The village
Ebberston & its history
A historic estate village where the land rises from the River Derwent toward the moors, at the mouth of the narrow valley of Kirk Dale.
Ebberston is a village in the Ryedale area of North Yorkshire, on the A170 between Pickering — about six miles west — and Scarborough, about eleven miles east. It lies on the southern edge of the North York Moors, where the land rises from the River Derwent up toward the moors, at the mouth of the narrow valley of Kirk Dale.
It is a historic estate village, and that shows in its fabric: many of its buildings are Grade II listed, built of local sandstone under pantile roofs. Historically the village was agricultural, and farmland still frames it on every side.
The civil parish is Ebberston and Yedingham. The parish church, St Mary's, stands about half a mile west of the village, and Ebberston Hall — the Grade I listed Palladian villa of 1718 — sits a short distance to the north-east of it.
At a glance
- County
- North Yorkshire
- Area
- Ryedale
- Civil parish
- Ebberston and Yedingham
- Nearest towns
- Pickering, Scarborough
Local legend
Elfrid's Hole and the wounded king
Above the village, over a spot known as Elfrid's Hole (also written Ilfrid's Hole), a stone tower was erected in 1790. Its inscription records that Aldfrith — rendered on the stone as "Aelfred", King of Northumbria — rested here after a defeat in the year 705.
Told as legend, not as history
In reality, King Aldfrith of Northumbria is recorded as dying of illness at Driffield around 704–705, not in battle at Ebberston. Aldfrith was a scholar-king of Northumbria's golden age, the era linked with the Lindisfarne Gospels.
The wounded-king tale and the name "Elfrid's Hole" nevertheless remain a genuine and much-loved part of Ebberston folklore — and the 1790 tower is a real monument to it.