Collected Words & Wisdom

Interesting August Folklore

Tue, 31 Jul 2012 21:02:14 +0100

1 August is traditionally known as Lammas Day and, although not necessarily observed on this day, was meant to coincide with the first reapings of wheat. The name ‘Lammas’ comes from the Anglo-Saxon word ‘hlafmaesse’, meaning ‘loaf mass’. The festival of Lammas marks the beginning of the harvest, when traditionally farmers would make loaves of bread from the new wheat crop and present them to the church for use as Communion bread during a special mass to thank God for the harvest. This custom ended when Henry VIII broke away from the Catholic Church and was replaced with harvest festivals at the end of the season.

A full moon occurs once every 29.5 days and so, with the exception of February, the possibility exists for two full moons to occur in any of the remaining eleven months. (This year August has two full moons, on 2 and 31 August.) The second of these is called the ‘blue moon’, hence the expression ‘once in a blue moon’, referring to the rarity of the occasion.

The English calendar is littered with fairs and festive gatherings. An official fair could only be granted by royal charter, which gave the ‘owner’ of the fair the very lucrative right to collect any tolls and dues generated by the event. Charters were often granted to religious or charitable institutions as a way of ensuring their long-term funding. One such very famous event was the Bartholomew Fair held in Smithfield in London on 24 August every year since it was granted its charter in 1133 by Henry I. However, the Bartholomew Fair gradually became more and more raucous and lawless and was eventually closed down in 1855.

On the last Sunday in August every ear, the village of Eyam in Derbyshire remembers the sacrifice made by the villagers in 1665 when the plague struck and the decision was taken to isolate the village in a self-imposed quarantine to prevent disease from spreading. Many of the graves can still be seen.

Interesting July Folklore

Mon, 02 Jul 2012 12:17:01 +0100

Considering the weather we have been experiencing lately, let’s hope the old adage

‘If the first of July it be rainy weather, ‘twill rain more or less for four weeks together’

does not hold true!

In the early Roman calendar, July was the fifth month in the year and was therefore called ‘Quintillius’ (meaning ‘fifth’) until it was renamed ‘Julius’ by the Roman Senate in honour of Julius Caesar who was born on 12 July.

The English year is littered with various festive fairs and fetes and July is no exception, two examples being the Fairlop Fair which takes place around a huge oak tree in Epping Forest on 6/7 July and Stagshawbank Fair held on 4 July in Corbridge, Northumberland, one of the most popular fairs in the north of England for at least 700 years and originally held at Midsummer.

July and through into August sees the time of the old rush-bearing ceremonies in Ambleside, Great Musgrave and, later in August, Grasmere. Until around 1800 floors of buildings, particularly in rural areas, would be covered with rushes for warmth and comfort, often mixed with sweet smelling flowers and herbs in the higher status buildings. Before they gradually acquired flagged floors, churches too would be strewn with rushes, as in early days there were no pews and the congregation stood or knelt on the floor. The annual rush-bearing or strewing soon became a major festival in which the whole community would come together in celebration.

15 July is St. Swithin’s Day. St. Swithin was Bishop of Winchester and died in 862. According to legend, he had requested to be buried in the churchyard but instead was interred inside the church as a mark of respect, whereupon it rained so hard for 40 days that his remains were re-buried outside in the churchyard. This all gave rise to the famous rhyme:

‘St Swithin’s Day, if thou dost rain, for forty days it will remain’.

The Whitstable oyster festival usually starts on the nearest Saturday to 25 July, as the trade has St. James as its patron saint. It begins with the ceremonial landing of the first catch of the season and a horse-drawn cart delivers the fresh native oysters to the restaurants in the town, followed by a week of events and concerts. There is also a ‘blessing of the waters’ service at Reeves Beach, to give thanks and to ensure good future harvesting.

Swans were introduced into Britain in the thirteenth century and were always owned by the Crown, but in 1473 permission to keep swans on the Thames was granted to the Worshipful Companies of Vintners and Dyers. Each year the swan keepers for these Companies meet the Royal Swan Master and together they journey down the river from London Bridge to Henley to capture and examine the swans. The beaks of the young birds are marked, one nick for the Dyers and two for the Vintners according to their parentage, with the Queen’s swans being left unmarked. The whole process is called ‘swan-upping’ and this year takes place from 16 to 20 July.

Interesting June Folklore

Wed, 06 Jun 2012 12:45:13 +0100

The first week in June sees the famous Horse Fair take place in Appleby in Cumbria, the greatest gathering of the year for travellers and Gypsies in the UK. In the old days horses would be driven through the crowded streets of the town but this has been banned for safety reasons. Nowadays the horses are ridden into the local river for a wash and swim and thousands of spectators gather on the banks to watch. There is also a market and lots of entertainment.

Summer is beginning and pagans everywhere look forward to the Summer Solstice, which this year takes place at 23.09 on Wednesday, 20 June. In recent times Druids have gathered at Stonehenge to worship the rising sun, though there is little historical evidence that they actually ever did so in the past. However, it is a fact that from the earliest records Midsummer in England was always celebrated with processions and bonfires and houses and churches were decorated with greenery. The bonfires had a dual purpose - on the one hand, they helped the local community come together in celebration, on the other, it was believed that the smoke from the fire purified the air and was therefore medicinal in nature. For this reason religious reformers in the 1500s branded the practice as superstitious and the custom gradually died out. One of the last places to keep the old tradition alive was the West Country.

Probably the whole period between St. John the Baptist’s Eve (23 June) and St. Peter’s/St. Paul’s Day (29 June) was regarded as one long Midsummer festival, when the famous ‘mock mayor’ ceremonies would take place, still practised today in the town of Abingdon with the election of the Mayor of Ock Street. In towns up and down the country civic pomp and the pretensions of local dignitaries would be made fun of in these mock mayor ceremonies, when there would be ludicrous ‘electoral’ speeches full of ridiculous promises and outrageous clothing and regalia, such as a cabbage stalk instead of a civic mace. The mock mayor would then be paraded through the streets, handing out outlandish favours and punishments and the whole affair would often degenerate into a loud drunken brawl. The mock elections would often take place at the same time as the real one at a time when most of the population was denied the vote and in the end local authorities took steps to suppress the custom.

In late June in the Cheshire village of Appleton a custom called ‘Bawming the Thorn’ is performed each year. The original hawthorn tree in question stood in the centre of the village and was rumoured to be an offshoot of the famous Holy Thorn at Glastonbury, which in turn is purported to have grown from a single thorn from Christ’s crown of thorns, planted by Joseph of Arimathea. The present tree in Appleton, however, only dates from 1967, when its predecessor blew down. ‘Bawming’ means decorating and each year local children decorate the tree with ribbons and garlands.

In June each year the Ceremony of Knolly’s Red Rose takes place in London when a red rose is presented to the Lord Mayor. The story behind this is that in 1381 Lady Constance, wife of Sir Robert Knollys, built a footbridge between her two properties in Seething Lane without first gaining the Lord Mayor’s permission, for which she was fined one red rose each year. The ceremony is organised by the Company of Thames Watermen and Lightermen and this year takes place on 14 June at 10.45 am at the Parish Church of All Hallows by the Tower.

FInally, remember the old line ‘If St. Paul’s Day be fair and clear, then it betides a happy year’. Fingers crossed everyone!

Interesting May Folklore

Tue, 01 May 2012 13:43:00 +0100

There are a great many traditional customs associated with May Day and it has been celebrated one way or another since the Middle Ages.

As in most Northern countries, May Day (or Garland Day) marked the end of the winter and was honoured through time with music, dancing and games.

In the early twentieth century greenery was collected by children to make garlands and there would then be a procession through the streets with flowers fastened on to sticks or hoops in the hope of collecting money.

At Charlton-on-Otmoor in Oxfordshire a large wooden cross is covered with yew and box leaves and placed above the rood screen in the church. This is referred to as the ‘garland’ or ‘lady’ and the greenery is replaced twice a year, on 1st May and 19th September. Children bring small crosses of wood or flowers which are placed around the church and after a church service they perform maypole dances.

Apart from maypole dances, other traditional May Day celebrations include the appearance of hobby horses and characters such as Jack in the Green.

Hobby animals have been a feature of May Day jollity for centuries and perhaps the most famous one is the Hobby Horse in Padstow, Cornwall. On 30th April the town is decorated with greenery and flags and on the morning of 1st May the ‘Oss wakes up to spend the day dancing through the streets, where it is considered to be good luck to be caught under his cloak! Minehead in Somerset is also famous for its hobby horse, though here celebrations go on for three days.

Jack in the Green was part of the seasonal calendar marked by chimney sweeps and he would dance through streets collecting donations for the sweeps to help see them through the summer when it was difficult to earn a living.

The Furry Dance takes place on 8th May in Helston, Cornwall and is another example of a pagan ceremony to ‘fetch the summer home’. It takes its name from the Celtic word ‘feur’ meaning ‘festival’ and dancers go along the High Street and weave in and out of everybody’s houses to bring good luck.

Another long-standing ceremony is ‘well dressing’. Wells were venerated as providing fresh clean water to villages and would be associated with local deities or spirits. As Christianity took hold, the worshipping of water spirits was replaced with saints and the custom of ‘dressing wells’ in veneration of the saints was established. The most famous well-dressing ceremony takes place in Tissington in Derbyshire, where it can be traced back to 1349 when the village escaped the Black Death.

29th May is Oak Apple Day and commemorates the triumphant return to London of King Charles II in 1660. The wearing of oak leaves was a symbol of the King’s narrow escape from Cromwell’s soldiers by hiding in an oak tree and was seen as a continuation of the traditional May Day festivities which already had a tendency to spread throughout the month.

May was obviously a busy month for our ancestors as they looked forward to the summer.

Offbeat London

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 16:17:14 +0100

Geoffrey Fletcher was born in Lancashire in 1923 and arrived in London in 1945 to study at the Slade School of Art. He loved to roam the city day and night and became adept at quickly and accurately capturing everyday street life in his sketchbook before adding final touches in a local nearby cafe.

In 1958 he was offered a job with the Daily Telegraph on a column called ‘London Day by Day’ and this became his metier for the next 30 years.

His most well known book, ‘The London Nobody Knows’, was published in 1962 and made into a documentary film with James Mason as narrator in 1967. He authored many other books on London and, like the present day Gentle Author of Spitalfields Life, would always add a little history, personal anecdote or idiosyncratic description to his work. He would not concentrate on the big landmarks, but rather on the ‘out-of-the way’ little known places.

Fletcher’s contributions to the Telegraph became increasingly concerned with the demolition of neglected historical buildings and although he was not against change, he was saddened by so much history being wiped out without a second thought.

His favourite London location was Islington which he regarded as having a ‘many-sided’ character with its combination of affluence and poverty and in his rambles he would often follow in the footsteps of fellow artist and Islington resident, Walter Sickert, who was a great inspiration to him.

Geoffrey Fletcher sadly died in 2004.

Great Graffiti in Spitalfields

Mon, 09 Apr 2012 19:50:23 +0100

Three great pictures of Spitalfields street art taken last week in March 2012:

Interesting April Folklore

Sat, 07 Apr 2012 12:52:23 +0100

No-one knows how April came by its name, but it may have come from the Latin word ‘aperire’, to open. April is, after all, the month when buds open and Spring begins, but only in the Northern hemisphere of course.

Anglo Saxons called April ‘Eastremonath’ which is where the word ‘Easter’ comes from. Eastre or Ostara was the Saxon goddess of the Dawn and therefore worshipped at the time of the Spring equinox, marking a new beginning in nature.

Above: The Goddess Ostara

The connection between Easter and the ‘egg’ symbolising new life also originates from pre-Christian times but fits perfectly with the Christian belief of the resurrection.

The original Easter Bunny was the Hare. The Anglo-Saxons believed that the hare laid eggs in its form to signify the imminence of the year’s rebirth, but the Church changed the hare into a ‘bunny’ in order to lead people away from pagan stories. The Spring Goddess was often depicted as a woman’s body with the head of a hare.

April begins with a day of fun and jokes - April Fool’s Day. The origin of this custom is shrouded in the mists of time but it has been kept for hundreds of years.

According to country lore, the arrival of the cuckoo heralds the beginning of Spring, with the result that cuckoo fairs are still held in many villages today, eg. Marsden in West Yorkshire, Heathfield in East Sussex

and Downton in Wiltshire. Traditionally, the cuckoo was supposed to sing from St. Tiburtius’ Day (14 April) to St. John’s Day (24 June).

Above: St. Tiburtius

The first Sunday in April is Daffodil Sunday, when in Victorian times families picked daffodils from their gardens and took them to local hospitals.

Maundy Thursday, 5 April, commemmorates The Last Supper and refers to Christ’s final instruction to his Disciples. The word ‘Maundy’ comes from the Latin ‘mandatum’, meaning to command. During The Last Supper, Christ washed the feet of his Disciples and in England the custom of the monarch washing people’s feet continued until 1689.

Good Friday (6 April in 2012, the date of the full moon) was believed to be the date of Jesus’ crucifixion and Easter Monday, the date of the resurrection.

23 April is Shakespeare’s birthday and St. George’s Day. Dragons are woven into the folklore of many English villages and hamlets, appearing in rhymes and in church sculpture. They are believed to have derived from serpent worship, found in most pagan cultures. Pagans believed that serpents brought wisdom, but the Church, of course, equated them with evil and sin, as in the book of Genesis. The dragon myth took hold and in a thirteenth century book of saints, dragons were depicted as demanding sacrifices of sheep and innocent maidens, requiring ‘dragon slayers’ such as St George and St Michael to come to their aid. The use of dragons on crests and as a heraldic device on shields became popular and connections with Arthurian legend and other romantic Medieval stories popularised the dragon myth.

Other dates of interest:

8 April           Buddha’s birthday
12 April 1961   Yuri Gagarin made the first flight into space.
15 April 1912   RMS Titanic struck and iceberg and sank.
16 April 1889   Charlie Chaplin was born.
18 April 1934   First launderette was opened!