree frmnework of the tree can
bloody well can'. Now the yew . . . r oots twisted in the earth' support no 1nore. At last most
tree is the original Methuselahite, as the Rune Poem says, but it trees will snap w1der their own
and everything about it is frmned does not lose its strength. Trees
to live forever. know nothing of old age or Top: The yew tree at
Yew grows slowly. Even when death: they grow on and on Crowhurst, Sussex in 1936.
yow1g it will only increase its until accident finishes them off.
By Lonsdale Ragg.
At the Edge 1 No.4 December 1996
give an idea of growth rates -
once we know that a tree
planted in (say) I780 is now
(say) seven feet in girth, then
we can deduce, as a general
principle, that the yew grows
one foot in 30 years. It is not
quite as sitnple as that, because
individual trees differ in their
powers of growth - in fact there
is a variation of plus or tninus
five feet frmn the tnean aJnong
trees older than 200 years - hut
the general pattern is clear. The
observations of Victorian
naturalists, who were tneasuring
yow1ger specitnens, suggest a
brisker rate of growth - one foot
every 20-25 years [2).
But things are different when
we cmne to the really old yews,
the veterans of above 20 feet in
Crowhurst in the early nineteenth century. girth. Nobody knows when they
were planted: it is open to
weight, or keel over in stonns: remarkable Alien Meredith. doubt whether smne were ever
but the yew knows a trick or Meredith is first and planted by hwnan hand at all.
two. It can turn disease into foremost a visionary. In the But antiquaries have Jneasured
health by allowing fungal 1970s he received a nwnber of the 1nost fa�nous specimens
infections to eat up its dreaJns about the Jneaning of repeatedly since the
heartwood, leaving a hollow the yew, about its i1nn1ortality seventeenth century, and here
tree which, such is the tensile and its powers of wisdmn and again we can draw on
strength of all that twisted healing. Unlike 1nost visionaries, Meredith's researches, since he
wood, continues to support the he responded to this by getting has collated figures for 1 1 of the
heavy crown of leaves. on his bike and beginning a best-known veterans [3).
Meanwhile branches loop down series of encow1ters with The clai1n that 'old yews
w1der their own weight until hw1dreds of yew trees, grow Jnore slowly than yow1g
they touch the ground, and measuring and recording the1n. ones' is not true, if it is taken to
there they set root. A yow1g A self-taught Jnan, Meredith Jnean a gradual deceleration in
branch Jnay even touch down followed up every reference he the growth rate proportionate to
into the leafmould inside the could find on old yews and the size of the tree. The largest
hollow trwlk, and then the tree single-handedly bridged the gap veteran of which there is a full
renews itself frmn within; or the between 1nystic intuition and record, the churchyard yew of
spread of disease may split the professional biology. He has Darley Dale (32-3 feet) is not
trw1k into staves, each bowing convinced leading figures, growing any slower than the
out to root itself individually, so including David Bella�ny and stnallest, Church Preen (22-3
that a single tree is transfonned Alan Mitchell of the Tree feet). Adtnittedly the sa1nple is
into a grove. Register, that yews are vastly stnall: and cmnparisons are
The last trick of the yew older- thousands of years older, rendered absurd by another
defeats ti1ne itself. The tree in smne cases - than anyone had factor. Many of these trees are
si1nply stops growing. There is realised. He has not convinced not growing at all. Totteridge is
no increase in girth, no annual tne; at least, not in the the hest instance. 26 feet in
ring. Having reached a sufficient pulllished version of his work. I girth in 1677, this tree has been
size, it re1nains stable; it 1nay shall he showing why. But it is measured on four subsequent
reswne growth, or not; and only fair to add that to refute occasions, up to the present,
barring accidents, it can stay Meredith, a researcher must without variation. When the
the same size w1til Domnsday. rely on the i1mnense corpus of Last Trwnp blows and the dead
So it is no simple Jnatter to information which he has scra�nhle out of Totteridge
discover the age of a yew tree, asseJnbled. churchyard, that tree Jnay still
and until recently most He has, for instance, he there, and if it is, it will still
authorities had given it up as a uncovered 37 referPnces to he 26 feet round the trw1k.
bad job. The revival of interest yews planted at various times All the other veterans have
in the yew, not just as a tree but since the Refonnation, and still been through sitnilar periods of
as a sacred tree, is due to the existing [I]. The statistics of inaction. It seetns that stability
work of one man, the these trees can be plotted out to lasts for the tree w1til its
At the Edge No.4 December 1996
ecological stasis is broken by a
variation in the available
sw1shine or soil, or through the
loss of a branch; then growth
recommences at a quite lively
rate - one foot in 40 years - until
its work is done, after which
there is renewed stability.
That is interesting for
botanists, but frustrating for the
student of antiquities. It makes
it i1npossible to tell how old a
yew tree really is, since there is
no telling how often it 1nay have
ceased to grow in its life, or for
how long. Re1nember our
fonnula of one foot in 30 years,
with an allowance of five feet
either way for individual
variation. On these grow1ds, a
tree 30 feet in girth 1nust date
to at least 750 years old, which
is AD 1250. But that is a
1nini1nwn estimate. There is no
maxi1nwn. All one can say is
that trees, like other landscape
features, should be regarded as
recent w1til proof is forthcoming
that they are old. There are a
lot of forces ranged against the
life of a tree, 1nan not least
mnongst the1n, and to survive
the centuries it helps to have
had s01ne protective significance
in human culture.
In the warm, dry lands that
fringe the Mediterranean South
there flourish 1nany evergreen
trees - cypress, hohn oak and
laurel as well as yew. The
ancients planted these in
ce1neteries, moved by the
contrast between the w1dying
tree and the sad graves arow1d
it, and also concerned to set up
a durable signifier that this land
had been devoted to burials and
was not to be broken up for the
plough. Cypress and yew
Tandlidge, Kent in 1936. By Lonsdale Ragg.
therefore becmne the trees of
1nourning; their branches were
hung up after a death; the traditions of the Metliterranean yew beside a chapel or chw-ch
Furies carried torches of yew, were transferretl to Christian served to re1nind its celebrant of
and consecrated the dead with c01mnunities on the western death, a grateful reflection for
the1n [4]. In our own northerly fringe of Europe; that of the holy 1nen; Colmncille spoke to
cli1ne, the yew is the only cemetery fringetl with angels beneath the shade of such
evergreen (barring holly) to evergreens among them. When a tree -
grow below the conifer belt, and cypress proved unequal to the 'This is the Yew of the Saints . . .
so it carries a greater sy1nbolic Atlantic gales, the 1nonks of Would that I were set in its place
weight. Its toxic foliage, both Ireland had to resort to yew as there!
lethal and w1dying, stands for a signifier for places of burial. On my left it was pleasant
tleath and i1n1nortality at once. 'Yew, little yew, you are
adornment
In the far-ranging world of conspicuous in graveyards' says
When I enteretl into the Black
early Jnonasticis1n, many the 1nad king Suibhne [5]. The
Church'.
At the Edge 3 No.4 December 1996
A visionary episode in The trees had grown to be yews [14]. These trees were
Exile of Conall Core describes a d01ninating presences is shown evidently planted at a ti1ne
similar scene at the Rock of by their frequency in before the circular flan had
Cashel in Tipperary: 'I beheld a placenmnes - Cell Iuhhar, 'yew been replaced by the
yew bush on a stone and I church', is found at six places, rectangular churchyard,
perceived a s1nall oratory in and Cill-eo and Killeochaille although the date of this change
front of it and a flagstone before occur with the same meaning is itself open to question, and in
it. Angels were in attendance [10). s01ne cases uwy be no earlier
going up and down fr01n the Irish saints, as pilgrims on than the thirteenth centw·y.
flagstone' [6]. The vision is this earth, were prepared to In Wales, as in Scotland, the
nakedly political, and serves to find a grave away fr01n th�ir yew appears to have asswned
w1derwrite the a1nbitions of a own cow1try: but they wanted to the role of living gravestone. At
yew-dynasty, the Eoganacht of keep up the old funeral customs. the abbey of Strata Florida, a
Mw1ster, but it shows that Iona, settled by Colwncille in veteran yew 1s pointed out as
churches with yews were 563, is 1nore properly I or Hi, the grave of Dafyud ap Gwily1n -
already fmniliar in the eighth 'yew island' [ 11]. The trees after an i1nplausihle clai1n, since the
centw·y. The planting of yews which it was na1ned 1nust have tree is 22 feet and so even at
was ofteu ascribed to the early been deliberately planted - the the mini1nwn esti1nate 1nost
saints. The 1nouastery at coast of Argyll is too windswept have been growing before the
lubhar-Chinntrechta, now for the1n to have grown death of the celebrated poet in
Newry, was nmned after 'the naturally - and they would have the 1380s. The tradition has a
yew tree which Patrick himself served as a 1nark of 1nediaeval origin, however, in a
iwd planted', and its burning in consecration by the saint or his 1nock-elegy on Dafydd written
1162 was a national outrage. followers. Graveyard yews in while he was still alive by
The yew tree of Ciaran at Scotland are 1nost co1mnon Gruffydd Gryg in which it is
Clomnacnoise was already arow1d the southwest coastline indeed proposed to bury hi1n
venerable in 1 149, when it was and the 1nouth of the Clyue, w1uer a yew [15). Tradition also
large enough to shelter a flock of suggesting a cust01n i1nported continued to link the yew with
sheep in a stonn; lightning by the Irish 1nissionaries. With saints. The churchyard yew of
struck the tree and 113 sheep time, the yews have bec01ne Uanerfyl owes its existence to
were killed [7] . Nineteenth­ proprietary rather than St Erfyl, who absent-1nindedly
century traditions should be com1nw1al signs; they stand left her staff stuck upright in the
received with caution, but the beside individual graves, or grow1d overnight, and in the
yew in the cemetery at mark the private burial places of 1nonung fow1d it had sprouted
Glendalough was said to have fmnilies within the churchyard into a yow1g tree [16]. Without
been planted by St Kevin, while [12]. 1naking any clai1ns for the
three ehn trees at Kihnonin in Irish cust01ns were also reliability of this story, it can be
Co. Offaly had replaced an current in Wales. The laws of taken as proof of an enduring
earlier trio of yews attributed to Howell Dda, which date fr01n link between churchyard yews
St Cuimin [8]. c.950, open the section on trees and pilgri1n saints.
Traditions of this kind were with 'A yew of a saint is a pow1d Exactly the smne tale is told
evidently current when Gerald in value' - twice the worth of an at Congresbury on the other
of Wales visited Ireland in the oak, and in 1narked contrast to side of the Bristol Channel. The
1180s. He tells of the Nonnan the 1niserable 15 pence quoted stwnp of a yew which re1nains
archers hilletted at Finglas, for 'a yew of a wood' [13). in the churchyard was a
Co. Dublin, who cast greedy Evidently the valuation bore no flourishing tree before 1829,
eyes on the 'ash trees and yews relevance to the worth of the and the S01nerset villagers knew
and various other kinds of trees' tree, hut was intenued to it as St Cougar's Walking Stick.
which abbot Kenach and his protect sacred ground against The saint has been associated
successors 'had formerly outrages of the sort carried out with this place since 894 but his
planted . . . r ow1d the ce1netery at Iubhar-Cinntrechta. life, a drmnatic rig1narole in
for the orna1nent of the church'. Yew trees appear to have which he features as the errant
The godless invaders cut these been planteu, as at Finglas, son of a Byzantine e1nperor,
up for firewood, but pr01nptly arounu the boundary of tlu� leaves a wide field for historical
died of plague. Giraldus was churchyard. The 1ninsters of inquiries: at least six Cougars
struck by the extensive Esgor anu Heullan were have been identified in Jifferent
distribution of yew in Ireland. anciently 'of celebrity for outposts of the Celtic west [17].
'You will see them principally in sheltering yews'. At Uanelly in The undergrowth of fantasy
old cemeteries and sacreu Brecon, thirteen yews survive at Congreshury is a typical
places, where they were planted out of an original ring of hackgrounu for the d1w·chyard
in ancient ti1nes by the hands _of eighteen; Penpont has a larger yew. More veteran trees have
holy 1nen, to give them what circle, with thirty-eight trees survived in England than
orumnent and beauty they surviving; Uanfihangel­ anywhere else, a tribute to our
could' [9]. That s01ne of the nant-Melan is ringeu by ancient ancestors' political stability
At the Edge 4 No.4 December 1996
rather than their piety:
unfortw1ately there are no early
sources to tnatch the words of
Colwncille or Howell Dda.
Claitns that statute
cmnmanded the planting of
yews in 1483, or that Queen
Elizabeth ordered thetn to be
grown in churchyards for the
benefit of bowyers, have a way
of vanishing on close inspection.
No primary source has been
c1uoted, either, for the
injunction of Charles VII of
France that yew should be
grown in the churchyards of
Nonnandy to furnish weapons
for crossbown1en. Other
traditions, that the trees were
planted to shade the church, or
Ciilbert White's yew at Selbome, Dorset.
to keep cattle frmn poisoning
thetnselves on the foliage, are By Hieronymous Cjrimm, 1776.
no tnore than antiquarian fancy
dressed up as folklore [18]. The the tree was known - the oghatn which girded the adjoining
cutting of yew branches to be letter ldho for 'yew' was temple, and to inquire too
borne in procession on Pahn elliptically described as 'oldest closely into its botany would
Sw1day, as a substitute for the tree' or 'tnost beautiful of obscure the real intent of the
liturgically correct but ancients' [20]. But old or not, story [23]. Sitnilarly the Eo
botanically w1available olive, the trees were felled without Mugna, one of the five sacred
was a widespread mediaeval regret. The cmmnentary on trees of Ireland, bore apples and
custmn. But it only represents a Brehon law defines yew as a acorns as well as hazel nuts for
versatile use of pre-existent Chieftain Tree not for its its fruit: although its natne
churchyard yews; Palm Sunday sanctity but on account of 'its tneans 'yew of Mugna', it is
processions were a late timber, used for household obviously a fairy tree, not an
developtnent, and tnany plants vessels, breast-plates etc.' Apple actual specitnen of Taxus
other than yew were acceptable and hazel, by contrast, were baccata. Another of the five
for use in the ceremony [19]. ritually protected [21]. Yew is trees, the Eo Rossa or 'yew of
It is equally hard to find so durable a wood that many Ross', was said to have grown in
evidence for the modern belief objects carved in it, both sacred Co. Carlow w1til it was felled by
that yew trees were venerated and secular, have survived in a congregation of titnber-hw1gry
as part of pagan religion. Alien the archaeological record. Its saints. That sounds historical:
Meredith is convinced that they use for oghatn wands and but then we find that the tree,
were; but then he is a visionary, rw1estaves therefore hears like its fow· peers, had grown
a passionate advocate for the witness to the sturdiness of its frmn the three-natured berries
trees, not an itnpartial judge of titnber and not the enchantment of a branch horn by the
their claitns. His colleagues of its natne [22]. tnysterious antediluvian
Anand Chetan and Diana The shortcmnings of pagan Trefuilngid Tre-eochair [24].
Brueton have devoted a great literature on this topic do not Story-telling of this kinu
deal of their book The Sacred trouble Chetan and Brueton. It certainly recalls the bile or
Yew to just this topic. There is a is possible to itnprove the sacred trees which were
lot about pagan trees and picture by suggesting that honoured in pagan Ireland - but
paganistn in general; Herne the ancient references to apple, ash it is not fair to regard the tales
Hunter, Robin Hood and Hu and oak trees are, in fact, yew; as tnere ech'?es frotn that past.
Gadarn have their turn, or by identifying Adam of They form a distinct and
together with tnuch other Bretnen's account of the sophisticated genre of historic
padding of a fatniliar kind. But evergreen tree at Gatnla fantasy, cotnposed by and for
actual references to pagan yews Uppsala as if it were a yew, Christians for whotn the yew
are few. uespite his Wlatnbiguous 'no Olle was already associated with the
Chetan and Brueton feel knows what kind of a tree it is'. resting places of the holy dead.
that, since the yew is such a This tniraculous tree, capable of The history of the sacreu
retnarkable tree, it tnust have bearing seventy-two hanged yew can be sketched in outli11e.
received respect frmn the bodies on its branches, cotnes It originateu i11 sixth or seve11th
earliest titnes. There is little to frotn the satne storehouse of century Irish uwnasticism; it
support this. The longevity of 1narvels as the goluen chain was carrieu over the sea to
At the Edge 5 No.4 December 1996
Strathclyde and Gwynedd as years (first century AD); theit· jurisdictions in the twelth
part of the establishment of archaeological context suggests century, trees were etnployed as
missionary raths and llans. that they are only half that age. landtnarks for tnoots. A decayed
Protected by law in tenth­ The so-called Pilgritns' Way yew stood on a tnound at •
century Wales, it was cultivated through Surrey and Kent runs Wonnelow Tutnp w1til 1855; it
across the border in the West beside banks created by had been the tnoot for one of
Cowttry and the marcher lands. mediaeval ploughing, and the the Herefordshire hundreds.
So it came to be adopted yews growing on these The hut1dredal court of
enthusiastically by builders of earthworks are already of Totteridge met ut1der the yew in
churches in southern England, venerable proportions [26]. the chw·chyard, and the
the ecological heartland of the At Knowlton in Dorset there tnanorial court and fair of
yew, and as a result of the is a linf> of yews, survivors from Pensale were held w1der a yew
Conquest it was grown on thf> an early hedgerow, with an at Langsett: Knowlton itself was
Engli-5h-facing coasts of average girth of 25 feet. Tht> the seat of a� Ttwtdred [29].
Normandy and Brittany [25]. trees are growing over one of a But other yews, equal in size
An interpretation on roughly series of henge tnonwnents, and and dignity, are. fow1d in sites
these lines would match up with this has persuaded Meredith to dating from the later Middle
the written references, Ages. Trees in deerparks
the general trends of have been preserved as
Almost every old yew can be
insular Christian history, part of a landscape fashion;
and the ages suggested parks flow·ished in the
seen to harmonise with the
for existing trees by a thirteenth century, and the
series of naturalists frmn yews within thetns cannot
plan of the church for which it
1831 to 1958. But it runs be Jnuch older, which
cleau contrary to tnodern Jneans that Meredith's
was planted.
estimates of the longevity dates for the trees at
of yews. Kentchurch Court (35 feet),
David Bellmny, following his give the1n an age of 2500 or Knowle Park {20 feet) and
conversion to Alien Meredith's 3000 years - postdating the Waldershare Park {30 feet) -all
views, has been issuing abandomnent of the henges, it esti1nated at 1000--2000 years
certificated claitns of age for is true, but still pretty old. old - are again Jnore than double
veteran yews. They hang in However, Knowlton was the true age. At Langley Park in
churches up and down the land reoccupied in the seventh Buckinghmnshire a self­
and they tnake an itnpressive century as a focus for pagan regenerating yew is growing in a
total; over 130 English Saxon burials, focussed on a Jnoated fannstead site; one at
churchyard yews are said to be dominating barrow towards Brackley in NorthamptonshirP
older than the establislunent of which the hedgerow is aligned. grows in or over a deserted
Christianity in this country. Half The trees fonn part of an tnediaeval village [30).
a dozen are ascribed a date in Anglo-Saxon network of Estitnates of their age should be
the late Bronze Age, while a few bow1daries and burials across tnade accordingly.
are tnore ancient still. That is a the ancient earthworks, and There is of course one
bit much for an archaeologist to they in their turn n1ay have tnediaeval structure consistently
swallow. The tninimwn age for influenced the choice of the site associated with yews - the
these trees, based on the known for a church in the twelfth parish church. Antiquarian
growth rates, would date tnost century [27]. literature on the yew owes
of thetn to the high Middle Fw·ther evidence linking the tnuch to generations of learned
Ages. yew with pagan burials cmnes incwnbents, each one
Stratigraphy itnposes some from Taplow, where the speculating on his own fmniliar
litnits to the mnbitious claitns' of excavators of the rich seventh tree, in the tnanner of Parson
Meredith and Bellmny. A yew century barrow Copleston of O.ffwell ( 1832) -
which has sprouted on an w1cereJnoniously dislodged a
earthwork catmot be older than 21-feet tree frotn the top of the 'Thy stetn, coeval with the
the soil on which it grows. A mound. Here, as at Knowlton, plinth, I WE\en
nwnber of the trees found away the history of the site continues That lifts tny flinty tower above
from churchyards are on into the Christian era with a the sod'.
hedgebanks or bow1daries church thirty yards away [28].
which seetn to be of Anglo­ Evidently the yew was planted This is the crux of the
Saxon or later date; there are at a tin1e when the barrow was tnatter. Archaeologically and
veterans at Wintershall {29 feet more itnportant than the botanically there is nothing
in girth), Acton Burnell Park (25 church, either to act as a implausiblP about a date 'coeval
feet), Aldworth (27 feet), Castle grave-tree for the eponymous with the plinth' for tnany English
Frotne {21 feet) and Chevening Taeppa or to tnark out the churchyard yews. But to go
{20 feet). Some of these are mound as a place of assembly. further - to daitn that tnore than
dated hy Meredith to 2000 Until the decline of hundredal a hwtdred churches were built
At the Edge 6 No.4 December 1996
on sites chosen because they
adjoined flourishing pagan yew
trees - that is something else.
There is little direct
archaeological evidence. When
the 2�feet yew at Selborne
cmne down in the great stortn
of 1991, the soil w1der its roots
was excavated and an
w1disturbed area was fow1d,
dating to a ti1ne when the tree
.
was nine or ten feet in girth.
C01nparison with 1nore 1nodern
trees of known age suggests that
the yew was 200-400 years old
at that ti1ne. This area was cut
by, and therefore earlier than, a
coffined burial whose �rave fill
contained five residual sherds,
•
none of the1n later than 1600
and one definitely thirteenth or
fourteenth century [31]. A tree
which was three centuries old in
c.1500 would be roughly Salcombe Regis, Dorset.
conte1nporary with the earliest,
FromVaughan Cornish's
twelfth century, phase of the
church. A si1nilar conclusion can The Churchyard Yew And Immortality; 1946.
be reached by an esti1nate of
size alone; a growth rate of one planted. It will stand to see s01ne evidence offered in
foot in 30 years up to the first overshadowing the entrance support. At F ortingall in
recorded measure1nent (23 feet path to the church porch, Perthshire two sections remain
in 1778) would suggest that the nortnally on the south side; fr01n an i1mnense yew which,
tree was planted in the eleventh where convenience has when intact, 1nust have
century. Meredith's estimate of dictated a porch to the north, 1neasured 56 feet in girth. At
1400 years (sixth century), with the yew is there also. even the 1nost conservative
all that it implies for the history S01neti1nes there are two trees, estimate this tree 1nust be older
of the site, is not necessary. one beside the 1nain fw1eral than the establislunent of
An archaeological case has path, the other hy a 1ninor Christianity in these islands;
also been 1nade·for the great entrance. As V aughan Cornish and although it has been subject
age of the yew at Tandridge in observes, this i1nplies that the to various ritual indignities,
Surrey. Very tall, 35 feet in church was laid out first and including the lighting of Beltane
girth, and grotesquely hollowed the yews cmne afterwards. fires against it and the
within, it stands by the west Co1n1non sense would suggest procession of funerals through
wall of the nave. We are this as the general rule. At its trwlk, the tree has obviously
assured that within the Saxon Dw1sfold the church stands on been cared for over the
crypt stone vaulting can be seen the edge of a bluff overlooking centuries. Significantly the
bridging the roots of the tree. the river Arw1, in a Wealden nearby placenmne Dw1eaves is
This, if true, would vindicate parish of dispersed and tigh-neimhid, 'the house of the
Meredith's clai1ns with a secondary settle1nent [33]. sacred grove', and a nearby
vengeance: for roots grow pari Below the path as it turns to village has the reputation of
passu with trwlks, and if these enter the church stands a being the true centre of
roots were equal to their twisty, hollow yew 24 feet in Scotland [34). Here it is easy to
present size a thousand years girth. Meredith in his usual way believe that the yew was
ago, then the tree must have dates it to 1500 years (fifth originally tended as an
been i1n1nense even then. On century). In which case, you equivalent to the Irish bile or
inquiry, however, I find that wonder, why does it happen to tribal tree, and was afterwards
Tandridge church has no Saxon stand just below the crest of a adapted as part of the
phase nor any crypt, and that hill on which a thirteenth­ enviromnent of a 1nissionary kill
local opinion was as puzzled by century church was to be built, during the Christianisation of
the story of the root as I was and opposite its door? Dalriada.
[32). It is not always Things were different in
Ahnost every old yew can be unreasonable to suppose that southern England. Most of the
seen to hartnonise with the plan churches have been built on parish churches with which we
of the church for which it was pagan sites, hut one would like are dealing were established
At the Edge 7 No.4 December 1996
long after the extirpation of These trees belong to the last rights of a s01newhat non­
paganism, and many of the1n phase in the cultural history of specific natw·e to all living
serve commwuties which were the sacred yew, its adoption hy creatures on the earth. It was a
themselves secondary the Anglo-Nonnan aristocracy. public relations exercise, and
settlements. A village with a The tree at Drybw·gh - the the fact that the signatories
name like Ashtead is likely to northermnost of this group - has were convinced of a prechristian
have come into being through grown slowly, while that at origin for the twelfth-centw·y
woodland clearance; in fact the Ankerwyke, in the rich tree w1der which they met is
church here is known to have floodplain of the Thmnes, has only one of the 1nany absurdities
been built as a dependent involved. But it would be
chapelry of Leatherhead short-sighted of a 1nere
What are a few centuries here
in 1120, and estimates of antii.]uarian to heckle fr01n
age for its 23 feet yew the sidelines. What are a
and there when the neo-pagan
tree 1nust be adjusted few centw·ies here and·
accordingly [35]. there when the neo-pagan
salvation of the planet is in
Some churches, and salvation of the planet is in
their yews, can be dated question? Yet I feel that the
question?
by inference. Lytchett truth should also count for
Matravers is one of s01nething.
several parishes in south-eastern flourished. Generally, however,
Dorset fonned in the tenth the di1nensions of the yews References
century by breaking up the support the rule of thwnh with
parochia of a local 1ninster - in which we began, of growth at a 1. Anand Chetan and Diana
this case, Stur1ninster Marshall rate of one foot in 30 years with Brueton, The Sacred Yew
(36]. Nonetheless its yew, 23 a five-feet 1nargin of error. It is (Arkana, 1994) pp250-253
feet in girth, is dated by hardly necessary to add that 2. Waiter Johnson, Byways in
Meredith at 1600 years (fourth Meredith's esti1nates for the British Archaeology (Cmnbridge
century). As before, his dates of these trees 1nake the1n, UP, 1912) p364; E.W.Swanton,
estimate of age appears to be yet again, twice as old as the The Yew Trees of England
double that suggested by the buildings which they were in (Farnhmn, 1958) plO
historical context. The sa1ne fact planted to e1nbellish. 3. Sacred Yew pp254-261
results obtain when churches I sOJnetiines wonder whether 4. Statius, Thebaid VIII:9-10
have been dated this search for pagan 5. Kenneth Jackson, Studies in
archaeologically. At Sydling antecedents does not betray a Early Celtic Nature Poetry
St Nicholas excavation showed subconscious resent1nent against (Cmnbridge UP, 1935) p12
the first phase of the church to the Christian tradition. The 6. A.T .Lucas, 'The Sacred Trees
be as late as the thirteenth annals of ge01nantic research Of Ireland', Journal of the Cork
century, thereby fixing a date are full of attetnpts to Historical and Archaeological
for its 14 feet yew [37]. 1narginalise or explain away the Soc. 68 (1963) ppl6-54 (p31)
There are great proble1ns in achieve1nents of the Church, as 7. Annals of the Kingdom of
proving that any given church is if sacredness and Christianity Ireland by the Four Masters, ed.
the earlie�t building standing on were s01nehow at variance with John O'Donovan (Dublin, 1851)
its site. There may have been a one another. In Alien Meredith's 1p1147; Chronicum Scotorum,
ti1nber original; there 1nay even case this zeal for pagan origins ed. Willian1 M.Hennessy (Rolls
have been a pagan predecessor. has persuaded hin1 that Magna Ser.46, 1866) p347
But the case is Jnuch clearer Carta was signed, not on the 8. Lucas, op.cit. pp36-37
with monasteries, which were accepted sfte of Rwmy1nede, 9. Topographia Hibernica in The
built at known dates on but at Ankerwyke under the Historical Works, tr. Th01nas
greenfield sites. They, too, have shelter of an age-old yew, the Wright (George Bell, 1887)
their yew trees. Waverley axis mundi of a prechristian p109, 125
Abbey, fow1ded in 1128, is cult. The tree itself has sent hin1 10. Sacred Yew pp88, 218
neighbour to a yew 2·1 feet in drea1ns of a coronation 1 1. William J.W atson, The
girth; Fow1tains Abbey, in 1132, cereinOily, and 1nessages ahout History of the Celtic Place­
is flanked by veteran yews of 22 the threat to its existence (a Names of Scotland (Blackw ood,
feet; next c01nes Dryhurgh in plmmed golf course). Well, if 1926) p87
1136, with a 12 feet tree: your life was in danger, 12. V aughan Cornish, The
Ankerwyke Priory, fow1ded in wouldn't you he prepared to Churchyard Yew and
1160, adjoins a 31 feet tree; glmnourise your origins a little? Immortality (Frederick Muller,
Strata Florida, founded 1184, as [39]. 1946) pp48-58
we have seen has one of 22 feet; In 1992 David Bellmuy led a 13. A.W.Wade-Evans, Welsh
at Muckross Ablwy, of 1440, the meeting which proposed - 777 Medieval Law (Oxford, 1909)
tree is 12 feet and stands in the years after the original event - a pp108, 248
centre of the cloister, obviously new Great Charter, a revised 14. Johnson, op. cit. p398;
a deliberate planting (38]. ecological version grantiug Cornish, op. cit. pp33-34;
At the Edge 8 No.4 December 1996