It has been some time since I inflicted a post about Roseberry Topping upon the world, the conical-shaped hill that looms over this northeastern corner of what is the historical county of Yorkshire, albeit a recycling of previous posts. Local pride being what it is, they have long called it “t’ highest hill i’ all Yorksheer,” a claim dutifully parroted by Margery Moorpout in that thrilling contribution to literature of the 18th-century, “The Register-Office.”
Once upon a more credulous time, the hill bore the grander name of Osnaberg, supposedly in honour of the god Odin, because if you are going to make things up, you might as well make them dramatic.
There is, inevitably, a legend. A Northumbrian princess, anxious about a dream that foretold her infant son’s watery death, consulted a witch, because who better to ask about life-and-death matters. The witch, full of useful advice, said the boy would drown. So the princess, in a display of impeccable logic, dragged the poor child up Roseberry Topping and parked him under a tent of silk, presumably thinking hills are famously dry and safe. She promptly fell asleep, while the boy, being a child and therefore inconveniently curious, wandered off, found a spring, and fulfilled the prophecy by drowning in it. The spring still exists today, upgraded to a “well,” if one can call a damp hollow a well, but tradition clings stubbornly to anything if it means not having to think too hard.
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