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The archaic head

Attention was drawn to the archaic head in the late 1960s, when local antiquarians started asking questions about the naïve sculptures of the human head being found around West Yorkshire, in field walls, on houses and in other locations.

At that time, they were sometimes called ‘Celtic’ heads, in a mistaken belief that they were around 2000 years old, and connected with a Celtic ‘severed head’ motif.

Folklore implied that they protect the house and occupants from misfortune or magical interference, or commemorate deaths during construction. Further research has demonstrated that, even if they are not themselves old, they have a place in an older tradition stretching back to pre-Christian worldviews. This research also indicates a particular concentration of such stone heads in the Calder valley dating from the 17th century, with another concentration from the 19th century. Indeed, two 17th-century folktales about the origin of the name ‘Halifax’.

Archaic heads are most often found in gable ends, or at windows, doorways or gates; they can be found on churches, halls, farmhouses and even wells and the Hebden Bridge aqueduct. All of these are locations traditionally thought to have a thinner veil between this world and the next, indicating that the heads are part of folk magic beliefs, rather than decoration.

This point is made doubly clear in the case of the Hebden Bridge Rochdale Canal aqueduct, where the head is placed overlooking the Calder, in a position where people are unlikely to see it. The head protects the aqueduct itself, and also looks towards the site of a whirlpool known to be one of the most dangerous stretches of the river. The head, dated 1795, is the only one along the whole length of the canal, and appears to confirm that even at that time the notion of the magical protective head was current in upper Calderdale.

Recommended reading: A Stony Gaze by John Billingsley (Capall Bann, 1998)

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