The Cotswold Way. Kev Reynolds

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      A steep wedge of a sunken track takes the Cotswold Way between North Nibley and the Tyndale Monument (Stage 9, Southbound; Stage 5, Northbound)

      Man in the landscape could well be the walk’s theme. As we have seen, the Cotswolds have no vast wilderness, no raw mountains or trackless moorland; it is not a countryside that threatens or bullies, but one that welcomes. Man has lived in harmony with nature for a long time here, using as a basic building material the very substance of the land, exhibiting a rare degree of artistry in the moulding of wall, doorway and crooked roof, until even the villages themselves appear to be an extension of that land, an integral part of the landscape.

      Instead of shunning habitation, as do many other long-distance paths, the Cotswold Way actively seeks out the timeless villages and towns that are among the loveliest features of the region. But timeless though they may seem, they are only comparatively recent additions to a landscape that has been worked, in some form or another, for 5000 years and more.

      The first ‘Cotsallers’ were nomads, hunter-gatherers who drifted through what was then a heavily wooded region, but made little visual impact upon it. It was Neolithic man, around 3000BC, who first began to clear patches in the woodland cover and to till the soil, and in so doing started a primitive form of landscape management. These groups of New Stone Age agriculturalists left behind some 85 burial tombs scattered throughout the region, among the finest being Hetty Pegler’s Tump and Belas Knap, both on or very close to the Cotswold Way. These ancient relics are typical of what has become known as the Severn-Cotswold Group: large cairns of stone with a covering of soil, and internal passageways lined with drystone walling which open into burial chambers. It has been estimated that some of these tombs must have involved about 15,000 man-hours to build, which indicates a surprising level of social involvement and organisation.

      As well as Hetty Pegler’s Tump and Belas Knap, there is another similar burial mound of the same period on Frocester Hill, while at Crickley Hill near Birdlip recent excavations reveal evidence of a 3 acre (1¼ hectares) Neolithic causewayed camp. This contained a village protected by earthwork defences of a double ditch and dry walling topped by a palisade. The discovery of flint arrowheads and items of charred fencing suggest that life in the New Stone Age was not entirely peaceful.

      Neolithic man was replaced by tribes of immigrants from the Low Countries. These so-called ‘Beaker People’ of the Bronze Age lived a mostly nomadic existence, raising stock and undertaking a primitive form of cultivation before moving on. The most significant evidence of their occupation of the Cotswolds (although these are not always clearly visible) is in the form of round barrows, contrasting with the long barrows in which their predecessors had buried their dead. Although there are more than 350 of these round barrows, none of any importance are actually to be seen along the Cotswold Way.

      The Iron Age

      What is visible, however, is a series of hill and promontory forts dating from the Iron Age, which lasted from about 700BC until the Roman occupation. The work of Belgic immigrants known as Dobunni, it is thought that these defended enclosures served different purposes. Some clearly contained working communities with villages of long houses, some were market centres or animal corrals, and some of the smaller enclosures perhaps were the fortified homes of Dobunni tribal chieftains. Yet whatever their function, they conformed to set patterns, being protected by deep, rock-cut ditches and tall, near-vertical walls. Nowadays they invariably appear as rounded, grass-covered mounds, some saucer-shaped and distinctive, others perhaps with sections of wall having been lost under centuries of ploughing.

      There are many fine examples of these hill forts along the route, the largest being at Little Sodbury, where Sodbury Hill Fort covers 11 acres (4½ hectares), enclosed by ditches and earth ramparts. Uleybury is even larger, at more than 30 acres (12 hectares), but is just off the route. Set on the escarpment above Dursley it had the additional protection of a 300ft (90m) drop down the scarp face. Other hill forts may be seen along the way on Cleeve Common, Leckhampton Hill, Crickley Hill and Painswick Beacon, among others.

      The arrival of the Romans

      The Roman baths, near Bath Abbey

      When the Romans came in AD 43 they adopted some of these Iron Age camps for their own use. In addition they built a fortress at Cirencester and another near Gloucester, then linked the two with Ermin Street, which is met on the Cotswold Way at Birdlip. Away from the towns – and none is greater in this part of Britain than the world heritage city of Bath – agricultural estates were established and well-to-do citizens built villas for themselves, usually richly decorated with mosaics, on well-chosen sites that caught the sun. The Cotswold Way passes near two of these, one above Wadfield Farm near Winchcombe, the other at Witcombe below Cooper’s Hill.

      The Saxon era

      The Roman occupation of the Cotswolds ended in AD 410 with the withdrawal of the legions and the advance of the Saxons. The Dark Ages that followed are shrouded in mystery, but it is thought that these latest newcomers brought with them a way of life that was not ordered with the same degree of Roman culture and organisation, and there seem to have been many tribal differences to settle. It was during this period that Arthur rose as defender of Britain.

      Tales of King Arthur are a muddle of historic evidence and legend, but that these were unsettled times cannot be in doubt. What seems certain is that towards the end of the sixth century a battle took place on Hinton Hill, near Dyrham, between West Saxon warlords Cuthwine and Cealwin, and three kings of the Britons. The kings – Coinmail, Condidan and Farinmail – were slaughtered and the Britons pushed back to Wales and Somerset leaving the towns of Bath, Cirencester and Gloucester in Saxon hands.

      The Cotswolds were then ruled by West Saxons in the south, and Mercian Saxons in the north. The Mercian capital was established at Winchcombe where a monastery was founded. At the abbey at Bath, which became an important and substantial Saxon town, King Edgar was crowned the first King of all England in AD 973. The Church grew in power, and by the end of the Saxon period actually owned a good proportion of the Cotswolds. It was during this period that whole sheepskins were being exported to serve English missionaries on the continent, an export that began as early as AD 700.

      Norman rule

      Tormarton church and its table tombs (Stage 11, Southbound; Stage 3, Northbound)

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