Monument record MDO709 - The Trendle, Maypole or Frying Pan, Cerne Abbas

Rectangular earthwork enclosure of unknown date on Giant Hill, consisting of an outer bank with a slight outer ditch on the north and east, and an inner bank with a slight inner ditch, the latter believed to have been a hedge bank. The feature is visible as an earthwork on aerial photographs and Environment Agency lidar imagery and was digitally plotted during the Dorset Upper Cerne and Piddle Valleys AIM project.

Earthwork, called the Trendle, forms a roughly rectangular enclosure, it consists of an outer bank with a slight outer ditch on the N and E and an inner bank with a slight inner ditch. The inner bank is of sharper profile and more regular form and is presumably of later date; it is indeed stated to have been a hedge-bank (Antiquity, IV, 113). Within the enclosure is a rise in the ground of quite irregular form. The enclosure is said to have been used for Maypole dancing. <1>

Possibly Romano-British, associated with the Cerne Giant (ST 60 SE 39). <2>

"The Trendle" or "Frying Pan"; a small banked enclosure measuring 30.5 m by 27.4 m with a raised disturbed centre. It may represent an Iron Age burial mound, the tomb perhaps of the person represented by the 'Giant'. <3>

Situated at ST 66730167, terraced into the S end of a N-S spur immediately above and E of the Cerne Abbas Giant, lies a well preserved rectangular earthwork. The area enclosed measures 23.0 m NW-SW by 19.0m NW-SE, and is a level platform cut into the slope. For such a small earthwork the system of banks and ditches is complex. They consists of an outer ditch 0.3 m deep, intact around the N side only, but traceable around the W and E. Inside this is a substantial bank 1.8 m high on the downhill S side, and 1.5 m on the uphill N side broken by a possible entrance in the S corner. A second continuous bank runs parallel to, and inside of, the above, averaging 0.6 m high and 2.0 m wide with traces of a vestigial inner ditch 0.2 m deep. Roughly central to the enclosure and orientated E-W lies a rectangular mound, 15.0 m long by 10.0 m wide, and up to 0.7 m high. Without excavation, it is impossible to conclude the age and purpose of this feature. However, some form of ritualistic origin seems likely. Surveyed at 1:2500 on MSD with 1:1250 enlargement. <4>

The earthwork is known locally as "Frying Pan". Enquiries to establish the application of the name 'Trendle' to the feature were negative. Mrs Fox (b) a life long, and now also the oldest inhabitant of Cerne Abbas, stated that she had never heard of the name 'Trendle' being applied specifically to the enclosure, but rather it seems to some vague indeterminable area of Giant Hill (name ST 670021). <5>

The feature is visible as an earthwork on aerial photographs and Environment Agency lidar imagery and was digitally plotted during the Dorset Upper Cerne and Piddle Valleys AIM project. <9, 10>

Colley March, H, 1902, The Giant and the Maypole of Cerne. Proceedings of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society, xxii, 101-118 (Article in serial). SDO21046.

<1> Royal Commission on Historical Monuments England, 1952, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume I (West), 82 (Monograph). SDO97.

‘(29) Earthwork, called the Trendle (Plate 107), immediately to the E. and above (28), forms a roughly rectangular enclosure (for plan, see preface, p. xxxiv). It consists of an outer bank with a slight outer ditch on the N. and E. and an inner bank with a slight inner ditch. The inner bank is of sharper profile and more regular form and is presumably of later date; it is indeed stated to have been a hedge-bank (Antiquity, IV, 113). Within the enclosure is a rise in the ground of quite irregular form. The enclosure is said to have been used for Maypole dancing.’

<2> Royal Commission on Historical Monuments England, 1952, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume I (West), xxxv (Monograph). SDO97.

<3> Dyer, J, 1973, Archaeological Guide to Southern England (Monograph). SDO17368.

<4> Barrett, G, Various, Field Investigators Comments GB, F1 GB 23-JUL-77 (Unpublished document). SDO17369.

<4.1> Ordnance Survey, OS 74/088/244-26 (Aerial Photograph). SDO17372.

<5> Stone, J W, Field Investigators Comments JWS, F1 JWS 27-JUL-77 (Unpublished document). SDO11902.

<5.1> 1977, Mrs Fox, 21 Long Street, Cerne Abbas, 27-JUL-77 (Verbal communication). SDO17371.

<6> Castleden, R, 1995, The Cerne Giant Project, Phase 2: Surveys Undertaken in 1995 (Unpublished document). SDO14244.

'4.8. The Trendle. The interior of the enclosure is really too extensively covered by the irregular low mound for a resistivity survey to detect any pattern of post-holes belonging to a pre-mound building. The largest area of the platform free of the mound was the area selected for resistivity survey, and the results from it were inconclusive. Possible 4 of 5 lows near the central mound represent the post-holes of part of a rectangular building; the position of this L-shaped setting suggests that a light post-built structure 10m by 8m may once have stood in the Trendle.'

<7> Historic England, Historic England Archive, AA67/02567 (Index). SDO14738.

IA/RB EARTHWORK, VIEW SOUTH SAID TO HAVE BEEN USED FOR MAYPOLE DANCING

<8> National Record of the Historic Environment, 199018 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

<9> John Boyden, 01-JAN-1969, JRB 108/32 (Aerial Photograph). SDO20898.

<10> Environment Agency, 16-NOV-2021, LIDAR Environment Agency DTM (Aerial Photograph). SDO18034.

Record last edited

Oct 30 2024 12:23PM