.....And battles, long ago

The Cheviot still hides its head

 Still on the trail of the elusive Battle of Piperdean, I contacted the Department of Archaeology at Northumberland County Council  who were most helpful and referred me to the Transactions of The Berwickshire Naturalists, an esteemed body  known locally as “The Nats”.   It seems I was following old tracks for, in the accounts of 1910, there was a report asking the same question …

where was the battle of Piperdean?

Piperdean

The conclusion was that it was fought near Wark on the River Tweed, at a farm called Pressen where, indeed, there is a small valley, on the Pressen Burn, called Piperdean.  The farmer was well aware of the  supposed history of the site.

Piperdean looking east

Piperdean looking west

The explanation given in the Nats report is that Ridpath in his Border History in 1776 confused the battle with that of Chevy Chase, which, in turn, was often conflated and confused with the Battle of Otterburn.
 This is apparently the reason for Piperdean being described as “on the  River Breamish near the Cheviot” but this explanation falls down as Otterburn is nowhere near the Breamish either.

 It  seems there were just so many conflicts across the Debatable Lands as they were known, that folk had difficulty recalling who killed who and where and when.   The date of Piperdean is not even  accurately  known… sometimes 1435... sometimes 1436.
 The violence continued for nearly two more centuries and the farm of Pressen has a fortified bastle -house incorporated into the farm steading.

The crow-stepped gable of the bastle in the farm steading

Now a farm workshop, the massive masonry of the bastle is still  there

Built a hundred years after Piperdean, its massive walls still showed the need for the defence of people and livestock in those lawless days.



The search has been fun and has highlighted some hidden corners of our countryside and its colourful past.

Wikipedia has been corrected…again.

In search of dubious battle

The Cheviot is as hidden as the site of Pepperden

Just outside our village there is the site of a battle, or so it says in Wikipedia.   One of the many raids, skirmishes and sometimes large battles that constituted the Anglo-Scottish Wars between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries.  The Battle of Piperdean …1436...was fought between the Scots and English or, to be more accurate between the Douglas and the Percy families.  The Scots won which was unusual.
The Battle of Piperdean… never heard of it… neither had I until I came across a reference to it whilst researching the Battle of Homildon Hill,  which I had heard of, which has a large marker stone near the site, and which the Scots lost.
The Battle of Piperdean.    A different tale.    No local knowledge, no marker, no reference on the RCAHMS website… not a trace… except on Wikipedia.

Piperdean, Auld Cambus

Within a few miles of us there is a field pictured on Wikipedia, with a burn running through it in a small gully that could just about  be called a dean and it is referred to as Piperdean on the O.S. map though, in past, the family who farmed the land called the field and the burn, Piper-ton.



George Ridpath’s Border History  of 1776 quotes the site where the Earl of Northumberland was surprised by the Scots as
“within his own territories at a place called Pepperden on Brammish not far from the mountains of Cheviot”

The Breamish  (Brammish) river is a tributary of the River Till which arises in the Cheviot range  well within the territories of the  Percy family but nowhere near our village.

Interestingly, the famous border ballads Chevy Chase and The Hunting of the Cheviot seem to share the confusion, having been thought to be about the Battle of Otterburn fought in 1388, nowhere near the Cheviot.

Daniel Defoe, journeying through Northumberland in the early 18th century was anxious to see where Chevy Chase was fought, the old ballad having featured in the Spectator in 1711.  He  records in his Tour through the whole Island of Great Britain that he was  shown  site on the side of a hill in the Cheviots where the conflict took place.    He was most likely shown the site of Homildon Hill where Percy and Douglas met in 1402.    The border hills were dotted with such scenes of slaughter for more than a hundred years.
It would seem that these old ballads, which probably conflate accounts of several encounters, contain at least some  details of Piperdean which appears more of a dispute about hunting rights, the continuation of a blood feud or  bloody minded provocation than anything political.


The Percy out of Northumberland
And a vow to God made he
That he would hunt the mountains
 of Cheviot within days three
In the magger* of doughty Douglas
And all ever with him be

* To spite or vex

Hector Boece or Boethius states “it is not known whether he (The Earl) had a commission to invade Scotland from the King of England or whether he undertook the enterprise himself.”
Whatever the reason for the fight, on this occasion, the Douglas won but the site of his victory seems to be lost.
Pepperden is no longer on the map but searching for it has brought me to some beautiful Northumbrian countryside and hidden jewels.





Old Bewick has a tiny Norman church built on what was probably  an Anglo-Saxon chapel.  It has been rebuilt many times, usually after destruction by marauding Scots, but still retains its essential Norman character.
An early 14th century effigy of a lady in the choir may be the wife of the man who first restored the church after the Scots invasions in the late 12th century.
Part of an Anglo-Saxon cross with a piscina is built into the porch and pieces of earlier carved stones incorporated into the restored walls.

14th century effigy

Saxon  carved stone in restored wall

.
It seems strange that a search for the site of conflict and killing, should lead one to such a peaceful spot.




 The Kirk Burn running alongside the church, for old ecclesiastical sites always had a source of water nearby for baptism, is crossed by a stone slab clapper bridge and the churchyard has some wonderful old gravestones and ancient yews.

Carved capitol with green man faces hinting at older religions

A succinct reminder

 The search for Piperdean will continue.