Wayland Wood is an ancient woodland near to Watton

Watton, Norfolk

Watton is a market town in the district of Breckland within the English county of Norfolk. It is situated on the crossroads of the A1075 Dereham-Thetford road and the B1108 Brandon-Norwich Road, about west of Norwich....

 in Norfolk

Norfolk

Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. Although the name has been claimed as a corruption of 'Wailing Wood', Wayland is the name of an historic Norfolk hundred

Hundred

Hundred usually refers to the number 100It may also refer to:* Hundred , historically a number not necessarily 100* Hundred , a mostly obsolete geographic term...

, within the area of which the wood stands.

Habitat

The wood covers an area of 34 hectare

Hectare

The hectare is a metric unit of area defined as 10,000 square metres , and primarily used in the measurement of land. In 1795, when the metric system was introduced, the are was defined as being 100 square metres and the hectare was thus 100 ares or 1/100 km2...

s and is located 1 km south of the town of Watton%2C Norfolk on the A1075 road to Thetford. It is a designated Site of Special Scientific Interest

Site of Special Scientific Interest

A Site of Special Scientific Interest is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom. SSSIs are the basic building block of site-based nature conservation legislation and most other legal nature/geological conservation designations in Great Britain are based upon...

 and features oak, ash, hazel and bird cherry trees, and is also the home to a golden pheasant

Golden Pheasant

The Golden Pheasant or "Chinese Pheasant", is a gamebird of the order Galliformes and the family Phasianidae...

 population. The wood is also the only known location in Norfolk where the Yellow Star of Bethlehem

Gagea

Gagea is a large genus of spring flowers in the Liliaceae found in Europe and western Asia. It is named after the English naturalist Sir Thomas Gage...

 grows.

Babes in the Wood

Wayland Wood is also the setting of the centuries-old tale of Babes in the Wood

Babes in the Wood

Babes in the Wood is a traditional children's tale, as well as a popular pantomime subject. It has also been the name of some other unrelated works. The expression has passed into common language, referring to inexperienced innocents entering unawares into any potentially dangerous or hostile...

, a brother and sister who are abandoned and die in the woodland. The legend tells that these two children were left in the care of their uncle at Griston

Griston

Griston is a village and civil parish in the Wayland area of the Breckland district within the English county of Norfolk.It covers an area of and had a population of 1,206 in 206 households as of the 2001 census. For the purposes of local government, it falls within the district of Breckland.It...

Hall on the edge of the woods, following the death of their parents. On reaching maturity they were to inherit their father's fortune, but should they pass before this time the wealth would go directly to the uncle. The uncle abandons the two children to stake his claim to the wealth.
In 1879, the tree that the babes had reputedly been left under was struck by lightning. The strength of the legend had grown to such an extent that people visited the area for souvenirs.