Lanshaw Lad Boundary Stone

From stone circles to Bronze Age rock carvings to wartime memorials, Rombalds Moor, or as it is more well known, Ilkley Moor has a huge concentration of markers demonstrating human presence. The Lanshaw area of the moorland has its fair share of these, including the Lanshaw Lad, a boundary stone marking the point where two areas of land ownership meet.

The boundary stone is made from a single piece of gritstone, stands roughly 700mm high and is found at the 19th century boundary between Ilkley Moor and Burley Moor. This defining of boundaries is not a new practice, it likely went back centuries, but became more formalised during the period when manorial lords wanted to mark out the land they owned and iron out any disagreements there may have been.

The major land owners in the area of Lanshaw were the Middleton family and it is thought that the Lanshaw Lad Boundary Stone was placed there by them. This is mainly down to one side of the stone being carved with “WM 1842”, which is thought to reference William Middleton, who was instrumental in trying to establish definitive, permanent boundaries on the moorland to support his claims of ownership and enclosure as part of the “Enclosure Movement”. It was basically him saying “This is my land, not to be used by commoners any more” or “get orf my land!”.

As you can expect the age-old rights of commoners to graze on the land or collect peat was fiercely contested and often resulted in both legal and physical resistance! The battle over rights of access went on for decades, but in the late 19th century the recreational and health benefits of Ilkley Moor were recognised by the local authority and in 1893 the Ilkley Local Board (ILB) successfully purchased a large tract of the moor from William's successor, Francis Marmaduke Middleton, transforming the moor from private land to an area for the use of the residents of Ilkley and beyond in perpetuity.

An additional carving was added to the Lanshaw Lad following this which simply says “ILB 1893”. A final carving of “TP” is also found on the stone but nobody seems to know what that means!

The Lanshaw Lad would have been one of many stones when first erected though many of these have now disappeared the boundary is still marked by a series of yellow timber posts. Not as interesting to look at but they are probably easier to spot in the heather. There is apparently a Geocache nearby the Lanshaw Lad you can try and find too.