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.]

Devon charm for curing sciatica, or boneshave

Me dipping my wizened leg into a Dartmoor Stream on a hot day.  If you wish to use my photos please attribute this blog

"TAKE a pail of clean river water, dipped from the down-flowing stream, a pair of shears, a large key, and a new table knife. Dip the knife into the pail of water, draw it back upwards, downwards and across the hip three times each way. Then dip the key into the water and proceed as before. Then dip the shears into water, shear the hip as though it were covered with wool. Return the water left in the bucket to the river and sing

As this watter goeth to zay,
So flow boneshave away."

Hewett 1900

Devon charm to determin weather your fiance will be true

Sheep and Butcher - Some rights reserved by laurakgibbs   http://www.flickr.com/photos/38299630@N05/3679542239/sizes/o/in/photostream/

"Procure from a. butcher a bladebone of a shoulder of lamb divested of all the meat. Borrow a penknife from an unmarried man, but do not say for what purpose it is required. Take a yard of white ribbon, and having tied it to the bone, hang it as high in your bedroom chimney as you can conveniently reach. On going to bed pierce the bone with the knife once, for nine successive nights, in a different place each night, repeat while doing so, the following :

Tiz not this bone I means to stick,
But my lover's heart I means to prick,
Wishing him neither rest nor sleep,
Till unto me he comes to speak.
 

At the end of nine days your sweetheart will ask you to bind a wounded finger, or to attend to a cut which he will have met with during the time the charm was being used."

Hewett 1900

Unlucky in Devon - 21

Crossed knives - Municipal coat of arms of Sobotovice village,  Czech Republic.

It is unlucky

"To cross knives."

Hewett 1900

Unlucky in Devon - 13

Knife - By Davi Segre (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html), CC-BY-SA-3.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/) or CC-BY-SA-2.5-2.0-1.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5-2.0-1.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

It is unlucky -

"To give a friend a knife ; as it cuts all love away."

Hewett 1900

Devon Dreams G - K

"The following few examples shew " the stuff which dreams are made of."

Garden. 

To dream of being in a beautiful garden shews you will be rich and prosperous in love.
 

Glass. 

Broken glass foretells quarrels and family strife.
 

Gold; 

To dream of gold portends riches.
 

Hares. 

To dream of these implies great trouble in pecuniary matters and sickness.
 

Horses. 

Shews that your life will be long and happy. If kicked by a horse you will have a long and severe illness, and heavy misfortune.

Ivy.

A sign that your friendships are true.

Inn. 

To dream that you are staying at an inn is a most favourable one. It shews that you will inherit a large fortune, be successful in all your undertakings, and will enjoy much happiness.
 

Jackdaw. 

Beware of danger and evil disposed persons.

Journey. 

If you are about to take one in your dream, you will meet with reverse of fortune.
 

Knives 

are always omens of some evil about to happen.
 

Kiss.

To dream that some one is kissing you, is a sure sign that you are being deceived. To dream that you are kissing some one whom you love is a sign that your love is not reciprocated."

Hewett 1900

Spilled Salt in Devon

Salt

"Salt, in country districts, is held as a sacred article, and the vessel used to contain it is considered hallowed and looked upon as a valuable possession. Dire calamities follow on spilling salt, and a charm is used to counteract the dread consequences...

...An old Devonshire friend has sent me the following lines, which he is in the habit of repeating when small matters go wrong in his household. I believe they were written by the poet Gay, from whom he must have learnt them when a child.

 

Alas, you know the cause too well !
The salt is spilt : to me it fell ;
Then, to contribute to my loss,
My knife and fork were laid across :
On Friday, too, the day I dread.
Would I were safe at home in bed !
Last night (I vow to heaven 'tis true)
Bounce from the fire a coffin flew.
Next post some fatal news shall tell
God send my absent friends are well !""

Hewett 1900

Map - Bristol

[I was told in Bristol that salt should be put over the left shoulder "into the eye of the devil" who was looking over it, or else to make sure the salt passed you by and was not used for salting you down like a pharaoh... My wife, however, puts the salt over her shoulder as a gift for the pixies!] 

The White Bird of the Oxenhams of South Tawton - Part 2

The White Bird of the Oxenhams - From a scanned version of Devonshire characters and strange events by Sabine Baring-Gould, published in 1908, http://www.archive.org/details/devonshirecharac00bariuoft

"...For those who may be unable to procure the whole of the poem, I select one or two stanzas which may be interesting.

Where lofty hills in grandeur meet,
And Taw meandering flows,
There is a calm and sweet retreat
Where once a mansion rose.
 

There dwelt Sir James of Oxenham,
A brave and liberal lord :
Benighted travellers never came
Unwelcome to his board.

Here it goes on to say that Margaret was sole heiress to his property ; she was wooed by one Bertram, who from a blow on the head became an imbecile. Margaret's grief was great, but " consoling time healed the heart with anguish grieved," and " soft vermilion of her cheek again begins to flow."

Then John the Knight of Roxamcave
Sought her fair hand to gain :
And he was handsome, young, and brave
How could he plead in vain ?
 

He fondly pressed his Margaret
To fix their nuptial day,
And on its joyful eve they met
With friends and kinsfolk gay.

~#~

How happy was Sir James that night,
Unburdened of his care.
For he believed, with fond delight,
That heaven had heard his prayer.
 

~#~

Then up he rose, with joy elate,
To speak unto Sir John,
And rapt desire, outspeeding fate,
In thought he called him son.
 

But while the dear unpractised word
Was forming on his tongue,
He saw a silvery-breasted bird
Fly o'er the festive throng.
 

~#~

Now John, and Margaret, and her sire,
With many a dame and knight,
Ranged round the altar, heard the friar
Begin the holy rite.
 

When Margaret, with terrific screams,
Made all with horror start.
Oh, heavens ! her blood in torrents streamed,
A dagger's in her heart.
 

Behind stood Bertram, who then drew
Away the reeking blade ;
And frantically laughed to view
The life-blood of his maid.

" Now marry me, proud maid !" he cried,
" Thy blood with mine shall wed."
Then dashed the dagger in his side,
And on the ground fell dead.

Poor Margaret, too, grows cold with death,
And round her, hovering, flies
The phantom bird for her last breath,
To bear it to the skies."

 

Hewett 1900

 

Map - Okehampton
Map - South Tawton

Corfe Castle - part 2

"Edward was hunting in the forest of Wareham one day, when the clever, cankered dwarf of the queen, Wulstan, came up to him, and by some story of strange bird or beast, lured the boy-king to follow him into the wood, and leave his attendants. Then, finding that Corfe Castle, where his brother dwelt, was close at hand, Edward thought he should like to see little Ethelred - then ten or eleven year' old - and rode thus unattended to the door of his stepmother's home. She received him at the doorway, kissed him, and asked him to alight. He declined, but asked to see his brother. Elfrida then called for wine, and whilst the king held the cup to his lips, either the queen or one of her attendants stabbed him in the back. The wounded prince had, however, strength enough to set spurs to his horse, and attempt to rejoin his suite; but fainting from loss of blood, he fell; his foot got entangled in the stirrup, and he was dragged a considerable distance, till the horse stopped of itself Elfrida, alarmed at his apparent escape, sent servants after him, who found the poor young prince dead, and his face much cut by the flints of the road over which he had been dragged. The queen ordered his body to be lodged in a house near; on that spot a church was afterwards built. The next morning she had it conveyed to a marshy place, and retired herself to a mansion of hers called Bere, ten miles off. Little Ethelred had seen the murder, and was overpowered by his mother's wickedness; he reproached her so bitterly, in his childish grief and horror, that she beat him most severely with the great wax tapers, the only weapons she had near her hand. Ethelred was so much hurt that he hated the sight of them ever afterwards. Edward's body was found, and the murder discovered; but Ethelred, who of course was quite innocent of his beloved brother's death, succeeded to the throne. Dunstan was compelled to crown him ; but as he placed the royal diadem on the boy's head, he accompanied the act with an awful prophecy. It ran thus: "Even as, by the death of thy brother, thou didst aspire to the kingdom, hear the decree of Heaven. The sin of thy wicked mother and of her accomplices shall rest upon thy head, and such evils shall fall upon the English as they have never yet suffered, from the days when they first came into the isle of Britain even until the present time."..." [cont.]

Valentine (undated)

Betty Stogs and Jan the Monster - part 4

'...All this time the dough was forgotten, and it was getting sour and heavy. At last, when the woman went away, the lump of sour "leven" was put down to bake. The neglected child got troublesome, and as Jan would be home early to supper, Betty was in a great hurry to get things done. To quiet the child, she gave it Jan's watch; and, that it might be the better pleased, she opened it, "that the dear chield might see the pretty little wheels spinning round." In a short time the "machine" was thrown down in the ashes, and it, of course, stopped. Betty, at last, wished to know the time; she then found the watch clogged full of dirt. To put the thing to rights she washed it out in the kettle of dish-water, which had not been changed for two or three days, and was thick with salt pilchard-bones, and potato-skins. She did her best to clean the watch, for she was now terribly afraid of Jan, and she wiped all the little wheels, as far as she could reach, with the corner of the dishcloth, but the confounded thing would not go. She had to bake the bread by guess; and, therefore, when she took it up, it was as black as soot, and as hard as a stone.

Jan came home; and you may judge the temper he was in at finding things as they were, and his watch stopped. Betty swore to the deepest that she had never taken the thing into her hands. Next morning Jan got up early to go to Bal; and taking the burnt loaf, he tried to cut it with a knife, but it was in vain--as well try to cut a stone; next he tried the dag (axe), and Mounster said it strook fire, and the dag never made the least mark in the crust...' [cont.]


Hunt 1903

The giant Bolster, part 3

[cont.] '...Be this as it may, the giant Bolster became deeply in love with St Agnes, who is reputed to have been singularly beautiful, and a pattern woman of virtue. The giant allowed the lady no repose. He followed her incessantly, proclaiming his love, and filling the air with the tempests of his sighs and groans. St Agnes lectured Bolster in vain on the impropriety of his conduct, he being already a married man. This availed not; her prayers to him to relieve her from his importunities were also in vain. The persecuted lady, finding there was no release for her, while this monster existed, resolved to be rid of him at any cost, and eventually succeeded by the following stratagem:-- Agnes appeared at length to be persuaded of the intensity of the giant's love, but she told him she required yet one small proof more. There exists at Chapel Porth a hole in the cliff at the termination of the valley. If Bolster would fill this hole with his blood the lady would no longer look coldly on him. This huge bestrider-of-the-hills thought that it was an easy thing which was required of him, and felt that he could fill many such holes and be none the weaker for the loss of blood. Consequently, stretching his great arm across the hole, he plunged a knife into a vein, and a torrent of gore issued forth. Roaring and seething the blood fell to the bottom, and the giant expected in a few minutes to see the test of his devotion made evident, in the filling of the hole. It required much more blood than Bolster had supposed; still it must in a short time be filled, so he bled on. Hour after hour the blood flowed from the vein, yet the hole was not filled. Eventually the giant fainted from exhaustion. The strength of life within his mighty frame enabled him to rally, yet he had no power to lift himself from the ground, and he was unable to stanch the wound which he had made. Thus it was, that after many throes, the giant Bolster died !

The cunning saint, in proposing this task to Bolster, was well aware that the hole opened at the bottom into the sea, and that as rapidly as the blood flowed into the hole it ran from it, and did

"The multitudinous seas incarnadine,
Making the green one red."

Thus the lady got rid of her hated lover; Mrs Bolster was released, and the district freed from the presence of a tyrant. The hole at Chapel Porth still retains the evidences of the truth of this tradition, in the red stain which marks the track down which flowed the giant's blood.

There is another tradition, in some respects resembling this one, respecting a giant who dwelt at Goran, on the south Coast....'

Hunt 1903

How Tom and Jack found tin, part 7

[cont.] '...Jane, as soon as Tom and Jack had left her, had proceeded to the room in the wall, and with much care removed the jewels, gold, and dresses, caring little, as she afterwards said, for the dead bones, although they rattled as she shook them out of the robes. In a little time she had all the dresses in the main court of the castle, and having well beaten and brushed them, she selected the finest--those she now wore--and put the rest aside for other grand occasions.

The condescension of the great Lord of Pengerswick was something wonderful. He kissed Jane until Tom was almost jealous, and the great lord romped about the court of the castle with the children. Tom was, on the whole, however, delighted with the attention paid to his wife by a real lord, but our clear-headed Jack saw through it all, and took measures accordingly.

Pengerswick tried hard to learn the secret of the stores of tin, but he was foiled by the tinkeard on every tack. You may well suppose how desirous he was of getting Jack out of the way, and eventually he began to try his spells upon him. The power of his necromancy was such, that all in the castle were fixed in sleep as rigid as stones, save Jack. All that the enchanter could do produced no effect on him. He sat quietly looking on, occasionally humming some old troll, and now and then whistling to show his unconcern. At last Pengerswick became enraged, and he drew from his breast a dagger and slyly struck at Jack. The dagger, which was of the finest Eastern steel, was bent like a piece of soft iron against Jack's black hide....' [cont.]

Hunt 1903

Tom, Jane, and Jack the Tinker, Part 8

[part 8] '...Tom had followed the example of the old giant, and killed his cattle by flinging rocks at them. The giant's "bowls" are seen to this day scattered all over the country. Jack gave Tom a knife of the keenest edge and finest temper, and taught him how to slaughter the beasts. When a calf was to be skinned, he instructed Tom how to take the skin off whole from the fore legs, by Un-jointing the shoulders, and to remove it entirely clear of grain, and without the smallest scratch. In addition to all this, Tomy Vein (who was now a boy four years old, but bigger than many at ten) must have a coat possessing all the virtues which belonged to the tinkeard's. So a bull-calf's skin was put on to the boy, and Jane had special instructions how she was to allow the coat to dry on his back, and tan and dress it in a peculiar way. The skin thus treated would shrink and thicken up until it came to his shape. Nobody can tell how proud the young Tom was of his coat when all was done, though the poor boy suffered much in the doing.

Now Jack the Tinkeard desired the intrusion of strangers as little as did Tom and Jane, so he set to work to repair the gate which he had broken down. He not only did this, but he constructed a curious latch with the bobbin; it was so contrived that no stranger could find the right end of it, and if they pulled at any other part, the latch was only closed the tighter. While he was at work a swarm of Jane's St Ives cousins came around him; they mistook Jack for Tom, and pointed out how the children, who were playing near him, were like their father. Jack "parlayed with them until he had completed his task, and then he closed the gate in their faces....' [cont...]

Hunt 1903