ROYSTON CAVE USED BY SAINTS OR SINNERS?
(Local historical influences of the Templar and Hospitaller movements)
Sylvia P. Beamon, MA (Cantab)
The town of Royston is situated at the northernmost point of Hertfordshire with the ancient crossroads at its centre, and is directly on the Meridian Line. It is post-Domesday and did not become a settlement until an Augustinian Priory was founded there during the 12th century. The town straddled the boundaries of five parishes in the two counties of Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire. Once it was granted its market charter by Richard 1 in 1189, a market was set up every Wednesday at the crossroads. This enabled the town to flourish as an economic centre for its surrounding area.
What, one might ask, makes Royston any different from all the rest? One remarkable feature sets this town apart from any other place in Britain and indeed the world, as far as is known, and that feature is the Royston Cave. It could be argued that to describe it as a Cave is not entirely accurate but no-one has yet found a better name for it, the writer has suggested ‘cavern’. It is not a natural cave in the geological sense and yet it is underground. Its original function and by whom it was created is still open to debate. Doubtless, this structure has been used for many different purposes throughout the centuries, - but - the most intriguing aspect by far is that its interior is decorated with carvings sculpted from the chalk walls, once coloured, and range in content from the pagan to the religious, thus posing the most tantalising questions as to its origins and uses.
If you can imagine you are inside a large wine bottle, then that is the shape of Royston Cave. When standing at the bottom, it is some 30 feet [9 m] high, with measurement across the bottom of approximately 18 ft [5.5 m] - a large circular room. Both above and below a frieze, where it was likely to have been separated into two chambers by a wooden floor, or divided and surrounded by a balcony at some time, are rectangular and oven shaped recesses, or niches, like cupboards, cut in the walls.
DISCOVERY OF THE CAVE
The Cave was discovered In 1742. Women, who sold cheese and butter in the butter market, got tired standing all day selling their wares and wanted some seating on which to rest. They asked some workmen to make them a bench. The men started by hammering a post into the ground, when to everyone’s astonishment it nearly disappeared. Amazingly, they had found the centre hole of a millstone which, they did not know at that moment, was covering an opening beneath their feet. The men took up the stone and found there was chalk rubble in what looked like a well shaft (now called the North shaft). After removing what rubbish they could, they let down a small boy on a rope, then a ‘slender’ man. They both reported there was at least one chamber, possibly two, but all was full of garden soil. Because people in Royston thought there might be treasure down there they became troublesome, so the workmen decided to dig out the soil at night. All that was said to have been found was one human skull and a few bones, a piece of brass with nothing written or drawn on it, and some pieces of pottery, brown with yellow spots Later, a seal with a single fleur de lis design, was handed in.
What surprised everyone, as they dug downwards, was that the walls were decorated with carved religious figures recognisable as St. Katherine, St. Lawrence, St. Christopher, St. George or St. Michael, and Crucifixion scenes. These had once been coloured. Also there were strange signs and symbols which the writer was later to link with the Knights Templar.
WHAT ARE THE MAIN CAVE THEORIES?
Between 1743 and 1746 the Reverend Dr. William Stukeley wrote two books. He thought that the Cave was a chapel and the walls carved in relief by Lady Roisia de Vere, wife of Geoffrey de Mandeville, first Earl of Essex, depicting her family history in the 12th century. In other words, the carvings were like leaving a photograph album behind of the people she loved, knew and what they did. For a few years her family, in all likelihood, lived at Newsells Manor House, in the nearby village of Newsells (Herts.).
The Rev. Charles Parkin wrote two books in answer to Stukeley's and concluded it was a hermit's cell and oratory. Sometimes a hermit did help travellers, and one may have lived here for a while to point people on their way across country. Because there was a Cross at Royston, Parkin also maintained that a Hundred Court [a Hundred is a term given to an area, similar to a County] had been held here since King Alfred the Great’s time but there is no firm evidence.
Joseph Beldam in the mid 1800s was the third writer; his conclusions were:
The Cave was first formed by means of shafts, either by British or Romano-British men [BC]: perhaps later it was used as a Roman columbarium - a place to store cinerary urns. This idea is unlikely as there are not enough niches in the walls. Next, he thought it received most of its decoration about the Crusading period and then, if not before, was converted into a Christian oratory to which a hermit was probably attached in the 16th century. He felt it was then filled in about 1540, at the time of the Reformation when king Henry VIII closed churches and monasteries.
It is fortunate that Stukeley and Beldam, over a hundred years apart, drew what they saw when they visited the Cave and put the illustrations in their books. A couple of large lumps and other smaller bits of chalk from the carvings have fallen off since [one piece on the North wall fell in July 2002]. By looking at their drawings you can mostly see how they were before, although of course, they did not have the advantage of photography.
The writer has lived in Royston since 1961 and, although fascinated by the Cave, was frustrated by the dearth of written evidence, and devoted 25 years to exhaustive research in the hope of finding some elusive answers travelling far and wide across the Continent in her efforts to solve the enigma of the carvings, establishing in the process a feasible link with the Knights Templar Order.
THE KNIGHTS TEMPLAR THEORY
Religion was very important in the Middle Ages, most people went to Church and had to believe in God, Jesus, his mother Mary, and the Holy Spirit. They were taught that their religion was the only true one and anyone who thought differently was called an 'infidel', a non-believer. As Jesus had been crucified in Jerusalem, the Christians wanted to have this City for themselves so they fought for it.
The Knights Templar were a Crusading order (1118-1308). A good description of them is that they were 'monks of war'. They lived as monks, yet fought as soldiers in the Crusades, throughout the Holy Wars in Palestine (Israel). Much land, carefully documented, was given to the brethren all over Europe, including Britain. Several local land-owners also donated land to them. There were Templar houses at Cambridge and Baldock, which were less important than the preceptories [larger establishments similar to monasteries] at Hitchin, Duxford and Shingay-cum-Wendy, all these places only a few miles from Royston. Smaller parcels of land were received from Reed, Whittlesford and Royston. The exact whereabouts of the land in Royston is not known.
The Templars became a very powerful organisation which plausibly led to their downfall in October 1307 in France when Philippe le Bel, the French king, together with the Pope brought heretical charges, allegedly false, against them. It seems Templar thoughts on Christianity were not the same as those of the State and Church believed they should be. They were accused of worshipping cats, heads and skulls (remember that a skull was found in the Cave) at initiation ceremonies, sodomy, spitting on the cross, etc. For these heresies, the punishment was death by burning.
There was a three month gap before the English king, Edward II, decided to follow the French king, round up the Templars and put many in prison. The order was dissolved finally in 1312. Both greedy kings wanted the Templars' money and lands but most of the land was eventually given to the Knights Hospitallers, a similar Crusading group who mainly looked after sick people.
THE BALDOCK TEMPLARS AT ROYSTON MARKET
Baldock 9 miles [14.4 km] away from Royston, was a Templar created town. Their lands around economically supported them during peaceful times. Every week between 1199-1254, in all probability no more than two or three Templars travelled to Royston for the weekly market where they sold produce from their farms, no doubt including butter, cheese, wine from their vineyards at Weston close by, and leather goods. It is possible that an upper storey of the Cave was used to store the market goods. The cave would have been a suitable place to keep dairy food cool, particularly in the summer months. And the bottom, created into a chapel in emulation of their Holy Sepulchre Church In Jerusalem.
To this end, the writer has written and published several highly successful, articles, pamphlets and booklets culminating in the definitive book published in 1992. These alone have provided a major contribution to heightening public awareness of the Cave, not only in Royston, but worldwide. Furthermore, because of the inevitable chalk-pilling through temperature changes in the Cave and damage caused by constant flooding, it underlines the necessity to preserve and protect this unique Grade I English monument for future generations.
------------------
Summary
Royston Cave, listed Grade 1, is a unique, small man-made bottle-shaped underground cavern, some 30 feet high and 18 feet in diameter. Presumed to be two- storied, it is cut out of middle-horizon chalk. It was discovered in 1742, purely by accident, close to the site where the ancient Icknield Way crosses the Roman Ermine Street. When it was emptied of ‘garden mould’ the walls were found to be covered with engravings of saints, Crucifixion scenes, and included various signs and symbols.
Over the years several theories as to its age and function have been discussed. After 25 years of research, the writer has come to the conclusion that the Cave was at one time probably used by the Knights Templar Crusading Order (1118 -1308); the upper storey used primarily as a store for market goods from farms belonging to the Order based in the nearby town of Baldock, formerly known as Baghdad, and the lower area, decorated with the majority of the engravings, as a small oratory.
(Local historical influences of the Templar and Hospitaller movements)
Sylvia P. Beamon, MA (Cantab)
The town of Royston is situated at the northernmost point of Hertfordshire with the ancient crossroads at its centre, and is directly on the Meridian Line. It is post-Domesday and did not become a settlement until an Augustinian Priory was founded there during the 12th century. The town straddled the boundaries of five parishes in the two counties of Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire. Once it was granted its market charter by Richard 1 in 1189, a market was set up every Wednesday at the crossroads. This enabled the town to flourish as an economic centre for its surrounding area.
What, one might ask, makes Royston any different from all the rest? One remarkable feature sets this town apart from any other place in Britain and indeed the world, as far as is known, and that feature is the Royston Cave. It could be argued that to describe it as a Cave is not entirely accurate but no-one has yet found a better name for it, the writer has suggested ‘cavern’. It is not a natural cave in the geological sense and yet it is underground. Its original function and by whom it was created is still open to debate. Doubtless, this structure has been used for many different purposes throughout the centuries, - but - the most intriguing aspect by far is that its interior is decorated with carvings sculpted from the chalk walls, once coloured, and range in content from the pagan to the religious, thus posing the most tantalising questions as to its origins and uses.
If you can imagine you are inside a large wine bottle, then that is the shape of Royston Cave. When standing at the bottom, it is some 30 feet [9 m] high, with measurement across the bottom of approximately 18 ft [5.5 m] - a large circular room. Both above and below a frieze, where it was likely to have been separated into two chambers by a wooden floor, or divided and surrounded by a balcony at some time, are rectangular and oven shaped recesses, or niches, like cupboards, cut in the walls.
DISCOVERY OF THE CAVE
The Cave was discovered In 1742. Women, who sold cheese and butter in the butter market, got tired standing all day selling their wares and wanted some seating on which to rest. They asked some workmen to make them a bench. The men started by hammering a post into the ground, when to everyone’s astonishment it nearly disappeared. Amazingly, they had found the centre hole of a millstone which, they did not know at that moment, was covering an opening beneath their feet. The men took up the stone and found there was chalk rubble in what looked like a well shaft (now called the North shaft). After removing what rubbish they could, they let down a small boy on a rope, then a ‘slender’ man. They both reported there was at least one chamber, possibly two, but all was full of garden soil. Because people in Royston thought there might be treasure down there they became troublesome, so the workmen decided to dig out the soil at night. All that was said to have been found was one human skull and a few bones, a piece of brass with nothing written or drawn on it, and some pieces of pottery, brown with yellow spots Later, a seal with a single fleur de lis design, was handed in.
What surprised everyone, as they dug downwards, was that the walls were decorated with carved religious figures recognisable as St. Katherine, St. Lawrence, St. Christopher, St. George or St. Michael, and Crucifixion scenes. These had once been coloured. Also there were strange signs and symbols which the writer was later to link with the Knights Templar.
WHAT ARE THE MAIN CAVE THEORIES?
Between 1743 and 1746 the Reverend Dr. William Stukeley wrote two books. He thought that the Cave was a chapel and the walls carved in relief by Lady Roisia de Vere, wife of Geoffrey de Mandeville, first Earl of Essex, depicting her family history in the 12th century. In other words, the carvings were like leaving a photograph album behind of the people she loved, knew and what they did. For a few years her family, in all likelihood, lived at Newsells Manor House, in the nearby village of Newsells (Herts.).
The Rev. Charles Parkin wrote two books in answer to Stukeley's and concluded it was a hermit's cell and oratory. Sometimes a hermit did help travellers, and one may have lived here for a while to point people on their way across country. Because there was a Cross at Royston, Parkin also maintained that a Hundred Court [a Hundred is a term given to an area, similar to a County] had been held here since King Alfred the Great’s time but there is no firm evidence.
Joseph Beldam in the mid 1800s was the third writer; his conclusions were:
The Cave was first formed by means of shafts, either by British or Romano-British men [BC]: perhaps later it was used as a Roman columbarium - a place to store cinerary urns. This idea is unlikely as there are not enough niches in the walls. Next, he thought it received most of its decoration about the Crusading period and then, if not before, was converted into a Christian oratory to which a hermit was probably attached in the 16th century. He felt it was then filled in about 1540, at the time of the Reformation when king Henry VIII closed churches and monasteries.
It is fortunate that Stukeley and Beldam, over a hundred years apart, drew what they saw when they visited the Cave and put the illustrations in their books. A couple of large lumps and other smaller bits of chalk from the carvings have fallen off since [one piece on the North wall fell in July 2002]. By looking at their drawings you can mostly see how they were before, although of course, they did not have the advantage of photography.
The writer has lived in Royston since 1961 and, although fascinated by the Cave, was frustrated by the dearth of written evidence, and devoted 25 years to exhaustive research in the hope of finding some elusive answers travelling far and wide across the Continent in her efforts to solve the enigma of the carvings, establishing in the process a feasible link with the Knights Templar Order.
THE KNIGHTS TEMPLAR THEORY
Religion was very important in the Middle Ages, most people went to Church and had to believe in God, Jesus, his mother Mary, and the Holy Spirit. They were taught that their religion was the only true one and anyone who thought differently was called an 'infidel', a non-believer. As Jesus had been crucified in Jerusalem, the Christians wanted to have this City for themselves so they fought for it.
The Knights Templar were a Crusading order (1118-1308). A good description of them is that they were 'monks of war'. They lived as monks, yet fought as soldiers in the Crusades, throughout the Holy Wars in Palestine (Israel). Much land, carefully documented, was given to the brethren all over Europe, including Britain. Several local land-owners also donated land to them. There were Templar houses at Cambridge and Baldock, which were less important than the preceptories [larger establishments similar to monasteries] at Hitchin, Duxford and Shingay-cum-Wendy, all these places only a few miles from Royston. Smaller parcels of land were received from Reed, Whittlesford and Royston. The exact whereabouts of the land in Royston is not known.
The Templars became a very powerful organisation which plausibly led to their downfall in October 1307 in France when Philippe le Bel, the French king, together with the Pope brought heretical charges, allegedly false, against them. It seems Templar thoughts on Christianity were not the same as those of the State and Church believed they should be. They were accused of worshipping cats, heads and skulls (remember that a skull was found in the Cave) at initiation ceremonies, sodomy, spitting on the cross, etc. For these heresies, the punishment was death by burning.
There was a three month gap before the English king, Edward II, decided to follow the French king, round up the Templars and put many in prison. The order was dissolved finally in 1312. Both greedy kings wanted the Templars' money and lands but most of the land was eventually given to the Knights Hospitallers, a similar Crusading group who mainly looked after sick people.
THE BALDOCK TEMPLARS AT ROYSTON MARKET
Baldock 9 miles [14.4 km] away from Royston, was a Templar created town. Their lands around economically supported them during peaceful times. Every week between 1199-1254, in all probability no more than two or three Templars travelled to Royston for the weekly market where they sold produce from their farms, no doubt including butter, cheese, wine from their vineyards at Weston close by, and leather goods. It is possible that an upper storey of the Cave was used to store the market goods. The cave would have been a suitable place to keep dairy food cool, particularly in the summer months. And the bottom, created into a chapel in emulation of their Holy Sepulchre Church In Jerusalem.
To this end, the writer has written and published several highly successful, articles, pamphlets and booklets culminating in the definitive book published in 1992. These alone have provided a major contribution to heightening public awareness of the Cave, not only in Royston, but worldwide. Furthermore, because of the inevitable chalk-pilling through temperature changes in the Cave and damage caused by constant flooding, it underlines the necessity to preserve and protect this unique Grade I English monument for future generations.
------------------
Summary
Royston Cave, listed Grade 1, is a unique, small man-made bottle-shaped underground cavern, some 30 feet high and 18 feet in diameter. Presumed to be two- storied, it is cut out of middle-horizon chalk. It was discovered in 1742, purely by accident, close to the site where the ancient Icknield Way crosses the Roman Ermine Street. When it was emptied of ‘garden mould’ the walls were found to be covered with engravings of saints, Crucifixion scenes, and included various signs and symbols.
Over the years several theories as to its age and function have been discussed. After 25 years of research, the writer has come to the conclusion that the Cave was at one time probably used by the Knights Templar Crusading Order (1118 -1308); the upper storey used primarily as a store for market goods from farms belonging to the Order based in the nearby town of Baldock, formerly known as Baghdad, and the lower area, decorated with the majority of the engravings, as a small oratory.