Survey of English Place-Names

Historical Forms

• latus cujusdam montis qui vocatur Maidanecastell 1175–86 YCh1563

Etymology

Castle Hill Fm & Castle Hill Wood, 1858 O.S., Maiden Castle (lost), latus cujusdam montis qui vocatur Maidanecastell 1175–86 YCh 1563, v. castel , hyll . The only remains at Castle Hill are two tumuli (1″ O.S. 97–470379) between Cock Beck and the hill of Towton Battle Field. There is no precise indication of the site of Maiden Castle , and although it may refer to 'the slope of the hill' at Castle Hill Wood, it is probably the name of the ancient entrenchment overlooking Cock Beck further west (1″ O.S. 97–445376); this appears topographically to belong to the Becca Banks series of earthworks, or to the great ditch called Woodhouse Moor Rein (ib 4437) which runs in a south-easterly direction from the former. What lends support to this is that Roger le Peytevin, who confirmed his father's grant of Maiden Castle to St Peter's Hospital, York, made about the same period a grant (YCh 1564) of Woodhouse, reserving to himself the latus montis of the earlier confirmation. The entrenchments referred to enclose the hill on which Woodhouse Grange stands. The name Maiden Castle (of which this is a very early example) probably means 'an embankment or old earthwork frequented by maidens because of its seclusion' (v. mægden , castel , esp. EPN ii, 31–2); because of the great disparity between the age of the earthworks to which these names usually refer and that in which the names are likely to have been created, they can hardly refer to the impregnability of the fortifications, as is sometimes suggested. v. Addenda.