Details

The monument includes a section of a post-medieval boundary, which is situated
on the central plateau of the Tabular Hills.
It runs approximately north to south for 280m, with the last 80m curving more
to the north west. The linear boundary to which it belongs runs from Dixon's
Hollow in the north to the converging heads of Sand Dale and Heck Dale in the
south and is used to mark the modern division between the parishes of
Allerston and Thornton Dale.
For its southern 200m, the boundary segment survives as a rounded bank of
earth and stone, 3.5m wide and standing up to 0.5m high. The bank has a ditch
on its west side 2m wide and 0.5m deep, which increases to 3m wide and 1m deep
as the boundary descends the slope towards its northern end. For the last 80m
at the northern end the bank has a much more stony composition and is up to 3m
wide with a height between 0.5m to the east and 1m to the west. There is no
ditch visible alongside this northern part of the bank, which in the 19th
century formed the western side of an enclosure belonging to Staindale Warren.
The southern end of this section of the boundary has been truncated by a
surfaced forestry track and an unsurfaced track has breached the centre of the
section.
This boundary section forms a sample of the network of post-medieval
boundaries which were constructed from the 17th century onwards, to enclose
the wastes in the township of Allerston. They lie in an area which has a
history of land division which dates from the prehistoric period.

MAP EXTRACT
The site of the monument is shown on the attached map extract.

Source: Historic England

Reasons for Scheduling

This boundary section is a well-preserved and documented example of early
post-medieval enclosure on the Tabular Hills. It illustrates the process of
physical division between parishes of formerly common uplands, which took
place in the late medieval and early post-medieval periods. The boundary
section provides a sample of a more extensive network of post-medieval
boundaries within the parish of Allerston. The continued use of many of these
boundaries during the post-medieval period demonstrates their importance in
the landscape. The stratigraphic relationship between the two parts of this
boundary will preserve important evidence which will date its sequence
of construction. This network of post-medieval boundaries is superimposed upon
a pattern of land division dating from the prehistoric period. The spatial
relationships and differences in form between the boundaries of these two
periods demonstrate the changing character of landscape division over time.

Source: Historic England

Sources

Books and journals
Spratt, D A, Linear Earthworks of the Tabular Hills: North East Yorkshire, (1989), 36
Winchester, A J L, The Harvest of the Hills, (2000), 26-51
Harris, A, Spratt, D A, 'Yorkshire Archaeological Journal' in The Rabbit Warrens of the Tabular Hills, North Yorkshire, , Vol. 63, (1991), 177-206

Source: Historic England