Hypnogoria Halloween Advent Calendar - Door 20 - Some Walk At Sunset

Yes, I always draw the curtains early now. But no, it's not because of the view. I mean, I'm not morbid, but I never found it particularly spooky. I'm not one for horror films or stuff like that. Give me a good Agatha Christie any day. 

Oh just ignore that. It will stop in a moment... 

Where was I? Oh yes, the view. Well, I’ve lived in this maisonette for years. The people downstairs are lovely, we get on very well. Salt of the earth. Do anything for you. I bought it back in 1993, and have been very happy here. 

I was never bothered the main lounge window overlooking the cemetery. Yes, you can see a lot. High enough up you see, nice view of Barrow Lane though. It's very quiet, just dog walkers mainly. No problems with “the yoof” hanging out in there. Guess the boneyard scares them away. The trees in autumn are quite something. 

To be honest I always found the view very peaceful. The window overlooks the oldest part of the cemetery, all Victorian monuments and beautifully landscaped. It's a real haven for wildlife, there are squirrels, rabbits. The occasional fox. And all kinds of birds. Very restful. People avoid cemeteries because they associate them with death, but they are full of life you know. 

So why am I selling? Well, therein lies a tale... 

I often enjoy, well used to enjoy, sitting in that armchair and just gazing out. I'm a bit of a bird nerd, you know. So there was always something to catch my eye. Anyhow, after a while you begin to get to know the rhythm of the place. At most hours, I can predict who you are likely to see in the lane. And know the best times to see the different wildlife.

The funny thing is one gets to feel like one knows the various passing folk. And at times, that has, I admit, made me to forget myself and be perhaps overly familiar to people who I know well but they have no idea who I am. 

Yes, it is a bit embarrassing and that's not the worst of it either. 

Anyhow, yes, where was I? Oh yes, one gets to know the regulars, and one notices a new face on the beat as it were. So then, I couldn't help but notice when the girl appeared. Now I say 'girl', but I probably should say 'young woman' really. Late twenties, early thirties maybe… Long dark, flowing hair. Always dressed in a long dark brown coat. 

I first saw her walking down one of the little paths one can see over the cemetery wall. And at first, I thought she was probably a mourner. However, I saw her regularly, usually walking around the cemetery, but sometimes strolling leisurely through the trees in Barrow Lane. Always around the same time. Just around sunset. And even though I was often seeing her from a distance, you could tell she was, well, and I hope I don't sound sexist here, but she was simply one of nature's beauties. 

While I am getting on a bit, and far too old for that kind of thing, I did start to look forward to seeing her whenever she appeared. At first I would see her two, maybe three times a week. 

Funny thing though, she didn't seem to have a set direction. I mean, nearly everyone I see from up here is on, what I think of, a set flight path. There’s the lad on a bike who passes about five o'clock every day bar Sunday, either coming or going to a paper round. Various folks and their doggies tend to appear around the same times, on particular walks. Some every day, some every couple of days. 

She, however, though always turning up around the same hour, walked in and out of view from different directions. Sometimes in the lane, sometimes meandering in the cemetery. 

I think that unpredictability just added to the fascination. Most people I see are easy to work out. This old boy is going to the allotments down on Fringside. That lady cuts down the lane to pop into town and comes back the same way. You get the idea. But she was a mystery, and I began to try and guess where she would appear every day. Moreover, I began to wonder who she was. I never saw her with a companion. But other than she enjoyed a walk in the local area, I could fathom nothing else about her. 

However, at some point, I realised that she was appearing now every evening. Always around sunset. And what's more, I did not feel… I'm not sure what the word is… content perhaps, if I did not see her. The days I missed her walk through my little view, I started to feel restless and anxious. 

Yes, I realise how that sounds. And I should have noted that perhaps there was something awry. A habit was growing into something more. Not quite an obsession, that sounds way too dramatic. But something, shall we say compelling. 

I know I should have spotted it, but these things creep up, you know. I had first seen her last autumn, and this… interest had slowly taken root bit by bit. 

I began to take to my armchair in good time, and I wouldn't want to move in case I missed her. Silly really I know, but there you are. If I needed a fresh cuppa, well too bad. It wouldn't hurt to wait, would it. What did it matter anyway? After all, I wasn't hurting anyone. 

So then, I got quite agitated when, one Tuesday, she didn't appear. And I was sure I hadn't missed her. Indeed I sat in that chair long into the night, just to see. Perhaps she had come earlier. Perhaps she was ill. I spent a restless night, but come the morning, I was hopeful she would appear again that tea time. 

I made sure I was in my armchair from lunchtime onward. I even prepared a flask of tea. But no, again she did not appear. And I was, well, not in the best spirits. Another restless night. But the next dawn found me tired and stressed. I was getting very worried about her. Worried for her. 

Now I know how that sounds. Why was I so bothered? Well, I ask you, is it so terrible to show some concern for another person, even a stranger? 

I know that Haggleton is a lovely little place, but awful things can happen anywhere. I mean, just last week that boy went missing. And if you know your local history, awful things have happened in the past. And more often than not, in the autumn, in October. 

It was a very tense day, and I admit I hardly strayed from the window. However my vigil was to be fruitless. Again she had not appeared. 

By this point, I was past myself. And as the dusk gathered, a sudden thought jolted me out of my chair. I decided to make a search. I would comb the lane and cemetery just to be sure. To try and quiet that anxious voice in my mind that was telling me she was lying dead in a ditch somewhere. 

So I grabbed a torch and donned my overcoat and set out. I went the entire length of Barrow Lane twice, checking under bushes and undergrowth and getting the occasional funny look from passing dog walkers. But I saw nothing untoward. That left the cemetery to check. 

Until that moment I hadn’t realised just how big and sprawling it was. As I said, it’s beautifully landscaped, with trees and bushes and little paths making lots of little glades and dells. I guess it was done that way so that although the cemetery is a very large public space, the landscaping effectively divided it into lots of small, well, rooms you might say, so mourners and relatives would have a degree of privacy when visiting their dearly departed loved ones. However it meant it would be a nightmare to search, especially as the sun was well and truly setting now, and I had maybe half an hour at best before it vanished beneath the horizon. 

There was a lot of ground to cover, but how to do it best. I realised, with a mounting panic, that without a solid strategy, there was a good chance that I would end up going round in circles, searching the same areas, or worse ending up completely lost. So I opted to dash along the main bigger paths first, thinking I could at least cover as much ground as possible, in a short space of time very swiftly. 

Part of me though was questioning just how important this all was. Did I really want to end up stumbling around in a cemetery in the dark? And that prospect was starting to fill me with as much dread as my worries for the possibly missing girl. The rational answer to that is obvious. Well, it is obvious now. But when one is in the grip of panic that rational voice is often drowned out. 

So I started down the main path into the heart of the cemetery, at first walking at a brisk pace. But as I walked, I realised how poor my grasp of the layout of the cemetery was. Were there actually main paths neatly dividing the graveyard into neat sections? I had assumed it would be laid out in a sort of a grid, but it was rapidly seeming like the opposite was true. Paths branched off here and there and often following crooked lines beneath whispering trees, frequently vanishing out of sight as they curved around. I was now almost running, and I was no longer certain where I was running too, or if I was just fleeing the rising terror that was snapping at my heels. 

However before I was consumed by the dreadful panic attack, I caught sight of something familiar. No, not the girl, but a tall white spire-like monument that I can see from my window. And I plunged towards it like a drowning man racing for a life ring. 

I stumbled into what was a familiar glade but now viewed from an unfamiliar vantage point. However I still knew this spot well enough to find my way to an ancient bench and flopped down breathless. I closed my eyes and let the last rays of red sun wash over me. 

I lingered for what seemed like an age, although it must have only been a few seconds really. Gradually my heart stopped trying to burst out of my chest and my breathing smoothed and slowed. I opened my eyes again and saw the light had not yet gone, and If I made a move now I could at least find my way out of the cemetery before the light went. I was unsure of my exact location but I could see the wall that borders Barrow Lane, and hence if I followed that wall it would lead me back to the north entrance and out onto familiar safe streets. 

Suddenly feeling very old, and not just a little bit foolish, heaved myself off the bench, checked I still had the torch in the pocket and, grasping its reassuring weight, I started off down a little path that meandered through ancient tombs and leaning headstones but never strayed too far from the wall. 

A soft breeze was stirring the trees, sighing through the brushes of cypress, and shaking the sycamores, lifting loose turning leaves, which drifted down in slow showers of tumbling red, ochre and gold. In the last fading daylight it was quite beautiful, soothing away the last of the panic and anxiety. I should walk out more in future. Not lazing away days sat in a chair. I should be out in the world, not watching it from a first floor window. 

The little path that was guiding me toward the entrance and back home, took a little turn, wandering round a cluster of old oaks and a large mausoleum just by the wall. The curve of the path forked with another little path wandering away to the west and the setting sun. And as I turned I saw a dark shape break the dying rays of the sun. 

My heart leapt. I recognised the silhouette instantly. It was her. She had just turned onto the branching path from another glade and was heading west into the setting sun. Thoughts of home vanished, and I trotted after her and before I knew it , I heard my voice call out “Oh, thank heavens, there you are!”

As soon I as I blurted this out I was obviously mortified - the poor girl had no clue who I was. I mean, what would you think if a strange panting old man in a shabby overcoat suddenly called out to you. And what’s more, made it clear he’d been looking for you? How was I going to explain this? Did she have a rape alarm? Should I just leg it, or stay and apologise? 

The world slowed down again, and she turned round to stare at me, the breeze playful turning at that moment to blow golden leaves whirling around her. Time seemed to stop and hold its breath. And indeed what I saw took my breath away too. The jumble of thoughts clamouring in my mind all vanished. And one new question arose, and one that dominated my mind - why wasn’t she in her grave? 

I think I might have screamed, as the breeze carried the charnel odour to me. I turned and ran, ran as fast I could, stumbling, in some cases, leaping over graves. Not caring, Just desperate to get away. And when I literally fell through my own front door, I locked and bolted it, and I shoved that heavy oak sideboard - yes, that one over there - up against it. The drinks cabinet took quite a pounding that night I can tell you. But even then, sleep was slow to come. 

The following morning - a sunny bright day thankfully, I marched down to the station as soon as the ticket office opened and got on a train and went .. Well, it doesn’t matter where I went. A long way away. 

It was a fortnight before I felt up to coming back. Everything was safe and sound when I returned. And by that point, I was quite happy to believe that I had suffered a moment of madness, a delusion brought on by the silly panic my obsession brought me to me. Needless to say, I changed my habits. The armchair was moved away from the window. And I took long walks out in the surrounding countryside. We are very lucky here you know, there are dozens of incredible walks just on our doorstep. 

So why am I moving? Ah well now… Oh, here we go! She’s back again. No, stay here, really just stay here. And do not open those curtains. Really don’t. Yes, that is her now. Knocking at the window... 

DIRECT DOWNLOAD - Door 20 - Some Walk At Sunset

Find all the podcasts in the HYPNOGORIA family here plus more articles on the weird and wonderful here-

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FOLKLORE ON FRIDAY - The Riddle of the Churchyard Yew Part II

Well do I know thee by thy trusty yew,

Cheerless, unsocial plant! that loves to dwell

‘Midst skulls and coffins, epitaphs and worms:

Where light-heel’d ghosts, and visionary shades,

Beneath the wan cold moon (as fame reports)

Embodied, thick, perform their mystic rounds:

No other merriment, dull tree! is thine.

from The Grave, A Poem by Robert Blair 

Last week we began digging into an oft-debated mystery: why are graveyards planted with yew trees. And after debunking several commonly trotted out theories, we traced the association of the yew tree with death and funerals back to ancient times. As a writer in The Gentleman's Magazine (1781) surmises neatly for us - 

We read in the Antiquities of Greece and Rome that the branches of the cypress and yew were the usual signals to denote a house in mourning. Now, sir, as Death was a deity among the antients (the daughter of Sleep and Night), and was by them represented in the same manner, with the addition only of a long robe embroidered with stars, I think we may fairly conclude that the custom of planting the yew in churchyards took its rise from Pagan superstition, and that it is as old as the conquest of Britain by Julius Caesar.

And certainly we do have very good evidence of the yew and cypress being used in funeral customs in the United Kingdom during the Roman occupation. For example, in a very revered work by the pioneering polymath Sir Thomas Browne, entitled  Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial, or, a Discourse of the Sepulchral Urns lately found in Norfolk, published in 1658, he notes that - 

 The funerall pyre consisted of sweet fuell, cypresse, firre, larix, yewe, and trees perpetuall verdant. 

And here we are perhaps getting closer to the heart of our riddle, for in Classical times, and often in the ancient pagan world too, cremation was more common than burials. Now yew wood burns at a very high temperature, and to cremate a  human body one does need a very hot fire to burn the bones. Furthermore, yews are highly aromatic, and so building a funeral pyre using timbers from resinous trees such as the ones listed by Browne has another very practical use - namely masking the smell of charred flesh. Now one of the reasons why cremation was so popular is the fact that fire was seen as cleansing, and there are of course many traditions which feature flames as a symbol of  spiritual purification. And once again on a practical level, cremating a body did effectively neutralise the threat of infection from decomposing corpses. 

 However on the subject of the yew in particular, Browne goes on to wonder -

Whether the planting of yewe in churchyards holds its original from ancient funerall rites, or as an embleme of resurrection from its perpetual verdure, may also admit conjecture.

Now this opens up another aspect of the yew tree - its evergreen nature. Now trees and plants that do not shed their leaves in winter have long had association with eternal life and rebirth. However one does wonder why it seems to be the darker and woodier yews and cypresses that have gained funereal associations. One hypothesis is that the link with death specifically came from the yew's poisonous nature. The tree was widely to believed to so toxic that is was dangerous even to sleep in its shade. And in fact there is some truth in this old piece of English folklore - for, if the weather is hot enough the yew tree's deadly toxins such as taxin, taxiphyllin, and ephedrine, can evaporate from the sap. And hence it is, theoretically at least, possible to become poisoned if one is sitting close by the trunk on a hot day.

But also I suspect there are also some underlying practical considerations that made the yew more associated with funerals and burials than other evergreens such as holly or ivy. Our ancestors may have been many centuries away from the discovery of bacteria, but they knew well enough there was a hazard of infection from the recently dead. Now to this day we associate the smell of coniferous trees with cleanliness, to the point it has entered our language - "pine fresh".  And I suspect this is why we find yew, cypress and other of the more resinous evergreen plants and trees being part of funeral decorations in many cultures - for their fresh scents were thought to clear the air of noxious vapours and unclean forces. And certainly it is a tradition that has crossed both the centuries and different cultures. The Oxford Book of English Folklore (2000) notes that up until the 19th century, it was a popular custom to lay boughs and wreaths of yew upon a coffin before burial, with several regional variants. For example in 18th century Somerset, the Reverend John Collinson records -

Our forebears were particularly careful in preserving this funeral tree whose branches it was usual for mourners to carry in solemn procession to the grave, and afterwards deposit therein under the bodies of their dear friends

from A History of Somersetshire Vol. 1 (1791)

Another interesting variation is found in Ireland, where boughs of yew trees are used in Palm Sunday parades. Indeed in some regions this special day in the run up to Easter is even known as Domhnach an Iúir, which means "Yew Sunday". Now some have theorised that yew branches were chosen for their supposed resemblance to palm leaves, however looking at the two trees it is hard to imagine any that are perhaps more dissimilar! Therefore I'm rather more inclined to suspect the yew was chosen for its funereal associations - for after all, Palm Sunday is the beginning of a series of events that will lead to the Crucifixion of Jesus. And it is especially fitting considering that the Yew tree also has folkloric connections to rebirth and eternal life as well as death.

As we remarked in the first part of this little investigation, yew trees are extraordinarily long lived, and they possess remarkable powers of regeneration. Indeed yew branches can actually reach down to the ground and burrow under the soil to throw up new stems, creating new trunks around themselves. And hence while the yew tree had a fearsome reputation thanks to its toxic nature, with the 17th botanist Nicholas Culpeper ominous proclaiming "the most active vegetable poison known in the whole world, for in a very small dose it instantly induces death without any previous disorder", our forebears were equally well aware of its resilience, longevity and its powers of regeneration. Truly it was a tree of both life and death.

Recent research into the age of yew trees certainly suggest that our ancient forebears were probably well aware of the tree's astonishing life-span. It is currently reckoned that one of the oldest living things in Europe is an ancient yew tree growing in St Cynog’s churchyard at Defynnog in Powys, and is believed to be more than five thousand years old! And this venerable tree is not alone: for example, the yew growing in the churchyard of Fortingall in Perthshire, Scotland is reckoned to be in the region of three thousand years old, while the yew where King John alleged signed the Magna Carter, which stands in the now ruined priory of Ankerwycke in Berkshire has witnessed at least 2,000 years.  And modern tests have established that there are many more ancient trees still growing throughout the British Isles.

However this does rather raise a large question - for such ancient trees almost certainly predate the churches whose graveyards they stand in. All of which makes one wonder if there is perhaps more to the theory that the churches were constructed on ancient places of pagan worship. Now while we rightly pointed out last week, we actually know very little about the beliefs and practises of the Druids, however we do know considerably more about the culture of later pagan inhabitants of ancient Britain. After the Roman Empire collapsed, a new wave of colonists arrived but this time from Northern Europe. And rather than being the barbarous Vikings, beloved of historical cliches, a great many Norse, Scandinavian and Germanic folks came and peacefully settled in old England.

Now their religion revered a pantheon of gods and goddess, lead by the All-Father, most commonly known as Odin. Now in Norse mythology there were said to be nine worlds which were supported by the branches of an immense cosmic tree, Yggdrasil. And Odin had gained his wisdom, and not to mention his considerable powers of magic, by hanging himself on this world tree in a ritual of death and rebirth. Now for decades, scholars have referred to Yggdrasil as an ash-tree, however recent research, most notably by Fred Hageneder, has revealed that this is probably a mistranslation. For in the oldest sagas, and from where we gain much of our knowledge of Norse culture, Yggdrasil is referred to as vetgrønster vida which means "most evergreen tree", and as barraskr meaning "needle-ash". Hageneder therefore has claimed that Yggdrasil was actually a yew tree not an ash, and scholars have found that while there is no archaeological evidence for the ash being important in Norse rituals, there are many example of the yew tree being revered in their culture.

Now considering that Christianity co-existed with Norse and Germanic paganism for several centuries, with the Catholic Church only becoming properly established in the British Isles around the 6th century, and it taking another couple of centuries to completely convert the country, it is therefore very possible that some already ancient yew trees may have had some religious importance to the pagan locals, and hence churches were built nearby them. Clearly with modern research proving the incredible age of some of our churchyard yews, and the recent revelations of the nature of Yggdrasil, it perhaps time to have a closer look at the role of the Yew in ancient British paganism and how t relates to the history of Christianity in these isles.

Certainly the close links to both the Classical world and the Northern European pagan traditions we have uncovered certainly suggest that the yew tree has long been revered as a tree of life and death, and the seemingly ancient tradition of planting yews in graveyards is merely one of the more recent additions to the lore of this magical tree.

FOLKLORE ON FRIDAY - The Riddle of the Churchyard Yew I

       
 Come away, come away, death,

   And in sad cypress let me be laid.

   Fly away, fly away breath,

   I am slain by a fair cruel maid.

   My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,

   O, prepare it!

   My part of death, no one so true

   Did share it.

from Twelfth Night (Act 2, Scene 4) 

A traditional feature in many churchyards in the United Kingdom is the presence of an ancient yew tree or two. And as attested by the quote from Shakespeare above, the yew tree (Taxus baccata) has long been cultivated in our graveyards, and borne an association with death and all things funereal. To summon up another literary example, the graveyard at St. Oswald's Church in Grasmere boasts eight yew trees planted by the poet William Wordsworth. However the reason quite why this particular tree has long been a favourite to plant in cemeteries has been the subject of much debate over the years. 

One of the first often proffered reasons is purely practical: in his epic work Observations on the Statutes (1766), the lawyer and antiquary Daines Barrington, has this to say on the planting of yews in churchyards - 

Trees in a churchyard were often planted to skreen the church from the wind; that, low as churches were built at this time, the thick foliage of the yew answered this purpose better than any other tree. I have been informed, accordingly, that the yew-trees in the churchyard of Gyffin, near Conway, having been lately felled, the roof of the church hath suffered excessively 

And indeed, there is a statute by King Edward I that does mention the planting of trees for this very purpose. However in his article Yew Trees in Churchyards, which can be found in the volume Antiquities and Curiosities of the Church (1897) edited by William Andrews, the Victorian scholar TN Brushfield M.D. notes that the statute in question does not make a specific reference to yew trees, and is more concerned with the cutting down of trees in churchyards rather than a policy of deliberately planting them. Furthermore Dr Brushfield goes on to sagely remark that -

If even intended to act as a shelter from windstorms, a number would have been planted either on the side of prevailing winds, or a belt of them would have surrounded the edifice. 

So then, we can dispense with the screen idea, and move swiftly on to the next oft-cited theory for having yews in churchyards. This next notion posits that yew trees were planted in churchyards so that the local parish would always have wood for bows and arrows. However in the same essay, Dr Brushfield neatly skewers this theory too, noting that - 

The remarkable fact that the English yew did not yield the best bows, may be noted here. Stringent regulations were laid down in several statutes, to require merchants to import bow staves from foreign parts simultaneously with other merchandise. In the time of Elizabeth, the price of “each bow of the best foreign yew” was 6s. 8d., while that of an English one was 2s. Spanish bows were then considered by far the best, but history shows that they were required to be used by English archers to make them fully effective as weapons of war.

In addition to these very pertinent historical facts that argue against the bow theory, later connoisseurs of yew lore have noted that the usual single tree planted in a churchyard would not yield enough wood to be terribly useful for making weaponry anyway. Now one of the fascinating things about yew trees is their exceedingly long lifespans, and many of the oldest have been quietly growing by churches and in cemeteries. Indeed it is widely accepted that many of these churchyard trees are a thousand years old or more. And therefore as many churchyards yews are reckoned to be old enough to have been around when the long bow was a standard weapon of war, it is very telling that they show little if any sign of ever being harvested for this purpose. And in support of this, no parish records have ever come to light that detail either the harvest or sale of yew tree timber. However this does show that the tradition of planting yews in our burying grounds is undoubtedly ancient. 

Now the third commonly cited explanation takes us into more sinister territory, for the yew is a tree with a dark reputation. And rightly so, for the leaves, the sap, and even the wood of the yew tree are very toxic. And so it has been theorised that yews were planted in graveyards to discourage cattle or sheep from wandering in and grazing around the graves. However once again, the actual number of yew trees usually found in cemeteries rather argues against this theory. For a typical old churchyard will only be home to one or maybe two ancient yew trees, hardly enough create to an effective botanical barrier for even a small churchyard, and furthermore they are often located far from the edges of the graveyard. An additional problem with this theory is exactly how toxic the foliage of yew trees are to livestock is somewhat unclear. There are with mixed reports coming in down the years, and even accounts of yew leaves being used to bulk out winter fodder for cattle and the animals suffering  no ill effects from this diet. However perhaps most damning of all, there is the simple fact that many churchyards have ancient walls surrounding them to do that very job in the first place.

Another common theory moves away the allegedly practical reasons for yews in churchyards, and looks to more esoteric ideas. According to this different line of thinking, we are looking at the problem the wrong way round - the real question is not why we plant yews in graveyards but why do graveyards appear around yew trees. For this particular theory states that yew trees were an important part of worship in ancient British paganism, and so when the Christian missionaries came, they built their churches at the sites of the old temples. Therefore ancient church come with an even more ancient yew.

"The Druid's Grove- Norbury Park Ancient Yew Trees" by Thomas Allom

Now we do know that this kind of site conversion did take place. In fact at the dawn of the 7th century, we have a letter from Pope Gregory I written to the Abbot Mellitus, in which the Pope has these instructions for St. Augustine -

Tell Augustine that he should by no means destroy the temples of the gods but rather the idols within those temples. Let him, after he has purified them with holy water, place altars and relics of the saints in them. For, if those temples are well built, they should be converted from the worship of demons to the service of the true God. Thus, seeing that their places of worship are not destroyed, the people will banish error from their hearts and come to places familiar and dear to them in acknowledgement and worship of the true God.

And indeed there are many attested examples in Northern Europe where churches have been built on former pagan sites. However all the same, many scholars have taken exception with this explanation - partly because they claim there is a lack of botanical and archaeological evidence to back it up, but mostly because we know very little of the beliefs of the pre-Christian Britons. And hence the idea they venerated the yew tree is pure supposition. According to The Oxford Book of English Folklore (2000) by Julia Simpson and Steven Roud a more likely scenario is that -

the custom of planting yews in churchyards seems to have come with Christianity to Ireland and Wales, in imitation of Mediterranean cemeteries with cypress and laurel

However once again, as soon as one finds a promising theory, it is not long before problems with it surface. Firstly we ironically have the same lack of direct evidence that undermines the paganism theory. But a more second problem is that it mistakenly supposes that the planting of cypresses in European burying grounds is an exclusively Christian custom. 

For looking into the historical record, we find that long before the rise Christianity, the cypress and the yew was associated with death and funerals. In Classical Rome, its branches were woven in wreathes to venerate Pluto the god of the Underworld, while in ancient Greece the yew was associated with Hecate, a goddess associated with the night, herbs, poisonous plants, and witchcraft. 

Furthermore, long before Pope Gregory, the Romans had a policy of site conversion. When the Empire gained a new territory, for it was standard Roman practise to erect new temples at the native places of worship, usually finding an equivalent in the Classical pantheon to the local deity they were supplanting. Therefore given that the Roman Empire spread far into the north of Europe, it would seem a more likely bet that the yew tradition came with them several centuries before the Christian missionaries set out.

However why were these trees so closely associated with death and funeral rites in so many cultures? Next time, we shall explore the sinister associations of the yew tree and hopefully get closer to the heart of the riddle of yew trees in churchyards...