The Hill of the Dragon: A Medieval Wayside Shrine and Regional Assembly Site Near Guildford, Surrey

IN MARCH 2020, ARCHAEOLOGY SOUTH-EAST RECORDED what may be a rare example of a medieval wayside shrine, preserved in a railway cutting through St Catherine’s Hill in Guildford, Surrey. The hill is a pronounced topographical feature on an early river crossing at the intersection between two early long-distance routes. Anciently known as ‘The Hill of the Dragon’, it is identified as a regional meeting place for two of the early folk territories of Surrey, which endured as a fair into the 20th century. The site is conceptualised here as the Christianisation of a persistent place, an ancient waypoint situated in a mythologised landscape of movement and assembly.