Bourne Woods - Hereward and The Woods

Hereward and The Woods

The twelfth century, Peterborough story of Hereward is often translated as referring to the 'woods near Bourne' (for example, both FNQ and Bevis, Chapter 27), when what the Latin text says is in brunneswald. The now lagely forgotten Brunneswald, or Bromswold, lay some tens of miles from Bourne, in the neighbouring county of Northamptonshire. However in chapter 19, it was super brunneswald, juxta brunne, beyond Brunneswald, near Bourne, that he 'then departed into the woods until his men should be gathered together'. While there, he was invited to come and organize the defence of Ely (FNQ chapter 19). After the siege, one of those he fought (FNQ and Bevis, Chapter 34), though not in the Bourne Woods, was Ogger, probably Odger the Breton, listed as the major landowner in Bourne in 10862. This holding included the lion's share of Bourne Wood, which had been the property of an unidentified Leofwine3 and of Hereward's father's grandson, Morcar.