The following paper was presented at the New Forest Knowledge Conference 2017 entitled: New Forest Historical Research and Archaeology: who’s doing it? Below you will find the abstract of the paper and a video of the paper given if permission to film it was given by the speaker.
Speaker:
Mike Gill, Avon Valley Archaeological Society
Abstract:
The LoCATE project is a joint partnership between Bournemouth University and the New Forest National Park Authority, aimed at providing training in and access to advanced archaeological survey equipment. AVAS members have been successful in applying this training to the investigation of a range of sites in the vicinity of the Avon Valley, with impressive results. By describing these geophysics surveys, this talk aims to inspire local heritage groups in the New Forest area to add geophysics to their toolkit of landscape research.
There are literally hundreds of intact Bronze Age burial mounds, locally known as ‘butts’, in the New Forest including round barrows, bell barrows, and disc barrows. Locally, barrows were known to be ‘Burial Places of Giants’, with giants responsible for their construction and fairies or other supernatural beings known to be living within them. Seven barrows found together were known to be particularly associated with fairies. Some even had their very own legends about them, such as one known as Cold Pix’s Cave on Beaulieu Common, which is haunted by a spirit named the Colt Pixy.
Several Neolithic long barrows have also survived in the immediate areas surrounding the New Forest such as Giant’s Grave, a single 68m long mound found at Breamore near Downton. The mound is accompanied by the ‘Giant’s Chair’, bell barrow, not far from ‘Grim’s Ditch’ which, according to local folklore, was created by the devil (a word that from the 1200’s referred to ‘false’ gods i.e., the old gods and land spirits of the British Isles).
Another notable site is Stagbury Hill Barrow Cemetery, near Bramshaw. The Stagbury mound is likely to be a natural formation, but one that has been used by settlers for thousands of years for different purposes. There are four surviving burial mounds at the top of the hill (both round barrows and bell barrows, circa 1500-1100 BCE).
– Vikki Bramshaw, author of the book ‘New Forest Folklore, Traditions & Charms’
National park archaeologists are working with Beaulieu Estate to conserve and display an ice house that can be found on the estate grounds. This is one of the projects in the £4.4million Our Past Our Future heritage lottery fund scheme. As most of the structure is buried a laser scan of the ice house was commissioned creating a very detailed dataset to inform conservation work, but also provide an educational tool. You can see an animation created from the laser scanning below.
So what is an ice house?
Brick underground ice houses can be found in the grounds of many large and not so large estates. In England, the first were constructed in the early 17th century by King James I who is credited with having one built at Greenwich in 1616. One of the earliest ice houses once existed in the grounds of the Queen’s House at Lyndhurst probably constructed before the end of the 17th century. They remained popular with wealthy landowners on their estates until the end of the 19th century when refrigeration was being introduced and ice was being produced commercially rather than being imported. Domestic refrigeration becoming more common from the 1920s onwards. The Beaulieu Ice house is a late example constructed in the 1870s.
The underground chambers provided a temperature controlled environment allowing ice cut from local fresh water supplies in winter or imported ice to be stored for long periods of time. The ice house typically contains a drain at its base that would have originally allowed waste water to drain away as ice melted. In many cases ice could remain in the ice house for anything between 12 and 18 months. The ice houses could also be used to store food at the same time as the ice thus prolonging it’s shelf life. As well as preserving food, ice could also be used to create a freezing compound in the ice house by combining it with salt. Placing a container within the freezing compound allows any liquid to be frozen and was the traditional method for producing ice cream.
The ventilator at the top of the internal dome of the Beaulieu ice house visible in the 3D animation below is an unusual feature and relates to its later use. During the Second World War the ice house became an apple store that allowed apples from the adjacent orchard to be kept many months after harvesting. Storing apples requires the space to be ventilated due to the CO2 they give off that would pool in the bottom of the ice house and be lethal.
The ice house is built from both red and also yellow (Beaulieu buff) bricks stamped ‘Beaulieu’ and made at the estate brickworks at Baileys Hard on the Beaulieu River (A similar project has been working to record the surviving kiln, which you can read about here: Beaulieu Brick Kiln). It is also worth noting that the Beaulieu ice house would have been covered by soil to increase it’s insulation, the soil has been removed at some point in the past.
Beaulieu ice house is a grade II listed building #1094424
Volunteers have been involved with cleaning and re-pointing the ice house and listed building consent will be sought to repair the break between the dome and the tunnel entrance.
Beaulieu Ice House Laser Scan Animation created by Archaeovision
Beaulieu Ice House 3D model for you to explore created by Archaeovision
The bogs of the New Forest are truly infamous, rumoured to swallow both walker and beast if given half the chance. Significant tracts of bog are marked on Forest maps as morass or mire, and many place names in the Forest include the word ‘more’ or ‘moor’ in their name, meaning ‘area of marsh’.
The bogs play a big part in New Forest folklore. Wet ground can be particular and known to be haunted by the Colt Pixy, a local trickster spirit that entices travellers into the bogs. A similar legend exists elsewhere in the UK, involving the trickster spirit Poake (Puck) who leads unsuspecting travellers to their demise. Once they are thoroughly stuck, he ‘sets up a loud laugh and leaves them quite bewildered in the lurch’. The traveller is said to have been ‘poake-ledden’ (Puck-led).
The Will-o’-the-Wisp (or ignis fatuus, Latin for ‘foolish fire’) is another such Forest spirit seen on the moors and believed to entice people towards the mire by impersonating a lamp. This effervescent pixie-light is often described as a fine, blue-white flame that draws a traveller towards it but then either becomes intensely bright or suddenly extinguishes, causing them to blunder into a bog.
The pixie William is believed to carry the ‘Wisp’ of light (i.e., ‘Will with a Wisp’). William also appears as the spirit Jack (Jack-o-Lantern) or Puck (Pwca/Pooka) who Shakespeare describes as transforming into fire.
– Vikki Bramshaw, author of the book ‘New Forest Folklore, Traditions & Charms’
There are a number of interesting symbols found etched into the buildings in the New Forest. The charms can be found on fireplace mantels, ceiling beams, and door and window frames.
The purpose of the charm varied depending on what symbol was used and where it was carved, but in general they were evil-averting symbols believed to ward off evil spirits. They are sometimes called ‘witch-marks’, but this term can be misleading as it suggests the marks were created by witches, in fact many different people from all walks of life carved these symbols.
Old houses, pubs, and churches are natural places to find apotropaic marks, and all needing similar spiritual protection. One of the most intriguing finds so far in the New Forest may be at Queens House in Lyndhurst, which adjoins the Verderers Court. Here we find a half-finished hexafoil (a good-luck charm) in the oak mantel of the library room fireplace.
– Vikki Bramshaw, author of the book ‘New Forest Folklore, Traditions & Charms
Calshot Castle is a mid 16th century stone built artillery castle with 18th and 19th century alterations, lying on Calshot Spit on the southern shore of Southampton Water. The symmetrical plan of the castle centres on a three storey gun tower or keep, separated from the surrounding curtain wall by a courtyard within which lie both accommodation buildings and later searchlight emplacements.
Fears of a French Invasion at the end of the 19th century resulted in the castle undergoing substantial modification to become an artillery fort once again after a long period of use as a Coastguard base combatting smuggling in the area. In 1894 a large quick fire gun battery was built to the south east of the castle, which was completed by 1897. this was supplemented by the installation of Defence Electric Lights installed on the castle to be used in conjuction with the battery and a boom was built across Southampton Water controlled by the castle.
A set of detailed maps and colour drawings of Calshot Castle and battery completed in 1901 can be found in the National Archives WO78/4954 some of which have been reproduced for this article.
In 1907 Calshot Castle underwent its last major modification as a fortress; the roof of the keep was strengthened to permit the installation of a pair of quick fire guns to augment the adjacent battery.
Calshot Castle and its adjacent battery were stripped of their weapons before the end of the World War I.
The battery had been completely removed by the late 1920’s when aerial photos available from Historic England through the Britain From Above website show hangers built on where the battery once stood.
The full Historic England scheduling record for Calshot Castle can be found: Here
Christmas School Treats. Most New Forest children in Victorian and Edwardian times experienced frugal celebrations in comparison with present day celebrations. At Bartley Infant School in 1893 there were dolls, other toys, sweets and crackers and an excellent tea was provided for the children.
The horse has long been associated with old customs, magic, and witchcraft across the British Isles and Northern Europe, so it is not surprising that the same applies in the New Forest where the pony is such an important animal.
The Collepixie is a local trickster spirit that takes the shape of a New Forest Pony and entices walkers, horses, and their riders into the treacherous bogs of the New Forest. The spirit is usually described as a small ‘wild’ looking pony with a long and rough pale coat, or a sleek and handsome young pony which lures the traveller to their untimely demise. The Colt-Pixy is also associated with the ‘hag-riding’ of horses; ponies who were found in the morning sweated-up and/or with rough wind-plaits in their mane, believed to have been charmed by the Colt Pixy into a wild gallop in the night.
Many places in the New Forest are named after this spirit, in some instances indicating dangerous patches of ground or otherwise places known to be haunted by the spirit.
Overtime, ‘colt pixy’ has become ‘cold pixy’.
– Vikki Bramshaw, author of the book ‘New Forest Folklore, Traditions & Charms’
This paper was presented at the New Forest Knowledge Conference 2018 entitled: The Role of Commoning in the Maintenance of Landscape and Ecology: A New Forest, National and Global Perspective.
Speaker:
Graham Bathe, Open Spaces Society & Researcher
Abstract
At one time there were 900 royal hunting forests in England and Wales, perhaps covering a quarter of the land. A king could not even visit them in an average lifetime, let alone hunt in them. So, what were they really for? This talk will examine the genesis of the royal forests, the role of commoners within them, and how such rights arose and have shaped the landscape. It will consider winners and losers in royal forests, and how the rights of the king, his forest officers, the local nobility and peasant graziers all interplayed. It will seek to explode some of the myths associated with the royal forests, and explore the protection afforded to commoners and vegetation within them. Finally, it will consider how the modern values placed on the forests, of conservation, amenity and access are all dependent on maintaining ancient traditions.
