Julius Caesar is supposed to have tied his horse to this yew and slept in its shade on his way to conquer Britain in 55 BC. Historians doubt he ever came near the small West Flanders town of Lo, but the legend gave the tree its name, Caesarsboom, and the name is the reason it is still standing at the foot of the Westpoort, the last of Lo's four medieval town gates. Judged by its size, Flanders' own heritage inventory puts the real age at 200 to 300 years. It has been a protected monument since 2005.
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Caesarsboom
European Yew (Taxus baccata) · roughly 250 years · Lo (Lo-Reninge), West Flanders
Julius Caesar is supposed to have tied his horse to this yew and slept in its shade on his way to conquer Britain in 55 BC. The tree is about 250 years old. Both of those statements are on the record, and only one of them is true.
Flanders' heritage inventory and every serious account agree on the second: judged by its size, the current yew most likely dates from the eighteenth century, somewhere between 200 and 300 years. Historians doubt Caesar came anywhere near Lo at all, though the road beside it may be Roman in origin. The legend is the reason the tree has a name, and the name is the reason it is still here.
There is an older thread, and it is worth keeping separate. Documents hint that a yew has stood on this exact corner since about 1050. That is a claim about the spot, not about this trunk, which is a successor on a site that has apparently always wanted a yew.
The setting does the rest. It stands at the foot of the Westpoort, the only one of Lo's four medieval town gates still standing, beside Het Damberd, recorded as one of the town's breweries since 1499. It is 2.5 metres round, 7.5 metres tall and 8 metres across the crown, restored in 1989 and protected as a monument since 2005.
Lo is small and far from anywhere else on this map. The gate and the yew together are the reason to come.
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