Every now and then I try and feature a bit of West Midlands trivia on the website, anything from the factual to the fictional, from the sublime to the ridiculous, the more whacky, amazing or obscure the better.
Here are a few short offerings before the holy shrine of West Midlands folklore, custom and myth:
Did You Know?
When King Ethelbert, ruler of East Anglia, died in the 8th century, his body was brought to Hereford for burial. In the place where the King's body was rested before burial, a spring of gushing water rose from the ground. The spring of water no longer exists at the site, but in 795 King Offa of Mercia built a shrine dedicated to Ethelbert on the same site which subsequently was replaced by Hereford Cathedral. Well ...I never!
The Needle's Eye is a cleft in the rock on the summit of the Wrekin in Shropshire which according to local legend first opened up at the moment of the Crucifixion when the rocks were torn asunder. A tradition grew up around the Needle's Eye where girls would climb through the cleft without looking behind them, lest they should never be married. The girl's boyfriend would traditionally meet his love with a kiss on the opposite side of the rocky cleft although in the modern age she is more likely to meet a hoody offering her a swig of his alco-pop.
Arbor Day is an ancient tree dressing festival which takes place annually at Aston-on-Clun near Ludlow. A black poplar tree in the centre of the village is dressed with flags in the run up to Arbor Day itself (29th May), on which occasion the flag of St George is raised above all others. The ceremony is thought to be derived from the very ancient practice of tree worship but these days is accompanied by the far more contemporary entertainment of Morris dancing.
The traditional annual Midlands holiday known as Wakes Week dates back to a custom in the town of Bilston where folk would keep a vigil by the graves of the dead on the eve of St Leonard's Day (6th November). The graveyard vigils were abandoned during the Reformation but moved to the local market square, with the date of Wakes Week changing from November to mid-summer. The religious aspect of the wakes gave way to joviality and amusements such as bear baiting, becoming such a disorderly affair that the whole thing was finally banned in Victorian times. Yet more strangely, the name Wakes Week survived and became the name given to the annual industrial holiday in the Midlands when the factories closed and we all went off to Blackpool. A convoluted history I am sure you will agree, though apparently true!
Do you have any West Midlands stories stranger than these? Let us have them for publication on Spaghetti Gazetti.
editorialgazette@aol.com
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