September 29, 2023 - 10:30am
The felling of the mighty sycamore on Hadrian’s Wall is simply unbearable. I haven’t felt a loss like this since the mediaeval beams of Notre Dame came crashing down in 2019. Like so many Northumbrians, I am mourning what was the cynosure of our county. Looking back through the photos I’ve taken of Sycamore Gap down the years, the tree is almost impossibly beautiful. With its domed canopy and slightly twisted trunk, it stood like a sentry amid the shivering milecastles strung out along the great dolerite shelf of the Whin Sill.
I last visited on the freezing Boxing Day of 2021 when I had the whole place to myself, other than a flock of sheep that swept past me like a shoal of fish. I stood contemplating how Kevin Costner and Morgan Freeman could’ve got here so soon after landing on the shores of East Sussex. But this is a place where centuries are compressed.
Whenever Roman travellers passed a sacred grove, noted the philosopher Apuleius, they would “make a vow, or a fruit offering, or…sit down for a while”. And for many people Sycamore Gap was a sacred site: a place where ashes were scattered and troths were plighted, or simply somewhere to venerate and commune with nature.
No wonder that the Bishop of Newcastle, Helen-Ann Hartley, posted “I’ve spoken with many people today who are profoundly upset at the loss of this tree … It bore a pastoral load in its strength and beauty”. For Sycamore Gap represented the ancient history and austere beauty of Northumberland, and was also a symbol of the deep Northumbrian love of local history and the natural world.
Indeed, a preoccupation with nature was characteristic of the Northumbrian Enlighteners of the 18th century. These included figures such as Lancelot “Capability” Brown, whose unsurpassed topographical and horticultural acumen was nurtured as a shepherd’s boy in Redesdale; or Vice-Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood, who planted acorns by the Wansbeck; or Thomas Bewick whose obsession with local flora and fauna found ready customers among the gentlemen naturalists of the Coaly Tyne (it is so telling that Newcastle gained a natural history museum decades before it had an art gallery).
With the news that an arrest has been made, vengeful comments are swirling online as to appropriate punishments for this crime of lèse-majesté against mother nature. In Greek mythology, it was recorded that when Erysichthon felled Demeter’s sacred tree, the latter goddess afflicted him with insatiable hunger, which led to his death from eating his own body. Vengeful tweeters haven’t gone quite that far, but I note that constructing a pillory from the fallen timbers has already been mooted.
As has the hopeful suggestion from a local antiquarian that if Capability Brown “could move fully mature trees almost 300 years ago, someone somewhere must have a mature sycamore they can donate and be replanted.” I would certainly support this, for those who say that this is only a tree should realise that for heartsore Northumbrians everywhere this outrage has left more than just a gap where a sycamore once stood on Hadrian’s Wall.
Dan Jackson is the author of the best-selling book The Northumbrians: The North East of England and its People. A New History, published by Hurst (2019)
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SubscribeI’m also very upset at the senseless felling of the sycamore – and it seems to go deeper than the general outrage that I generally feel at the wanton destruction of beautiful and valuable things that were there for everyone to enjoy.
It seems symbolic for greater things about which I feel frustration and alienation. The loss of respect in society in general. The selfishness of the “me-me-me” society and how freedom is now taken to mean “I’ll do what I want and to hell with everyone else”. The lack of awareness that the collective will to preserve and protect things like this tree is the cultural glue that has been holding us all together but which is now splintering under the weight of the hyper-individualism I mentioned just above.
The sycamore’s destruction is a very physical and visible manifestation of the erosion of that collective feeling.
More precisely the the “me-me-me” generations
And given the age of the suspect it was no doubt done with an eye to garnering online attention
I will not be surprised if we’re confronted at some point with a selfie or video of the perpetrators doing the deed. Destroying a 200-year old cultural treasure for some “likes” on TikTok? Yeah, why not?
Urgh, the very thought.
Do you honestly believe that a 16 year old boy could have gone up there, on his own, with a chainsaw, in a howling gale, and chopped down a big tree without killing himself?
He might be the idiot who showed off about it on social media, but I live in Northumberland and we all think there is more to this.
There is a lot of hatred of walkers in rural communities, and of people who treat the place like a theme park.
This is what I have been thinking. Somebody is fed up of people going there, walking about, parking their cars, to see that tree, so removed the attraction.
How awful! People parking their cars and walking to see the tree!
It’s a pity we can’t restore flogging, not of the tourists but those misanthropic recalcitrant locals who seem to be under the misapprehension that Hadrian’s Wall belongs to them alone
I agree also Caroline. Having seen images of the stump I can tell that the notch, back cut and hinge were just as they should be. This tree was brought down by someone who knew what he was doing. Also the fact that the suspect is supposedly a 16 yr old minor and that is a red flag for me as he can claim anonymity. So we will be unable to learn anything about him, if he actually exists at all.
If that is so, I’m on the side of the tourists! It isn’t actually a populated area is it? “Hatred of walkers”?! That sounds positively unhinged.
Er, perhaps here a lesson in how not to race to judgement. The now prime suspect is 60.
Logan’s Rock in Cornwall was dislodged by Royal Navy sailors 200 years ago, another act of vandalism.
It’s very difficult to understand the mind of the person who felled the tree.
I feel a sense of loss when any tree is cut down.
What was most upsetting about the felling of the sycamore was the effort and planning that it required – it can’t have been done as a simple act of “mindless” vandalism. The 16yo (if indeed found culpable) can’t have been acting alone… unless he had knowledge of tree-felling beyond his years and access to the professional equipment required for such a task.
One spark of hope. Tree experts have assessed that with careful tending, the remaining stump might produce shoots which can grow and eventually become a full tree again. The timescale is, of course, centuries. I’d prefer this to replacing the tree with a newly-planted version. It would at least become a symbol of renewal, rather than the current despair.
I’ve had a close look at images of the stump. The notch, back cut and hinge are perfect. Also the chainsaw used had a bar length longer than the diameter of the tree where the cut was made. This tree was downed by a person who knew what he was doing. I would be interested to know which way the wind was blowing on the night in question. The fact that the lad who is suspect is 16yrs old and therefore has a right to anonymity is a red flag for me.
The second ring of the seventh circle of hell, or the fate of Tantalus, for the little scrote?
An act of pure nihilism – a profanity in the sense of spite against the sacred, against life and nature.
Trees aren’t sacred.
Trees are sacred to many people in many cultures and they are certainly sacred to me.
Bet you are fun at parties
I bet you are!!
Southerners who visit Northumberland twice a year,.and have done so for 30 years. We’re surprisngly upset. Yes, at one level it’s a tree. But, of.course, at another it’s a powerful semiotic of memories, aspirations, dreams, and whatever else the individual ascribes to it. In my.case a sense that the mindlessness of the violence reflects our current nihilism.
He won’t have a good life watching his back forever.
Against whom ?
Very few people are loons enough to get worked up about the tree.
I always loved sitting in the bows of a sycamore in our garden as a child which cemented the sacred relationship with trees. Coincidently I actually walked the sill and past the wonderful tree, with the personal remembrance stones at its base, only 10 days ago. A tragedy and stupid irreversible act of bitterness no doubt…
TikTok and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race.
‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.’
– Keats
So sorry for your loss, and that of other creatures, human and otherwise, who valued this beautiful tree. It is felt across the ocean; I just heard a neighbor here in Colorado mention it with sadness. Such a senseless act, such sacrilege. Although it’s no surprise, being reminded that our species includes individuals who would do such a thing is painful.
I imagine he is a hero with his mates.
From the outside, it appears to be a very English crime!
We certainly care more about it than the epidemic of knife crime killing the young today
DON’T worry about the despair, misery and tearing anxiety of people throughout Britain and the world.
DO worry about a dear, departed tree !
What’s wrong with the UnHerd classes ?
Focus on the story line
You are
With respect, this and majority of comments on the subject, are in my opinion utterly hyperbolic. It was one (non native) tree in an empty landscape largely devoid of life except for the sheep mentioned in the article . My concern is the for the great emptiness of the land rather than the loss of a lonely tree.
Sadly, the “great emptiness” that you profess disappoints you so much has now been made complete. You can’t have it both ways.
Each to his own I guess but I find your comment indicative of some serious aesthetic and cultural numbness.
It would appear that “Bobs Yeruncle” – amongst others – also lacks the courage to comment under their own name …
A symbolic thing. The sign of a past life gone and an uncertain future. To copy another contributor yesterday, “A Peasants’ Revolt”.
Indeed – but that’s way over the head of some of these anonymous contributors.
Stop whingeing on about anonymous contributors lacking the courage to identify themselves. Some of us may have very sound reasons for doing so.
That’s the problem isn’t it? You see only nothing – ‘an empty landscape devoid of life’ – whereas for many those empty places are full of richness, imagination and spiritual meaning. They contain riches for the soul of humanity if one cares to look for them. This act of wanton tree felling is tantamount to murder and ought to promote a conversation about bringing in protections and rights for nature and the natural world.