The Modern Antiquarian. Stone Circles, Ancient Sites, Neolithic Monuments, Ancient Monuments, Prehistoric Sites, Megalithic MysteriesThe Modern Antiquarian

Chanctonbury Ring

Hillfort

Folklore

The young son of the landowners, Charles Goring, planted the beech trees of Chanctonbury Ring in 1760. There are various romantic tales about their birth - that as a child he ran around the hill scattering their seeds, or that he often went up the hill with a little flask of water to tend to his little seedlings. A less sympathetic story tells of him sending his poor servants up the hill with buckets of water! A more pro-proletariat version has the lowly girls and boys of the village sowing the beechnuts.

(collected together in Westwood and Simpson's 'Lore of the Land' (2005).)
Rhiannon Posted by Rhiannon
3rd March 2006ce

Comments (0)

You must be logged in to add a comment