There are two grouped Tree Preservation Orders in place for Stanton on the Wolds aimed at ensuring their future safety and Rushcliffe Borough Council who impose the Orders have given us a statement with details of the trees positions. They say: "Do you have a particularly attractive tree, an old tree, a rare or unusual species, or a tree of local or historical importance in your garden? Any tree with a trunk diameter of at least 75mm    (3 inches) at a chest height of 1.5m or 5 feet above ground level can be protected against threats, such as felling demands by neighbours. Tree Protection Orders (TPOs) will prohibit the felling, uprooting, root pruning, topping, lopping, wilful damage or destruction of that/those tree(s) without the consent of the local authority. There are exceptions; for instance if there is an immediate risk to health or safety. The routine annual pruning of fruit trees can also be done.

If you want to protect a tree you must write to the local authority stating your reasons and include a sketch showing the position of the tree(s) to be protected. The planning authority must advertise the proposed order. A temporary Tree Protection Order can come into effect immediately. There is then a 28 day period when neighbours can register their objections. At six months the TPO may be made permanent or be allowed to expire, although the original application can be re-instated at any time.

Work to any tree covered by a TPO would require five days notice to the responsible authority and for trees in a Conservation Area a six week notice is required. The authority may require the same species to be replanted if a protected tree needs felling. TPOs may cover a single tree or entire copses or woods. For Stanton there are no single trees covered by TPOs anywhere within the parish, however there are two group TPOs. The first was made out for Roundhill Spinney, a triangular copse along the West side of the A46 when this spinney was still in the Parish of Cotgrave. The second order covers a narrow strip of hedgerow on the West side of Thurlby Lane just after the Browns Lane and Stanton Lane junction.

If anyone is interested in having a tree(s) protected, then please contact the Design & Conservation Team at Rushcliffe Borough Council, Civic Centre, Pavilion Road, West Bridgford or phone 0115  9148352

A SECOND STANTON NEOLITHIC STONE AGE AXE 

 by Alan & Val Hunt

Anyone familiar with the Transactions of the Thoroton Society will most probably enjoy reading the summary called “Archaeology in Nottinghamshire: work carried out over the year”. For the last few years an assessment on possible archaeology has been required for any building work or soil disturbance (UK government directive PPG 16, 1990). The assessment may be called for as either a statutory requirement or as part of the planning process. The evaluation can either involve a desk-based sensitivity study (paper chase) or alternatively some form of field work. The simplest is the paper chase where the proposed building work is checked against a national list to see whether the works are close to scheduled ancient monuments, or listed sites or buildings, or even close to a village centre. If the proposed work does not fall within these categories then it can often proceed without any further investigation. For more interesting sites the field work can involve a full and costly archaeological dig to record the findings, compared with others where a ‘watching brief’ is carried out by a trained inspector on one or more site visits.

As bulldozers were very busy on two sites within the village during the summer of 2006, we decided to practise our ‘watching briefs’. The first site on the clayey eastern side of the village produced some nice specimens of the Liassic bivalve fossil Gryphaea, but nothing else of interest. The second site, not far from the centre of the old village, was much more exciting. The soil disturbance produced the broken back end of a Neolithic stone axe. The axe would date to somewhere between 3,500 BC and 3,000 BC.

As arctic conditions finally retreated from Britain about 10,000 years ago, the warming process was slow and led to the gradual colonization of the land by a succession of tree species: first birch then mixed pine and oak. The shift from hunter/gatherer to the pursuit of agriculture led to a more sedentary lifestyle and freed dedicated teams of people  to mine flint or stone and to manufacture various stone or flint tools. This cooperative effort led to the  design of very sharp flint axes more adapted for tree felling and the introduction of blunter stone ‘axes’ which may have been more suited for tilling the soil.  Scientific study of stone axes (petrology) has identified twenty-five sites across England, Wales and Scotland where Neolithic stone axe factories were producing quantities of these tools. The second Stanton axe has been examined by Rachel Atherton of the Portable Antiquities Scheme. Rachel works from her base in Derby and is the Regional ‘Finds’ Liaison Officer for Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire. The axe has been assigned to group VI, and was made from an igneous greenstone at the Great Langdale axe factories in Westmorland which are to known to have been very active about 5,500 years ago. The type VI axe is the most common type north of a line connecting the Thames and the Severn. In a recent review by Clough and Cummins, of the Neolithic stone or flint axes that have so far  been found in the East Midlands, the type VI stone axe was by far the most frequent, forming 40 % of the 903 known axes and gives some indication of the scale of trade between the north of England and Nottinghamshire.

 The discovery in 1938 of a Mesolithic hut floor and scatter of worked flints, the un-earthing in 1949 of the first Stanton flint axe (see ‘Stanton on the Wolds: a brief history of the village’ pages13-14) and now the finding of a second axe would all suggest that early man found conditions along the ridge of high ground on the east side of Stanton Lane/Thurlby Lane suitable for a degree of continuous habitation. We would like to suggest that parishioners having any form of house/garage construction/extension, new driveways or remodelling of their gardens should look out for signs of early man’s activities such as napped flints, arrow-heads, axes, beads or pottery. The Portable Antiquities Scheme has a marvellous web site at www.finds.org.uk which is fully searchable by county/village/type of object. Rachel may also be contacted on 01332 716665