The moat, Blackgreves Farm near Wythall, Birmingham

Perfect walking day (for us, anyway, 14 degrees C, with a breeze) yesterday so we went to prospect a short walk, only about 3 miles, for our morning coffee shop/afternoon tea walking group. Mostly it was around the golf course near Wythall on the outskirts of Birmingham, but the 12th century moat around the later Blackgreves Farm House, and the bluebells next to it, made for additional interest. It seemed to us that a big old tree had been cut down and now provides wild life habitat.

 

'Details

The monument includes the buried and earthwork remains of a moated site at

Blackgreves Farm. Records refer to Richard I granting the tenement to Reginald

De Barres, and in 1252 Henry III granted the same lands to William de Belne,

whose family retained the property until modern times despite its recorded

ruin following the Black Death.

 

The sub-rectangular moat makes a complete circuit of the moat island except

for a solid, stone lined causeway across the middle of its southern arm. The

moated site is orientated north to south and measures approximately 80m

square. The island, which measures approximately 40m by 50m, is partly

occupied by an 18th and 19th century farm house which is excluded from the

scheduling, although the ground beneath it is included. The surface of the

island is generally raised 0.5m above the surrounding ground level.' ( ancientmonuments.uk/116013-moated-site-at-blackgreves-far... )

Done