The Daily Bleed today would have us know that if Tan Hill fair is still trying to happen, today is the day.
Tan Hill fair had a bit of a reputation. An 80 year old shepherd, Daniel Swatton, speaking in the 1930s, said “Th’ used to reckon as anybody could get a pint o’ beer an’ a smack on th’ yead ver dreepence up at Tan Hill.”
(from ‘Shepherd Lore – the last years of traditional shepherding in Wiltshire’ by Peter Gurney (C S Smith), published 1985 but written 1935)
According to Kathleen Wiltshire in her ‘Wiltshire Folklore’ the valley below Tan Hill was within living memory supposed to stand ‘a miniature stone circle of 9 upright sarsen stones about 4 ft in height, in the centre of which lies a prostrate stone about the length of a man’.
Leading up from the circle was a path, to a chalk figure of a horse – or a donkey – on the hill above. ‘This pony or donkey is 75ft from nose to tail, which stretches down much like that of the Uffington horse, and its head is very large.’
‘Tan’ is apparently an ancient word for ‘fire’ (it certainly means fire in Welsh) – perhaps indicating that this hill (the highest in Wiltshire) was used as a beacon? Also a festival was held on the hill on St Anne’s day every year (geddit? – St Tan’s) in July – given official status by Royal Charter in the 1300s, but effectively died out in the 1930s (though I suspect people will still be gathering up there). John Aubrey said: “On St Anne’s hill, vulgarly called Tan Hill, every year is kept a great fair within an old camp.. the commodoties are sheep, oxen and fineries.” His mention of a camp might have been a confusion with the earthworks of Wansdyke. (quote reproduced in ‘The Marlborough Downs’ by Kenneth Watts, 1993)
(from a series of posts by rhiannon, at the Modern Antiquarian – there’s a couple or three spooky anecdotes about the area, too)
It appears that there are no easily-found images of Tan Hill fair, although surely there must be some, out in the world. The most recent account I can find of an attempt by the Tan Hill fair to happen is more than ten years old:
In August last year, thirty lean, sun-tanned, scruffy people pulled their handcarts, goats, donkeys and bow-topped wagons to the top of Tan Hill, near Devizes in Wiltshire. They claimed that a Royal Charter, issued in 1499, entitled them to hold a fair at Lammas on the summit.
The police arrived in six riot vans, three dog vans and a helicopter. As the revellers trooped back down the hill, the officer in charge said “When will you people realize that this is Wiltshire, and you don’t belong here???
(from Grubbing Out The Past, by George Monbiot, published in the Guardian 10th January 1996)
Ah the dubious pleasures of contemporary rural England. Gor’ bless.
