A RARE re-enactment of an historical ceremony took place at Poole.

Mayor of Poole, Cllr Xena Dion, was Admiral of the Port during the Beating of the Sea Bounds ceremony on Sunday.

Poole’s sea boundaries were first recorded in 1341 were checked and found to be in order during the re-enactment.

The Mayor set sail on Greenslades’ Purbeck Gem, accompanied by eight ‘jurors’, the town crier David Squires and a full boat of keen participants and observers – including a handful of pirates bent on mischief.

The party came ashore at Brownsea Island and North Haven, continuing the ‘Pins and Points’ ceremony. As ‘common folk’ did not read and write, the boundaries had to be remembered and passed down from one generation to the next.

Children were taken to the boundary points and boys ‘smited’ on the hand and girls ‘pricked on the hand with a bodkin’ to ensure they would never forget. It was considered a great honour to be chosen to be a part of the ceremony.

Cllr Xena Dion helped organise the event, along with John Buckby and other members of the Society for Poole, local historian Michael Cullen and Marty Caine from the Pirates of Poole.

Cllr Dion said: “This ceremony was in serious risk of being lost to the people of Poole forever, and, this time, we have made sure the information and uniforms are kept together for the future.”