By Graham Lee, senior archaeologist at the North York Moors National Park Authority

A number of the linear boundaries near Sutton Bank have long looked to be rather too sharply defined for the prehistoric date ascribed to them. This raises the question of why might someone have recut or reinforced these (presumed) prehistoric boundaries more recently?

The main historic event recorded here is the Battle of Byland on 14 October 1322. Local historian, John McDonnell, summarised that the English army of Edward II, pursued from Scotland by the Scottish army, took up a defensive position ‘on a nearby hilltop’, awaiting reinforcements while the King rested at Byland or Rievaulx Abbey. This force was routed when the Scots found a way onto the escarpment behind the English army, the suggested route being still known today as Scotch Corner.

Could the opposing armies have used existing, but presumably modified, prehistoric defences to secure their positions, before the English Army were eventually routed by a surprise Scottish attack from the rear?

The National Park recently commissioned a small-scale excavation of the defences of Roulston Scar Iron Age hillfort, the site today occupied by the Yorkshire Gliding Club. The hillfort defences lie to the west of a deep ravine known as Boar’s Gill beyond which a similarly aligned boundary, known as the Casten Dyke South, also faces north.

The excavation, carried out by the Landscape Research Centre, indicated that the latest phase of activity represented was a linear trench cut into and along the top of the Iron Age rampart with associated postholes, probably representing some form of palisade. Unfortunately, no dating evidence was secured from the trench or postholes but the position of the trench-cut, the fill and sharpness of remains suggest an historic date.

Further work is clearly required to attempt to secure additional dating evidence from all the potential parts of this battlefield landscape but, at present, we have the northern rampart of Roulston Scar hillfort, reinforced with a sizeable palisade, and the Casten Dyke South, perhaps specifically constructed for this encounter, both with their defensive faces to the north, protecting two promontories of land respectively 24 and 28 hectares in extent.

Between 880 to 1300 metres to the north we have the Casten Dyke North, a further prehistoric boundary which appears to have been recut / reinforced facing south across the intervening gap. Are these the respective positions of the English and Scottish armies in October 1322? Only further research will be able to tell.