Early translation into English from Kernowec (Cornish) of The Tale Of Ivan - part 5

St Levan Church (Llanlavan is probably Saint Levan - My poor knowledge of Cwmraeg (Welsh) would suggest so anyway, Llan in Welsh being roughly equivalent to a parish area) - image © Copyright Tim Heaton and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

[cont...] "...25 Now, as to the woman of the house, she conspired with a certain monk in the town, to murder the old man in his bed that night, while the rest were asleep, and lay the murder on the merchants.

26 And while Ivan was in bed, there was a hole in the pine-end of the house, and he saw a light, and he rose out of his bed and listened, and heard the monk speaking; and the monk turned his back upon the hole "perhaps," said he, " there is some one in the next house who may see our horrid deeds :" And with that the adultress, with her paramour, put the old man to death.

27 In the meantime, however, Ivan with his knife cut, through the hole, a pretty round piece of the monk's gown

.
28 And the next morning the adultress began to cry aloud, because her beloved was murdered ; and as there was neither man nor child in the house except the merchants, they ought to be hanged on his account.

29 Then they were taken and carried to prison, and at last Ivan came to them.

30 Alas, alas! Ivan, said they, a hard fate attends us ; our host was killed last night, and we shall be hanged for him.

31 Aha ! request the justices, said Ivan, to summon those who committed this heinous crime before hem.

32 Who knows, replied they, who committed the crime ? Who committed the crime ! said Ivan. If I know not how to prove who committed the crime, I will suffer myself to be hanged in their stead.

33 Explanation replied they 

(Nos 33, 34, and 35, Ivan repeats what he had seen, and produces the piece of the gown in evidence.)

36 And with that the merchants had their liberty, and the woman and the monk were hanged...." [cont...]

Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine 1818

Proverb on dying in debt

"Let him hang by the heels."  - Somerset.

(Of a man that dies in debt : His wife leaving all at his death, crying his goods in three markets and three Parish Churches is so free of all his debts). 

Ray 1768

[Not sure how the proverb links to the interpretation!  A friend of my wife said that if you die in debt you have made a profit....  Once again we find the number 3 has massive importance in folklore]

"As good be hanged for an old sheep than a young lamb" - Somerset

Ray 1768

Stabbed with a Bridport Dagger

Bridport, Dorset - by Steve Chapple [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

 

"Stabbed with a Byrdport dagger.

That is, hanged. The best if not the most hemp (for the quantity of ground) growing about Byrdport, a market town in this county. And hence it is that there is an ancient statue (though now disused and neglected) that the cable ropes for the navy-royal were to be made thereabout."

Ray 1768

Map - Bridport


[The proverb is well known enough today to be used in the Wikipedia entry for Bridport.]

Lydford Law proverb

Lydford / Lidford Castle - by john spivey [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

"First hang and draw, 

then bear the cause by Lidford law.

Lidford is a little and poor (but ancient) Corporation in this County with very large privileges, where a Court of Stanerries was formerly kept.  This libellous Proverb would suggest unto us, as if the Townsmen thereof (generally mean persons), where unable to manage their own liberties with necessary discretion, administering preposterous and preproperous justice."

Ray 1768

Map - Lydford

A terrifying Devon Lulaby

An appropriately fierce Black Ram... Steve F [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

"WHEN a child gets tired or a little out of temper, and he nurse wishes to amuse it, she dandles it on her knee, and sings -

"Vather and mawther
And uncle Jan,
Went to Market
Pin tap a black ram,
Off val'd vather,
Off val'd mawther,
And away raw'd
Uncle Jan ! !

All up ! all up ! all up !
Eat the fat ram
And hang Uncle Jan !
All up ! all up ! all up !
Huraw for Uncle Jan !""

Hewett 1900

A Devon charm for luck with games of chance.

Hangman's rope - http://www.flickr.com/photos/msabbath/2192938523/sizes/z/ Some rights reserved by Sabbath Photography

"Suspend by a silken cord around the neck, a section of the rope with which a person has been hanged."

Hewett 1900

Unlucky in Devon - 3

Ladder of Devine Assent - 12th century Icon from Egypt

It is unlucky to -

"To pass under a lean-to ladder without first crossing the middle fingers over the front ones.
 

"This superstition," says the Weekly Western News, Plymouth, "originates from an old coarse joke formerly frequent among the lower class. It took its rise from the fact that at the gallows at Tyburn the culprit had to walk up a ladder, there being no platform. The ladder was afterwards withdrawn and he was left suspended.""

Hewett 1900

Lucky in Devon - 30

Musician Hanged - Fac-simile of a Woodcut in Pierre Michault's Doctrinal du Temps Présent, small folio, goth., Bruges, about 1490

"To possess a rope by which a person has been hanged ensures good luck."

Hewett 1900

Evil King John at Corfe Castle

Corfe Castle - Some rights reserved by treehouse1977

"King John made the crime-stained castle his residence, and deposited his regalia in it. He also converted it into a State prison, and starved to death in it, in 1202, twenty-two French prisoners, the very flower of the Poitevin chivalry. Not many years afterwards he brutally tortured here Peter of Pomfret, the poor hermit who had prophesied that John should lose his crown in 1213. The king actually did resign it that year to the Papal Legate, and the truth of the hermit's prediction so infuriated the royal monster that he caused Peter to be dragged to and fro through the town of Wareham at the tail of horses, and afterwards he had the poor mutilated man and his son hanged in sight of the walls."

Valentine (undated)

Map - Corfe Castle
Map - Wareham

Lydford Law

"It [Lydford] is certain that it was formerly a place of importance; had its own mint, and in its castle were confined those who offended against the forest and stannary law - that oft-quoted and most unpleasant Lydford Law, "Hang to-day; try to-morrow."

In the morn they hang and draw,

And sit in judgment after.

"Is this the place?" you will cry shortly after turning down by the Dartmoor Inn, and Lydford comes at once in sight.

The castle keep, a grey ruin, stands on a mound near the church; a few houses cluster round it; the street is empty

For of its great name, I wis,

It only now the shadow is.

So wrote Risdon two centuries ago."

Cresswell 1921

Map - Lydford Castle

Jay's Grave

"Westward of this is the Ashburton and Chagford road, by the side of which is Jay's Grave. Jay was a young woman who, many years ago, hanged herself at Cannon Farm, and it is said was buried here in a suicide's grave."

Cresswell 1921

 Map - Jay's Grave

The Legend of John Trinnaman's Pool - part 4

...Some say that each time John Trinnaman filled the bag with wet sand, the bottom of the bag split open and the sand went back into the river. He then looked up to heaven and called for ‘more rope’ to tie the bottom of the bag. As he did so, a rope came down from the branches of the oak tree, wound itself round the butler’s neck and hanged him. The bag of sand, they say, turned into one big solid stone.

If you care to look closely around on the river bank in the Trinnaman Pool area in Long Timber Woods in Ivybridge, you will see a large oak tree at the base of which is an unusual granite stone. Cut in the stone is a large basin round indentation. Some people say that this was where John Trinnaman placed handfuls of sand as he gathered it from the river.

This is the John Trinnaman legend.

[Collected from Tom of Ivybridge, who first heard it from his teacher during World War One, whilst picking blackberries for the war effort. Sadly Tom passed away in the mid 1990's.]