Beating the Bounds
Bank Holiday Monday, 1st May 2006
Date: May 1st 2006.
Beating the Bounds:
The sun shone for the 38 villagers as they set out to “Beat the Boundary” around Baydon village on Monday 1st May 2006.
At 10.15am Mr Kevin Barnes led the group of young children, adults, pensioners and dogs along Ermin Street out of the village towards Swindon, climbing up over the peaks before turning right towards Russley.
A break for a picnic lunch was enjoyed east of the Baydon village near the motorway bridge.
28 walkers continued on the final leg of the 15-mile figure of eight that constitutes the Baydon boundary.
This was the 5th year that this event has taken place since Mr Barnes re-established the custom in 2002.
from
Beating the Bounds is a tradition where the boundaries of a
certain area, parish, town or county, is marked out, sometimes by
bouncing people off of boundary markers, more often by whacking the
boundaries themselves. It is a custom that was performed before we had
maps, to
remind the young people of the parish where the parish boundaries were,
and to see that there was no encroachment by neighbouring villages.
Walkers would reach certain points then stand in a group to beat the
ground with sticks saying, ‘We declare this is the boundary of the
parish of ........Cursed be he who moveth our boundary'
By circumnavigating our parochial boundaries we can look at our Parish from a variety of new angles and get a real feel for the place we live in - an area of outstanding natural beauty. It is also good exercise and will be the chance for people to get to know one another better through the shared experience.