WEST DON RUINS

Portion of wall, August 2012

As to those ruins along the West Don stretch, there are actually two sites in question. The first would seem to be easily-enough dismissed as the remains of an abandoned basketball court, some distance in from the east bank of the river. It was likely associated with a nearby day camp and outdoor education centre, across the Don, which has been in operation there since the late 1950s. The overrun state and remote location of the court, however, would suggest that it could have been built and then quickly forsaken at about that very time, if not earlier. No trails lead directly to this site any more, which one could easily miss during the verdant months of the year. Only a strange metal structure looking something like a double-crossed crucifix, rusting in a paved clearing on the forest floor, attracts the eye from the current network of pathways. Closer inspection then reveals the only hint of what its intended purpose must have been as one notes another such structure, now barely visible amongst the overgrowth, standing opposite from the first, with what is presumably its wooden backboard still somewhat intact.

The second ruin sits just north and west of the forgotten court, and mostly on the other side of the West Don — although one will observe stranded bits of rubble along both banks of the river at this particular site. The main part of the ruin consists of a tumbledown concrete wall, roughly 2 meters high and 10 meters in length, consisting of several large block segments, now almost wholly enveloped by the surrounding forest. Among the ruins one also finds a fallen rectangular pillar, more slender in proportion than those found in the Yellow Creek ravine, but otherwise much the same.

 Abandoned court, 2012

Any relation to the abovementioned court and/or education centre is decidedly difficult to suss out, not knowing exactly what the completed structure was in the first place. Assuming that all are related, however, one must wonder why both sites were neither maintained nor dismantled, but essentially left to rot by a still active institution. It is possible these ruins relate, instead, to the once sprawling Shadowbrooke Estate, a 40-acre homestead built just north of the education centre, in 1915, for then Senator Frederic Nicholls. But again, in what way remains unclear. As for any further relation to the East Don ruins, we might note that whereas the presumptive East Don "dam" sits downstream from a location indicative of the eastern Alps — Ocra Villaway — the West Don ruins sit downstream not only from the G. Ross Lord Dam and Reservoir, but also from St. Bernard's Convalescent Hospital, a structural heir of Shadowbrooke named for that renowned icon of the western Alps, Bernard of Menthon.

Of some additional interest is the fact that the West Don ruins can be accessed from the north via Goldfinch Court. At first this name seems a simple play on both its connecting thoroughfare (Finch Avenue) and a local species of bird (Spinus tristis). Some, however, may recognize that the European Goldfinch (Carduelis carduelis) is a highly emblematic figure in Christian artwork, representing both Christ's Passion and Resurrection due to its blood-red facial markings and fondness for thistle seeds (both allusion to the crown of thorns). It is, in fact, such a common motif that, by 1946, ornithologist Herbert Friedman could dedicate an entire monograph to The Symbolic Goldfinch: Its History and Significance in European Devotional Art, cataloguing some 486 paintings depicting this bird; the more famous of which includes Da Vinci's Madonna Litta and Raphael's Madonna and the Goldfinch. Indeed, the bird is most often shown in scenes of the Madonna and Child as a premonitory symbol linking Incarnation and Resurrection through the sacrifice of the Passion.


Details of wall, 2012

Now, keeping in mind our earlier question of why certain ruins have remained (or have been maintained) in the way that they have, if we were to follow this line of representational thinking most literally, and take the cruciform structure at the basketball court for Calvary, one might infer the ruined wall to stand for part of Herod's third city wall in Jerusalem, based on the traditional outline of Golgotha. One might venture another Don/Madonna connection in relation to this site, as well, while recalling the "virginal" implications of the East Don's "Tomar," via *to- + *mari-. Here, we must also recall that our rusting crucifix (another Redcrosse, perhaps?) is not just one of the traditional variety. This type of cruciform, with two cross-beams, goes by many names, the most common of which include the Patriarchal Cross, Bishop's Cross, Metropolitan Cross, Coss of St. Stephen, Cross of the Archangels, and Cross of Lorraine. It's origins and original meaning are obscure, though it is known from at least Roman times and remains a popular image in the former realms of the Eastern Empire. It is widely assumed that the extra beam represents the titulus cruces, or "INRI plaque" which marked Jesus of Nazareth as "King of the Jews." Meanwhile, more symbolic theories suggest that the two beams represent Christ's death and resurrection, secular power and ecclesiastic power, or that all three axes together represent the Holy Trinity.

That being said, it has been posited that this type of cross may pre-date any kind of Christian usage in so far as it likely descends from the ideographic representation of a shepherd's crook, common throughout the ancient Near East as a general symbol of rulership. Certain variations of the runic letter Ansuz, or Os, have been found inscribed this way, as well, particularly in the Danish "long-branch" version of the Younger Futhark (and we must note the nearby presence of a Denmark Crescent, just to the southeast of this site). In isolation Ansuz was used to denote or invoke a god, specifically one of the Æsir pantheon in Old Norse mythology (as opposed to any of the Vanir family, the Æsir's unearthly rivals). These origins would seem to transcend Scandinavia and Germanic paganism, though, relating etymologically to the Avestan ahura and Sanskrit asura deities (who themselves opposed daevas and suras respectively). In more modern usage we recognize the twice-crossed vertical line (‡) as a super-scriptural glyph known as a diesis, or "double dagger/obelisk," typically used to indicate the third note, caveat, or editorial remark on a page. We might also recognize that this particular symbol has been used to denote poison in botany, the transition state of a reaction in chemistry, white lead in alchemy, and, in certain styles of notation, a checkmate in chess (perhaps giving additional meaning to the "Bishop's Cross" of above).