Nico Ditch
The Nico Ditch ("Nico ditch", sometimes also called Mickle Ditch or Nikker ) is an artificially created ditch that runs between Ashton-under-Lyne and Stretford through the southern suburbs of the English city of Manchester . The date and interpretation of the structure are uncertain, but the moat was probably dug between the end of Roman times in the 5th century and the Norman invasion of England in the 11th century as a defense or as a boundary marker. The moat was originally at least 9.7 kilometers long, but is now built over in many places. In the areas that have been preserved, the trench is three to four meters wide and up to one and a half meters deep. The sections that have been preserved include a 300-meter-long section on the grounds of a golf course in Denton . A 135-meter-long section in Platt Fields Park is listed as a Scheduled Ancient Monument .
history
It is possible that the moat was a boundary marker for the expanding Anglo-Saxons in the 7th century. It is also conceivable that in the late 8th or early 9th century it marked the border between the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of Mercia and Northumbria , which at that time became the Kingdom of Wessex , the Danes and Celtic Britons competed for supremacy in north-west England. Legend has it that the moat was built in a single night by the residents of Manchester as protection against a Viking attack that dates back to around 870. Every man was obliged to dig his part of the trench as deep as his head was high. From the 19th century comes the myth that the trench was once the scene of a battle between Danes and Anglo-Saxons; In a matching folk etymology , the names of the neighboring places Gorton and Reddish were wrongly explained as Gore Town ("Blood City)" and Red-Ditch ("Rotgraben"). Excavations by archaeologists at the University of Manchester between 1990 and 1997 could not provide any indications for a more precise dating, but the final report of the project shows that the trench is unlikely to have a military purpose, as defensive trenches are mostly cut in a V-shape into the ground Nico Ditch, however, shows a more U-shaped profile. Whatever the original purpose of the ditch, it has certainly been a boundary since the Middle Ages - some sections still form the boundary between the districts of Manchester on the one hand and Stockport and Tameside on the other.
The first written mention of the trench can be found in a deed of donation from 1190, in which the monks of Kersal Cell are given lands in Audenshaw . Here the ditch is referred to in Latin as magnum fossatum ("large ditch") and with the synonymous English name Mykelldiche (probably from Old English micel , "large"). An alternative interpretation sees the origin of today's name in the designation of a water spirit in the Anglo-Saxon world, the Hnickar or Nickar; According to another theory, there is a connection with Old English nǽcan - "to kill."
literature
- W. Farrer, J. Brownbill (Eds.): Townships: Gorton . In: A History of the County of Lancaster. 1911. Vol. 4, pp. 275-279.
- John Harland, Thomas Turner Wilkinson: Lancashire Legends, Traditions. Llanerch Press, 1993.
- Mike Nevell: Tameside Before 1066. Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council, 1992. ISBN 1-871324-07-6 .
- Mike Nevell: Lands and Lordships in Tameside. Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council with the University of Manchester Archaeological Unit, 1998. ISBN 1-871324-18-1 .
- Mike Nevell: Manchester: The Hidden History. The History Press, 2008. ISBN 978-0-7524-4704-9 .
Web links
- BBC Online: A Ditch in Time
Coordinates: 53 ° 27 '3 " N , 2 ° 10' 37" W.