Latest Folklore

Someone getting a bit of mileage out of the local folklore:

A Singular Legend.

Those prone to superstition, no less than students of folklore, will have a special interest in the finding of the body of the young man who is accused of having murdered his sweetheart on the lofty Cornish hill of Castle an Dinas. The ancient and ruined fortress stands in the parish of Ludgvan; and of the saint after whom it was named there has long been told in the district a singular legend.

Saint Ludgvan, the alleged founder of the church there, was an Irish missionary; and it is said of him that he brought a stream of water under the church stile for the purpose of bestowing on it certain miraculous qualities, one of which was that no person baptised with it should ever expiate any of his crimes through medium of a halter.

Consequently it has been accustomed to be believed that no man of Ludgvan ever suffers this disgrace; and the popular belief in the legend is certain to be strengthened by the fact that now a peculiarly cruel murder has been perpetrated at Castle an Dinas, suicide, to use the old phrase, has “cheated the gallows.”

The belief, it may be added, is so strong in the district that the inhabitants of neighbouring parishes have been known to carry away the water of Ludgvan for baptismal purposes; but proof of its efficacy when thus removed is wanting.

From the (geographically surprising) ‘East of Fife Record’, 24th June 1904. It’s a slightly peculiar interpretation that St Ludgvan would be complicit in people getting away with terrible crimes, perhaps he intended that the local people would actually turn out very good and not do anything meriting hanging. But there we are. The poor victim found in the ditches at Castle-an-Dinas was Jessie Rickard, shot by Charles Berryman.

The popular name of this stone came from a local legend. The “masche” (something like witches of the piemontese folklore) used these stones, this one is the only survived today, to perform magic and to call storms and tempests.

Fonaby Top is now a farm, immaculate and clearly highly organised. This place is also the resting-place of the Fonaby stone sack, whose sinister history clings close. It nestles in a hedge bottom, untouched and, while not immovable, unmoved.

Mr Peter Cole, who farms here, treats it with the respect due to its hideous reputation. Would he move it, I asked? “By hell I wouldn’t,” he replied swiftly and decisively. And you wouldn’t think to look at him that the stalwart Mr Cole was a man to be easily moved by old wives’ tales. But that’s Lincolnshire!

From ‘Grimsby Daily Telegraph’, 17th September 1986.

Fingal’s Limpet Hammers are a pair of standing stones in Scotland that are associated with the legendary Celtic giant Fingal. The stones are named for their resemblance to limpet hammers, which are tools used to break limpets off rocks. The stones are also so large that only a giant like Fingal could wield them.

The stones are also known as Carrach An, which may mean “the pillars or erect stones”. During ploughing in the early 20th century, an underground passage was discovered, but it was later covered up.

BritainExpress

This is from ‘The Antiquities of Warwickshire‘ by William Dugdale (1656).

Southwards from Haseler (but within the same Parish) is a Coppice wood, and in it a notable Hill, which is of such a steep and equall ascent from every side, as if it had been artificially made, so that it is a very eminent mark over all that part of the Country, and by the common people called Alcocks Arbour. Towards the foot whereof is a hole, now almost filled up, having been the entrance into a Cave, as the Inhabitants report: of which Cave there is an old wives story, that passes for current amongst the people of the adjacent Towns;

viz. that one Alcock, a great Robber, used to lodge therein, and having got much mony by that course of life, hid it in an iron-bound Chest, whereunto were three Keys; which Chest, they say, is still there, but guarded by a Cock that continually sits upon it: And that on a time, an Oxford-Schollar came thither, with a Key that opened two of the Locks; but as he was attempting to open the third, the Cock seized on him. To all which they adde, that if one Bone of the partie, who set the Cock there, could be brought, he would yield up the Chest.

There’s another strange small hill not a few hundred metres down the road, and this is called ‘The Night Cap’ on modern maps.

The other hill has been known as either the “Devil’s Bag of Nuts” or “the Devil’s Night-cap.” The former name is part of a well-known group of legends clustering round September 21st, the devil’s nutting day. And in the local form it ran somewhat thus.

The Blessed Virgin Mary took shelter beneath a hazel bush, somewhere near this spot, and the bush spread a thick shelter over her so that she was not the least inconvenienced by the rain. She accordingly blessed the bush, so that it should bear specially good nuts. Now the devil was anxious, as usual, to undo any good that might be done, so he came nutting this way, but was very soon detected. In order to escape he flung down the troublesome bag of nuts, which grew into this hill.

In the ‘Stratford upon Avon Herald’, 4th July 1913.

Rumours of underground tunnels always count as folklore don’t they. (It reminded me of that at Fiddler’s Hill in Norfolk).

Arbury Hill is an ancient encampment. The great earthwork was thrown up by the Romans and the whole was surrounded by a wide ditch 20 feet deep enclosing about 10 acres. There are subterranean passages which were discovered a few years ago when a dog disappeared after a rabbit, in, it was thought, a rabbit hole. The dog was called, but never came back, though it was heard barking under the ground a long distance away. Digging operations revealed an underground passage with foul air in it. The dog was never recovered.

From the ‘Northampton Mercury’, 20th October 1933.

Also (I have not read it) John Walbridge’s article in ‘Mercian Mysteries’ (1991) suggests Arbury Hill is the ‘omphalos of England’ being further from the sea than anywhere else in the country. Which could be a fun fact.

Bygone Ashwell. Interesting lecture by Mr H.W. Bowman.

{...} The next object to arrest attention was Pancake Hill upon Highly Hill, the legendary voice of the old woman therein rewarding with a pancake all those who could complete the circuit of this old mound three times without drawing breath {sic ...}

Herts and Cambs Reporter, 27th March 1914.

The Supposed Tumulus In Parliament Hill Fields.
Nothing has come of the excavations undertaken by the County Council on the supposed tumulus in Parliament-hill fields. The result is exactly what many persons expected, for the legend connecting the British warrior queen with the mound is of the vaguest possible character. There are not wanting old inhabitants of the neighbourhood who assert that this particular mound has only attained to notoriety as “Boadicea’s Grave” within their own time, and that it was so christened by some practical joker who wished to impose upon the learned. Others of an antiquarian turn believe that genuine tumuli exist in the higher regions of Hampstead, bordering the Mansfield estates, but certainly not in Parliament-hill fields, which were in old times the dumping grounds for all sorts of rubbish. Anyhow the digging of the authorities has come to nought.

London Daily Chronicle, 5th November 1894.

Last week The Bedfordshire Times published a picture of Marston Church and with it a story of certain alleged exploits of the Evil One. Mr F.W. Marsom, of Northill, has some more stories to tell about the athletic prowess of Mephistopheles round and about Northill:

In Northill two versions of the story of the jumping powers of the devil are told, and both in connexion with Marston. The first is the same as that told before, but with the addition that when he took his leap he landed on Moxhill near Northill in a field called Hopper’s Hole.

The other version is that the devil took a hop, step, and a jump from Marston. His hop brought him to Hopper’s Hole, he stepped across Northill parish to Caesar’s Camp, Sandy, and from here he jumped and disappeared.

( Mr Marson then goes on to connect the story to leylines, an idea Alfred Watkins had in the early 1920s. ...) Applying these theories to the one-inch ordnance survey map we find that a straight line from Moat Farm, Marston, passes through the moat of Manor Farm, Cotton End, across Moxhill, Northill, to Caesar’s Camp, Sandy, which is the site of a prehistoric camp. This seems to fit the trackway theory, but the trouble is that so many lines can be found that the map soon begins to look like a spider’s web gone crazy.

Well I’m sold anyway :) From the Bedfordshire Times and Independent, 18th September 1936.

No. hang on. They’re not in a straight line at all.

Bear with me. It’s for your own good so you know how not to behave.

One day the Devil spied a man playing jumps or leapfrog in his own field upon the Sabbath. By this monstrous crime the Devil recognised him as one of his own. With one jump from the (church) tower he seized him and by another jump bore him to Hell. On the spot where he met his fate there is a stone known as the Devil’s toe-nail. It is a round stump about three feet high.

Miss D.B. Ward writing on Country Legends in the Bedfordshire Times and Independent, 16th July 1965.

At Marston Mortaine, Bedfordshire, one Sunday morning several boys played truant from church and wandered about the fields. A man dressed in black joined them, and proposed a game of hop-skip-and-jump. The boys acceded to the proposal, and commenced the sport, and when his turn came, the man in black took such an extraordinary hop-skip-and-jump, and cleared so much ground that the boys became excessively frightened, and concluded he was the devil. They ran home, and took care never to absent themselves from the services at church ever after; and the inhabitants of the village had stones placed on the spots where the devil’s feet came down to commemorate the event. And these stones remain to this day a testimony against Sabbath-breaking, and a witness of the devil’s prowess at hop-skip-and-jump.

Bedfordshire Times and Independent, 8th March 1873,

If you ask Marston people about the “Jumps” you are fairly certain to get widely-varying accounts of some legendary happenings. At least, when I passed through Marston the other day the stories I had heard came to my mind and I inquired about the legends. Older folk told some hair-raising yarns – in fact, the more the versions recounted, the more hair-raising they became and the more they differed in detail.

Of course this is nothing to complain about. It is a necessary stage in the building of a legend. Various accounts which come to us through the ages are gradually combined into one story, but the process is never completed, for by their very nature the stories acquire new details; generations of people see them in differing lights and read new meanings into them. And so it goes on.

The meanings of such inn signs as “Chequers”, “Rose and Crown”, “Three Horseshoes”, and “Bell” are fairly easy to trace, but the “Jumps” is local to Marston, though the legend of the devil’s leaps appears in various forms and in various districts. My authority tells me that at Marston the devil once appeared to a number of lads who were playing in the fields instead of going to church. After offering them money for jumping the devil is alleged to have exhibited his own agility by making two long jumps of about forty yards each. He then bounded over the church tower and vanished in a blue flame. Presumably there was also a smell of sulphur, but we are not told about that.

The incident caused so much dismay that the venerable Abbot of Woburn had to visit Marston and, with solemn ceremony, “disinfect” the place. Three stone crosses were placed where the devil jumped: the part of an octagonal shaft in the field opposite the inn years ago was said to be one of them. Local imagination long saw the impressions of the devil’s foot on the stone. Has this stone survived Marston’s mechanical navvies?

Marston Church tower stands about fifty feet from the church, the reason for this being wrapped in obscurity. Fanciful minds insist that the devil attempted to carry it away from the church, found it too heavy, and dropped it where it now stands. Apparently Satan is not so accomplished as a strong man as he is in other athletic directions.

Ernest Milton writing in the Bedfordshire Times and Independent, 10th December 1937.

The Principal Meeting of the Bedfordshire Licensing Committee {...} was held at the Shire Hall on Wednesday. Mr Eales represented the Justices, and applications for the renewal of the license of the “Jumps” Inn, Marston Morteyne, was made, on behalf of the owners, Messrs. Charles Wells, Ltd., and the tenant, Alfred Jackson, by Mr C.E. Dyer, instructed by Messrs. H. Tebbs and Son.

Against the renewal it was submitted that the house was isolated, with only a farmhouse and two cottages in its vicinity, and that the trade was small. When Mr Henry Swaffield was giving professional evicence, the Chairman (Mr Harter) said he believed the house obtained its name because the Devil was supposed to have jumped from a certain stone to the house, or from the house to the stone – which was it? – Witness: From the stone to the house. Mr Warren: And has not been seen since, I think? – Mr Swaffield: Not in that locality (laughter).

Mr Dyer pointed out that the trade of the house during the war was no criterion, and to take away this license would leave his client’s competitors in a majority of 2 to 1 in that parish. The house had been lately restored and was in excellent condition. During the last 20 years there had been only 3 transfers. The Bench declined to renew the licence.

Bedfordshire Times and Independent, 31st May 1918.

To the Editor of the Walsall Observer.
Sir, – I have been rather interested in your notes and the correspondence about Henry VIII and Sutton Coldfield. I shall be much obliged if you, or any of your correspondents, can clear up a certain puzzle about the origin of the name, or place, called King’s Standing. By the way, is this the place where King Henry was supposed to be standing when he was said to be attacked by a wild boar?

I have been told two quite different versions about the origin of the name King’s Standing. First, I was informed that this was the place where the Tudor Monarch used to stand to watch the hunting, or that he started the hunt from this spot, and this was one reason why Sutton was allowed to use the Tudor Rose on its coat of arms, etc.

Later on, I was informed that this was the place where Charles I stood to watch one of the battles between the Royalists and the Parliamentarians.

It is quite obvious that both these accounts of the origin of the name of King’s Standing cannot be true. Can anyone say which is the correct version of this interesting bit of local history. – Yours, etc., G.M Wood.

The newspaper (dully?) replies that Duignan says in ‘Staffordshire Place Names’ that it’s about Charles I, and that he didn’t have any evidence that the area was known as King’s Standing before 1642.

From the Walsall Observer, 9th August 1941.

There is a fine menhir at Lizerea Farm, Burhos, Wendron, which had fallen down, and was re-erected some fifty years ago by the then tenants of the farm – the three Pearce brothers. They were enormously strong men – one of them being the redoubtable champion wrestler, John “the Samson of Wendron.” It is said that these young men performed this tremendous task in order to leave a lasting memorial of their herculean strength.

Folklore in action by the sound of it. From an article on ‘Antiquities of the Helston District’ by A.S. Oates, in the West Briton and Cornwall Advertiser on the 20th May 1948.

In a field, not far from Booker’s Cottages, there exists, or did so until a year or two ago, direct evidence of local archery in the shape of a large sandstone, almost five feet in height and eight feet in circumference, grooved and worn in an extraordinary manner, some of the grooves being eight inches deep and extending the entire length of the stone.

These dents or grooves were caused by the sharpening of arrows, the stone being fixed in the ground for that purpose. This was probably the site of the local butts, and the very worn condition of the stone indicates its use over a very long period or by a very large number of men.

In Henry the Eighth’s reign it was enacted that all male subjects, except judges and the clergy, were to practice archery, and butts were to be set up in every township. Similar to modern rifle butts, these old time butts were merely mounds of sod and earth, with targets affixed, the arrows being sharpened upon a fixed stone near at hand.

It may thus be safe to conjecture that the Allerton stone was used by Sir Richard Molyneux’s retainers before proceeding to Agincourt, where their skill and prowess gained the King’s favour for their master and the chief forestership of the Royal parks.

The stone is known as “Robin Hood’s Stone,” local tradition maintaining that the famous outlaw once sharpened his arrows here, but perhaps this is stretching credulity too far.

Hmm yes maybe. And how do you explain that the whole country isn’t full of these stones. Never mind. It’s a good story. Taken from the Liverpool Evening Express of 10th December 1930, in an article about the ‘Romance of Allerton and Calderstones’ by ‘Gradivus.‘

This features the stones as a place of ill reputation, the type of place you’d find a bad-tempered witch throwing about curses to do with big subjects like sex and death. You’d imagine the stones’ towering presence helped the curse on a bit too – it certainly required very elaborate countermeasures.

An old dame gave me the following as having occurred years ago at Kirby Hill, near Boroughbridge. A young couple, recently married, met the witch (Sally Carey) near the Devil’s Arrows. What they had done to gain Sally’s displeasure, legend does not say, but as they passed the old lady she shook her stick, and almost screamed, “Ya want a lad, bud Ah’ll mak it a lass”; and sure enough, when the baby arrived, it was a girl. They had hoped it would be a boy, for much future fortune depended upon their having a son and heir. Still they hoped, should they be blest with a further addition, that the next arrival would be a boy. Three or four months after the birth of their daughter, the husband was thrown off his horse and killed.

Some time after the sad event, and late in the evening, Sally knocked at the widow’s door, on its being opened, the old hag screamed, brandishing her stick in the widow’s face, “It shan’t be a lad this tahm, nowther.” So terrified was her victim that she fainted, and was found some time afterwards in a doubled-up position and unable to rise. By-and-by, when sufficiently recovered, her friends strongly urged her to pay a visit to the wise man of Aldborough.

At last she was prevailed upon to do so, when a supreme effort on his part was made to break the witch’s power. Much of what the wise man did, the old lady had forgotten. All she remembered was that at midnight, with closed doors and windows, a black cat and a black cock bird were roasted to a cinder, on a fire made from boughs of the rowan tree; a long incantation was also pronounced, of which she could not call to mind a single word, for as she put it, ‘wa war all ti freetened.’ The ‘all’ consisted of the widow, my informant – then a maiden – and a mother of seven sons, the trio being necessary for the working of the charm.

When the baby was born, it was a boy, but a cripple. Once again the wise man was visited. This time the almost heart-broken mother was assured that, if she remained unwedded for seven years, her son would outlive his weakness, his back would grow straight, and all would be well. This demand was readily complied with. “But,” added the old dame, “t’ au’d witch tried all maks an’ manders o’ waays ti git her ti wed. Ah nivver knaw’d a lass seea pesthered wi’ chaps for ti ‘tice her, bud sha kept single, and bested t’ au’d witch i’ t’ end, fer t’ bairn grew up ti be ez straight an’ strang a chap ez yan need wish ti clap yan’s e’es on. Ah mahnd him weel, an’ ther’s nowt aboot that.”

From ‘Wit, character, folklore and customs of the North Riding of Yorkshire’ by Richard Blakeborough (1898).

One for folklore quibblers. All you have to do is Believe these stories, you don’t actually have to believe them.
The author is talking to an old lady of his acquaintance.

“Why,” said I, “when you were a girl there would be witches, or was that before your time?”
“No,” said she, “that it is not. There was one Dolly Makin; I once saw her myself, but she will be dead now, for she was over a hundred then; but my aunt once had a strange bout with her.”
“And where did Dolly live?” I asked, for I had years before heard of this same Dolly Makin.
“Nay, that’s mair ‘an Ah can tell ya,” said she.

“And what did she do to your aunt?” I inquired.
“Nothing; she only tried to. It was like this. There was one Tom Pickles wanted to keep company with my aunt, but he found out that she had a liking for one William Purkis. It was always thought, that when Tommy found this out, that he went to the witch and gave her something to work a spell on my aunt. Anyhow, one night when she had just finished milking, a fortune-teller came up and took hold of her hand, and told her a long story about the carryings-on of William Purkis and another lass, and she advised my aunt to take up with Tommy, telling her that things looked very black for her if she did anything else.

“But my aunt said that she would wed who she liked, and it would not be Tommy. At that the fortune-teller struck the cow with her stick; the cow lashed out and knocked the milk-pail over; my aunt flung the milk-stool at the fortune-teller’s head, but she ducked, and it missed her, and next moment they were one grappling with the other like all that. My aunt, however, was a well-built, strong lass, and after they had fought for a long time, neither gaining an advantage, the fortune-teller screamed out that my aunt had something about her that belonged to the unburied dead, or otherwise she would have mastered her, and had her in her power for ever. ‘But,’ said she, as she walked away, ‘I have not done with you yet;’ and then my aunt saw it was the old witch.

“My aunt did not know what the witch meant by saying she had something about her that belonged to the unburied dead; but news came next morning that her uncle had died the day before, and it happened that a brooch she was wearing had a bit of his hair in it. It was that which had saved her.

“It would have been useless trying to overtake the witch when she left her, even on horseback, for she once went from the top of Ingleborough to the top of Whernside at one stride.”

“But,” I ventured to say, “it is a long way, that.” I was not quite sure of the distance, but I knew I was within bounds when I added, “It will be quite nine miles.”

For a moment the old lady hesitated; even to her, after making all allowance for the witch’s marvellous power, it did seem a prodigious stride. “Well,” she said, with a sigh of relief, as an idea struck her, “maybe I am wrong; it would be a leap;” (or, as she put it, ‘mebbe Ah’s wrang; sha wad loup it.’) Again I pointed out that it was an enormous leap. “Deean’t ya want her ti ‘a’e deean’t?” (i.e. ‘Don’t you want her to have done it?’) she questioned, losing her temper. And then I had to smooth her ruffled feelings.

From ‘Wit, character, folklore and customs of the North Riding of Yorkshire’, by Richard Blakeborough (1898).

Flint arrow-heads were for ages looked upon as elf-stones, and are to-day worn as charms against unseen evils. They also possess healing power in certain diseases. So, too, do the belemnites – a fossilized portion of an extinct cuttle-fish. These, in the hand of a skilled person, work wonders in the case of sore eyes and ringworm. Unfortunately, though belemnites are common enough, the skilled hands are rare, and so their virtue in thousands of instances lie dormant. The belemnites are supposed to fall from the clouds during a thunderstorm; the same is said of rounded pieces of quartz or flints, one and all being called thunder-bolts, or ‘thunner-steeans.‘

When I was a boy, I was an ardent archaeologist. I remember on one occasion having been told that chipped flints were to be found in a field near Blois Hall. Hurrying thither the first whole holiday, I was fortunate enough on that occasion to find a flint arrow-head – the only one I ever did find.

This I showed to an old fellow who was hedging; without hesitation he pronounced it to be an elf-stone, declaring that the elves were evil spirits, who in days past used to throw them at the kie – I had up to that time always been told they were shot at cattle – but my informant stuck to throwing.

I well remember that he also said the elves got them out of whirlpools, where they were originally made by the water spirits, but he could not say what the water spirits used them for, though he knew of several instances in which both cattle and horses had been injured by the elves throwing their elf-stones at them. He further informed me that when the elves got them from the whirlpools, they had much longer shanks than was on the one I had found: this was so that better aim might be taken with them.

‘But,’ said he, ‘tha’re nivver fund wi’ lang shanks on, acoz t’fairies awlus brak ‘em off, seea ez t’elves wadn’t be yabble ti potch ‘em at t’beasts neea mair;’ and he had been told that fairies often wore them as ornaments. Sore eyes could be cured by the touch from an elf-stone, if a fairy had ever worn it, and they were also a potent love-charm if worn so that they rested near the heart.

From ‘Wit, character, folklore and customs of the North Riding of Yorkshire’ by Richard Blakeborough (1898). I’m not really moaning but it is quite laborious typing out (let alone reading) the ‘humorous’ renditions of common folk’s accents from these books :)

This Neolithic cromlech on Strumble Head is quite unique with its interesting markings on the capstone. Of course, they are likely to be natural.. However, the reasoning as to why this stone was chosen for the monument has interested explorers and antiquarians for centuries.

Richard Fenton’s account from ‘A Historical Tour Through Pembrokeshire’ written in 1810, is as follows:
“The side to the west of Carn Culhwch seemed to have been appropriated to druidical ceremonies from the many Cromlechs, some overturned, and some in their original position.

There is one more remarkable than the rest; a large unshapen mass of serpentine, fifteen feet by eight, and two and a half average thickness; under the edges of it are placed nine or ten small pointed upright stones, imbedded in a strong pavement, extending for some way round. These small supporters are fixed without any regard to their height, as only two or three bear the whole weight of the incumbent stone, one of which is so pressed by it, as to have become almost incorporated with it.

On the upper surface of the Cromlech are three considerable excavations near the centre, probably intended to have received the blood of the victim, or waters for purification, if (as it is the most general opinion) they were used as altars... this stone has a small inclination to the north-east. Its height from the ground is very inconsiderable, being scarce one foot high on the lowest side; and on the other only high enough to admit of a person creeping under it, though once entered, the space enlarges from the upper stone having a considerable concavity.

The earth below is rich and black. ..(I have since learned that the blackness I refer to, appears to have been chiefly the effect of fire, as many bits of charcoal and rude pottery have been picked up there.”

While modern science suggests they are likely the result of natural processes, the question remains: why did our ancestors choose this particular stone? What significance did they see in these markings that we might never fully understand?

We have covered this site in full over on our Youtube channel if you’d like to learn more – CoralJackz

This isn’t so much a folklore post as proof that cutting remarks have not been invented by the users of social media. Or at least that’s the way I’m interpreting it (I think you can’t help but hear it read in a pompous voice, and I think things like ‘to whom we are, no doubt, indebted’ and ‘expressly stated’ are not kindly phrases. And I think confounding placenames in Wales is probably quite easy especially if you aren’t Welsh):

I am indebted to Professor J.E. Lloyd for most kindly furnishing me with the following note with reference to the name of the camp:-

“It was Pennant who first, in his Tour of North Wales in 1773, took note of the remarkable hill-fort above Llanbedr-y-Cennin. He understood it to be known in the district as ‘Pen Caer Helen,’ and scaled the height in the hope of finding some traces of the Roman road style ‘Sarn Helen’. In this respect he was disappointed, though the discovery of the fort was ample compensation.

‘Pen Caer Helen’, we are assured in the Gossiping Guide to Wales was a mispronunciation of the actual name, ‘Pen Caer Llin’; Mr Egerton Phillimore, to whom we are, no doubt, indebted for the correction (Y Cymmrodor, xi, 54) does not mention his authority.

The ordinary form is the shortened one – ‘Pen y Gaer’ – under which the place appears in the old one-inch Ordnance Survy Map of the district (engraved in 1841).

In the notes to Lady Charlotte Guest’s edition of the Mabinogion, Pen y Gaer is identified with the ‘Kaer Dathal (or Dathyl)’ of theRed Book text. In order to dispose of this conjecture, it is enough to point out, as Mr Phillimore has done, that Caer Dathal is expressly stated to be in Arfon (Rhys and Evans’s text), while Pen y Gaer is in Arllechwedd Isaf – two districts which a mediaeval writer was not in the least likely to confound.

Moreover, Caer Dathal was near the sea, and not far from Aber Menai, Dinas Dinlle and Caer Arianrhod, as may be seen from the references to it in the Mabinogion.”

From ‘The Exploration of Pen-y-Gaer above Llanbedr-y-Cenin’ by Harold Hughes, in the 1906 volume of Archaeologia Cambrensis.

Should you wish to know who ‘Ronald’ is (although he’s a bit of a latecomer in TMA terms:

The next important personage to appear in Galloway history is Ronald the Dane, titular King of Northumbria, styled also Duke of the Glaswegians, in right of the ancient superiority of the Saxon kings over the Picts.
With Olaf of the Brogues (Anlaf Cuaran), grandson of Olaf the White, as his lieutenant, he drove the Saxons before him as far south as Tamworth. This was in 937, but in 944 the tide of victory rolled north again. King Eadmund drove Ronald out of Northumbria to take refuge in Galloway. Of this province he and his sons continued rulers till the close of the tenth century.

‘A History of Dumfries and Galloway’ by Herbert Maxwell (1896).

Also I noticed that the cairn is on the side of ‘Crotteagh Hill’ – this could come from ‘cruiteach’, meaning lumpy and uneven (spotted in ‘Studies in the topography of Galloway’, also by Sir Maxwell, 1887).

An interesting standing stone is to be seen on the southern slope of the Chevin above the town of Guiseley in the valley of the Aire (...). This stone is well-known to the small number of people who live near at hand. A similar stone is said to have stood at the head of Occupation Lane on the western end of the Chevin, and to have been broken up when the cottage was erected at that place. It is always called the “Bull Stone” and is said to be “lucky.”

Editorial Notes in the Yorkshire Archaeological Journal, volume 34 (1938).

Also, I read in ‘The English Dialect Dictionary’ (Joseph Wright, 1898) that a bullstone is a West Yorkshire word for a whetstone – which makes sense maybe as an explanation for (or even genuine use of) the grooves?

Another gravestone of interest [in the churchyard at Llansantffraid-Yn-Mechain] is the one on moulded pillars at the east end of the church, and was pointed out to us as being the stone marking the resting-place of the body of “David Maurice, the Suicide.” Tradition is a little at fault, as this is not the grave; but, for all that, Maurice or Morris may have been buried here in preference (under the circumstance) to the family vault at Llansilin. (...) The story touching David Maurice’s grave is that the entombed committed suicide in the river Tannatt, near to his father’s house, Penybont or Glan Cynlleth. The pool till lately was called “Llyn Dafydd Morris.”

Tradition asserts that D. Maurice, of Penybont, caused the “Carreg y big,” or “stone of contention,” to be removed from the centre of Llanrhaiadr village, in consequence of the great fighting caused by the assumption of the prize-fighter of the neighbourhood of the title of “Captain,” by leaping on the stone and proclaiming himself “Captain Carreg y big.” This was carried to such a pitch that the vicar of Llanrhaiadr begged David Maurice to remove the stone, which he did with a team of oxen, and placed it in his farm-yard; when, lo! and behold! the cattle, horses, sheep, and pigs, like maddened creatures, danced and pranced about the stone, and ending their joust with horning, biting, and eventually killing each other at the shrine of the “stone of contention.”

David Maurice, thinking the place haunted because of the stone, caused it to be rolled into the river near at hand, thinking the “charm would be thereby broken,” but, sad to relate, one morning he himself was found drowned in the pool which was called until lately “Llyn Dafydd Morris.”

The country people look at the death of David Maurice as a just retribution because he had removed the “Carreg y big,” which was said to be a boundary stone, and should not have been disturbed. This story received general credence.

In ‘A History of the Parish of Llansantffraid-Yn-Mechain’ by Thomas Griffiths Jones, in ‘Collections, historical and archaeological, relating to Montgomeryshire’ (1868).

The Foel Camp is situated on the summit of a commanding eminence, of a conoid form, close in the rear of the village. The internal area covers nearly two acres; its shape following, as most ancient camps do, the conformation of the ground. It has all the marks of a British post. The lines of defence around it partake more of the character of terraces than ditches, (but there are traces in two places of parts having been sunken), and make up one spiral road of access to the great arena.

The sides of the hill, excepting one, are very steep, and this steepness would be a great defence. The entrance is at the east end, where the sides are more approachable. There are no historical records concerning this, but tradition relates that there have been terrible combats about the foot of the mountain.

The spot on top of the Foel is called by the people “Soldiers’ Mount,” and it is said that the soldiers shot at each other from the Ffridd, (an opposite hill to the west), to the Foel, and from the Foel to the Ffridd, with bows and arrows.

It is of a spiral form, and has three ditches winding spirally one above the other. Some say that it was Caradog (Caractacus) ab Bran Fendigaid who encamped his left wing here while defending his country against the invasion of the Romans under Publius Ostorius, about the year of our Lord 51, his centre being on the Brewer. But all is conjectural.

Sul y Pys, or Pea Sunday (the Fourth* Sunday in Lent).

A custom prevailed among the old inhabitants of this parish of roasting peas or wheat grains, and then taking them to the top of the Foel, there to be eaten with very great ceremony, and drinking water out of the well on the Foel. This was done near the spot where the church was to have been built.

It is probable also that our forefathers sent presents to each other on this day, for it was an old saying with our mothers when asked for a gift, “You shall have it on Pea Sunday.”

The custom of eating peas was part of the Lent fasting, and the old people believed that they would be choked if they ate peas before Lent!

*Actually the fifth Sunday? This pea-eating event is known as Carlin Sunday in the north of England.

The Church stands on a piece of ground above the village, from which a fine view may be had of the vale below. Our ancestors delighted in building their temples on slightly elevated ground, that they might worship their God according to the fashion of their forefathers, the Druids, “in the face of the sun and the eye of light,” and this feeling was so strong in them that they had determined (so tradition relates), to build their temple on the Foel, on the opposite side of the hill facing the village; but neither peace nor prosperity attended the work, for all done during the day was removed in the night to the spot where the church now stands; therefore the church was built on its present site, because it was believed to be the spot where God desired to be worshipped.

Formerly the rejected site on the Foel was distinguished by a yew tree which grew there. This yew tree was accidentally burnt at the roasting of a kid on celebrating the jubilee of George the Third’s accession, and it is worth mentioning that the kid was taken out of a herd of goats that were depasturing on the side of the Ffridd.

In ‘A History of the Parish of Llansantffraid-Yn-Mechain’ by Thomas Griffiths Jones, in ‘Collections, historical and archaeological, relating to Montgomeryshire’ (1868).

The Culdees, 8th – 10th century

The so-called Culdees were early Christian ascetics who lived in remote communities, the Céli Dé or “Companions of God”. The concept originated in Ireland and it is believed by some scholars that the first inhabitants of Iceland, the “papar” who are recorded in so many placenames, were in fact Culdees. Famously, when the Norse first discovered Iceland, they were surprised to find traces of these Irish pioneers (“bells, books and staffs”); at a later date, although the Vikings wreaked havoc upon so many religious communities, they seem to have spared those of the Céli Dé – perhaps consciously out of affinity or respect, but perhaps merely on account of their material poverty and asceticism.

The late 8th century divine, St. Maelruan of Tallaght, developed a model “rule” for the Céli Dé and clearly influenced the movement. It is especially interesting that St. Maelruan, whose foundation was dedicated to St. Michael the Archangel, was believed to have had a personal archangelic sign, in the form of a clod of earth and a bible delivered from on high, to assist in his foundation. Note that St. Michael is associated with desert places (St. Michael’s Mount, Skellig Michael etc.) and also that he was highly esteemed by the christian Vikings. His symbol is a balance and he weighed the merits and demerits of the dead before determining their entry to heaven or hell.

The obvious link between the vikings, Iceland and St. Buo (discussed above) is matched by a link between St. Michael and the famous Viking grave at Kiloran. This is the only known example of a ship-burial with christian overtones, and gravegoods included a balance with weights, the symbol of St. Michael, special patron of the Céli Dé . There is also a supposed Culdee origin to the chapel-site at Balnahard, formerly known as Cille Cairine, and I like to think that Dún Tealtaig is another such site. Originally it was spelled as Dún Ceilte, which I suspect is a simple corruption of “Dun Céli Dé” – dwelling-place of the Companions of God. My notion was independently supported by at least one archaeologist who looked at the site.

Kevin Byrne – Colonsay History