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Hillfort
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This is not to do with this site necessarily - which is a small hillfort on a site previously occupied in the Neolithic - but does have links with the farm at its base, Bagbury. It struck me as odd to find a story about a strange and supernatural bull when there's one about a strange and supernatural cow not so far away at Michell's Fold. It even gets a bit of a stony connection, as the bull had to be contained by burying under the door stone of the church. It sounds awfully pagan vs christian - the bull ruled the area before the church turned up, and he even tried to destroy the building until he was firmly put in his place. I think Alan Garner would love it.
The story is in Collectanea Archaeologia (1862), in Thomas Wright's 'On the local legends of Shropshire'. He also tells the story of the Mitchell's Fold stones and their cow.
There are quite a few versions in Burne's 'Shropshire Folk-Lore':
http://www.archive.org/stream/shropshirefolkl00burngoog#page/n132/mode/2up and the following pages.
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Posted by Rhiannon
11th January 2011ce
Edited 23rd June 2013ce
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