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Barnsdale the Setting of the Ballads
Barnsdale, or Barnsdale Forest, shown by the circle, was much larger than it is today. It has a rich history steeped in folklore and lies in the immediate vicinity north and north-west of Doncaster. It was formerly forested and a place of royal hunts and was also renowned as a haunt of the outlaw Robin Hood in early medieval ballads.
Formally an administrative area in itself, Barnsdale has at different points in history come under the jurisdiction of the counties of Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire, Derbyshire, and Yorkshire.
Barnsdale no longer exists as an administrative region. Villages which once resided in the central and southern part of Barnsdale are now classed as part of South Yorkshire and come under the administration of Metropolitan Borough of Doncaster. Villages and hamlets that once resided in the north of Barnsdale now lie within the City of Wakefield metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire.
The small South Yorkshire village of Hampole is generally considered to lie within the dead centre of what was once the Barnsdale Forest area. It is recorded that Richard Rolle (1300-1349), the famous Latin and English religious writer and Bible translator, spent his final years at Hampole as a hermit, secluded in the dense forest.
The area was once thick woodland, rich with game and deer; and the monarchs of England are sometimes recorded as having gone on royal hunts in the Barnsdale forest. It is believed that at some point in the early medieval era, Barnsdale Forest was probably huge and may have covered most of South Yorkshire (in the same manner as Sherwood Forest probably once covered most of Nottinghamshire). It is possible that the large town of Barnsley, some fifteen kilometres to the west of Hampole, probably got the name from the forest.
Picture: Ancient Watling Street at Barnsdale
Barnsdale Bar is the site of the junction of the A1 (the historic Great North Road), the A639, and Wrangbrook Lane, Woodfield Road and Long Lane (junction 38 of the A1). Now motorway services lie on the site. It is six miles north-west of Doncaster.
All that now exists of Barnsdale Forest is small gatherings of trees at the side of the A1 motorway at Barnsdale Bar. There is however a wooded area around a half a mile wide, lying around a mile south of Hampole. It is called Hampole Wood, and although a small wood, the trees there may be direct descendants of the trees of Barndale Forest. The same could be said of the woodland that resides around a nearby stately home, Brodsworth Hall.
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