The Golden Pots

The high moorland stretch of Dere Street, on the watershed between Cottonshope and Ridleeshope, is marked by two cross sockets called the Golden Pots. The "Outer Golden Pot" lies at NT 8045 0722 above Pepper Side and the "Middle Golden Pot" at NT 8120 0633. Both feature on Armstrong's map of 1769 (fig. 17) along with a third near Featherwood, at the point where the moorland drove or drift-road leading directly to Elsdon branches off Dere Street (NT 81 04). This last stone (presumably once termed the "Inner Golden Pot") had already disappeared by Hodgson's day (cf. Hodgson 1827, 150-151).

The date of these stones is uncertain. Honeyman (1927) suggested the crosses were erected in the late 14th-century, partly on stylistic grounds but also by rather fanciful association with the battle of Otterburn, considering them to be funerary memorials for the Earl of Douglas. A location named Golding Pottes does actually figure in the Redesdale Forest boundary delimitation, which is set out in a Kelso Abbey charter associated with the Cottonshope foals dispute of 1228 (Liber de Calchou, 264; cf. Hodgson 1827, 17). If the 13th-century 'Goldingpottes' did indeed refer to the socket stones the implication would be that the sockets were of considerable antiquity for it would imply they had already lost their cross shafts by 1228.

This identification is far from secure however. Golding Pottes would be more appropriate name for a field containing some sort of pits, like 'Sand pottes', 'Colpottes', 'Claypots' etc (Honeyman - 1927, 99-103 - suggested it was an early name for the earthworks of Chew Green fortlet and camps). It is therefore more likely that Golding Pottes was the name given to a stretch of moorland near Dere Street, which had perhaps been scarred by some kind of extraction, and which, when deformed into Golden Pots, was subsequently transferred to ancient cross sockets alongside the road, whose true purpose had been forgotten as had the original meaning of the placename.

The function of the crosses is also uncertain, but they most likely served served as waymarkers defining the moorland course of Dere Street, and were perhaps situated at points where other trackways joined or crossed the route - a correlation suggested in particular by Hodgson's description of their location (1827, 150-151). Alternatively it is conceivable that they were boundary stones, in which case they may signify that Dere Street formed a convenient limit for some early estate.