Butt kicked and lit
George and the dragon... John Vincent reports on the legendary Yorkshire beast that met its match with a well-placed boot.
It’s a tale that dates back to the 16th century ... . a ferocious, scaly, bat-winged dragon terrorises the country folk around Wharncliffe Crags, just east of the village of Deepcar and about six miles north-west of Sheffield. The legendary flying beast, invincible against any weapons, was known as the Dragon of Wantley, with long claws, a near-impenetrable hide, “four and forty teeth of Iron” and a voracious appetite for children, farm animals – and even entire forests. According to a popular 17th century broadside ballad , the dragon has “a sting in his Tail, as long as a Flail”.
Villagers called on a robust and bawdy knight named More of More Hall for help. He took time off from drinking and womanising, donned a bespoke suit of spiked Sheffield armour and delivered a fatal kick to what the ballad calls the dragon’s “arse-gut” – its only vulnerable spot, as the enormous beast explains with its dying breath. The ribald legend originated, according to historians, with a lawsuit taken out in 1573 against the Lord of the Manor of Sheffield, George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury (1552-1590), who was accused of misappropriating funds. The crusading lawyer who took on and won the case on behalf of the people of Sheffield was named George More. The “dragon”, presumably, was the earl. My reason for stepping back into Yorkshire mythology is the appearance at the Chelsea Decorative Antiques and Fine Art Fair in London from March 2327 of a stunning silver military mess table lighter, its body in the form of a Blackbuck (Indian) antelope with a cast of a chromeplated Dragon of Wantley breathing fire with the wick in its mouth for the flame and foot placed on a flaming grenade. The lighter, from Mark Goodger Antiques, is priced at £2,850. The 1685 ballad – accurate in its topographical detail – was included in Thomas Percy’s Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, which in turn inspired an opera by Henry Carey (1687-1743), a novel,
The Dragon of Wantley, by Owen Wister (1860-1938) and a mention in the opening chapter of Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe (1819).
A stone wall bearing a fantastically carved dying dragon can be found on the southern edge of Bitholmes Wood, not far from where the monster was said to have been vanquished. Dragon’s Den is still marked on maps.
Wantley was the old local name for Wharncliffe Crags, now a Site of Special Scientific Interest, and the rocks of the escarpment, formed 320 million years ago, have been quarried to produce quern-stones for hand-grinding a wide variety of materials. The name Wharncliffe evolved from the term quern cliff.
Incidentally, More Hall did exist, as a 15th century (or earlier) residence, situated just below the gritstone edge of Wharncliffe Crags.
■ Also at the Chelsea fair, an 1860 mahogany dial clock from a signal box near York, bought by British Rail in
1976 for £41, is offered at £1,800 by Lincolnshire dealers Hansord.