North Country

A 400km drive brings us close to the Scottish border and Hadrian's Wall, to a small town far away about which I know little. A quick scout around the Internet highlights the perils of inhabiting the borderlands: for much of its history, Hexham seems to have been a place that warlike leaders like to beat up. In 875, a Viking called Halfdan Ragnarsson plundered the church before burning it down. William Wallace burned the town in 1297; Robert the Bruce demanded, and got, protection money in 1312; David II of Scotland sacked the monastery in 1346; a defeated Lancastrian commander was executed in the marketplace in 1464; in 1761, 45 local people were shot by the local militia during a protest about enforced military service

This hilly place is dominated by the abbey on its highest point, which was once the monastety. It was first built in 674, using stone from Hadrian's Wall, and the original crypt remains, but the current gothic building was erected in the 12th and 13th centuries. David II may have sacked it, but it was destroyed as an entity by Henry VIII in 1537, its assets and income transferred to the crown to fund warfare. Another beating up. The building became the town's principal protestant church.

The picture is from the abbey grounds; the tree in the gap is a horse chestnut, not a sycamore, and is still safely standing. The legs are attached to a teenage boy, but with no violent intent, I think