The Major Oak is allegedly Britain’s largest oak in scale with an estimated weight of 23 tonnes, a girth of 33ft (10 meters) and a height of 92ft (28 meters). The tree’s fame derives from its connections to the legend of Robin Hood, as it was allegedly the home providing him and his Merry Men with shelter (Miles, 2013). It is one of a few trees on the list of ‘Great British Trees’ in a public space that actually has a form of cultural infrastructure in place (the Major Oak trail) in order to direct visitors to it (Visit Nottinghamshire, 2022).

Despite is mythic connections to the story of Robin Hood, the Major Oak’s current name actually stems from the British soldier and antiquarian (a previous term for a student of ancient history or archeology) Major Hayman Rooke, whose name became associated with the tree after he featured a drawing of it in his 1790 book Remarkable Oaks. Before this it was known as the ‘Cockpen Tree’, a reference made to its hollow trunk being used to hold baskets of cockerels for fighting (The Woodland Trust, 2019). Evidence of why the tree is so large, aside from its perceived grand age (between 600-1,000 years old), is contested, however according to The Woodland Trust it may have come from being a working pollard, a method of tree management to create a series of dense branches to maintain a regular source of wood for harvest. Other theories suggest the tree could actually be a series of saplings which have fused together to make one large tree, a natural phenomenon called inosculation.

The tree has several impressive preservation methods in place to keep it supported. In 1908, chains were fitted to the tree to help keep it together, and a series of wooden staves wrapped together by the chains have been in place since the 1970's. In the same decade a large fence was erected due to the tree's roots beginning to suffer from compaction, a result of thousands of visitors to the tree each year (Sherwood Forest Website, 2024). The physical infrastructure responsible for its preservation is therefore just as remarkable as the tree itself, as well as being one of many conservation methods put in place to protect such heritage trees from becoming victim to their own massive size.