On to the modern era now, beginning with Haxey Hood; there is a brilliant display in the North Lincolnshire Museum, and it obviously caught the imagination of the pupils of Bushfield Road Infant School, who picked it as one of the subjects to go on the tree.
I’m calling it the modern era, although the tradition of Haxey Hood dates back to the 14th Century; it’s still very much alive and kicking in these modern times (up to press ~ there has been worrying rumours that building plans may affect things for the worse), and I’ve seen it up close on several occasions. 
There is so much to this tradition, from the communal singing beforehand to the Fool’s speech, to the children’s sack hoods and the main sway, sloe gin and the Boggins and Lord of the Hood…so how do you represent all this? I felt that it had to be down to one item, to fit in with the rest of the carvings; when you whittle it all down (literally!) it comes back to the leather “hood” itself, held aloft ~ as it is by the Fool, the Boggins, Lord and finally the triumphant pub landlard at the end of the day.
There were a couple of lumps on the trunk that I hoped to utilise ~ one for the end of the hood, projecting out of the trunk, and the other, larger lump for the hand and other end of the hood.
I couldn’t avoid the bend in the hood: if I’d taken it back further it wouldn’t have projected so well off the edge of the trunk, and the end with the hand was dictacted by the shape of the lump.
The other carved areas have had background details, and for this I took the double “H” that is found on the front of the Fool’s sacking top. The children’s designs had featured this quite prominently too.
Talking of the backgrounds, I went back and put a Roman key pattern on the side of the helmet and the Saxon and Viking carvings.
