Holy Thorn

• The felling of a single sycamore tree prompted an outpouring of grief last week.
• The tree – known as the “Sycamore Gap” – had been an iconic landmark and its location, Hadrian’s Wall in Northumberland, is a protected Unesco world heritage site.
• Planted in the late 19th century, the roots of the Sycamore Gap tree reached deep into individual and collective memory.

1. The Holy Thorn of Glastonbury

• After reaching Glastonbury in Somerset, he climbed Wearyall Hill, rested and thrust his staff into the ground.
• Being rooted in the “holyest erth” was no guarantee that the holy thorn would be immune from attack, however.
• But despite its chequered history, traditions associated with the holy thorn endure.
• After the damage caused to the Holy Thorn in 1647, cuttings were taken from which a tree now growing in Glastonbury Abbey is believed to descend.

2. One Tree Hill

• A similarly chequered history belongs to the 125-year-old Monterey Pine which sat on top One Tree Hill or Maungakiekie in Auckland, New Zealand.
• The pine had been planted on the peak to replace a native tōtara tree, chopped down by a European settler.

3. Newton’s apple trees

• There is a proliferation of “Newton’s apple” trees supposedly descended from the tree under which physicist Isaac Newton devised his law of universal gravity.
• As a result, “Newton’s apple trees” are now found across the world, their roots connecting to create a library of human history and discovery.

4. The Shawshank Redemption white oak

• In 2016, strong winds uprooted a majestic white oak in Mansfield, Ohio in the US, made famous by the 1994 film The Shawshank Redemption.
• Film fans were distraught and souvenir-hunters rushed to the site, removing parts of the fallen tree.
• Their branches and roots connect the brief history of humanity and the deeper history of our planet.