The Folklore of Warwickshire

For years I’ve felt that the folklore of Warwickshire has been rather overlooked compared to that of regions. This account aims to go some way to rectifying this.

#Blackthorn is associated with "the crone of death", #goddess of winter, the Cailleach. #Winter begins when the Cailleach strikes the ground with her blackthorn staff. Connected with #witches & known as the #tree of the keeper of dark secrets #FolkloreSunday

📷 by me

For Palm Sunday goat willow (Salix caprea) catkins were gathered to replicate the palms waved as Jesus entered Jerusalem. At one time the branches would have been taken into church to be blessed by the priest. #PalmSunday

🤍 Honey is symbolic of the spring time representing the bees that will soon be making honey. It is said if you pour honey or syrup in your garden as an offering to the deities and leave a tiny bowl of honey as a gift it will encourage fairies to visit your garden 🪏🍯🧚🏼‍♀️🐝

📷by me

In Baginton, the ghost of a woman in a long grey dress is reported to glide from the church of St John the Baptist and into the Old Rectory opposite. Witnesses have described her as being almost translucent.

🌿🪦🌿An old Welsh superstition warned against uprooting Periwinkle flowers growing on a grave - the desecrater risked being haunted by the spirit of the buried person, or plagued by terrifying dreams every night. #WyrdWednesday #FolkloreThursday #FolkyFriday #FolkloreSunday

#LegendaryWednesday In medieval belief, as recorded in Etymologiae by Isidore of Seville, falling stars were no idle wonder, but signs ~ omens in the heavens. Some said they marked a soul departing, or something cast down from above. Such lights were watched with unease, their brief passage noted in silence. They were not beauty, but warning ~ a reminder that the heavens were not beyond change. People did not make wishes on them. They watched… and wondered who had just been taken.

The theme is stars this #LegendaryWednesday! Felis, the lost cat constellation, was created by cat lover Francais de Lalande in the 18th century; it is now obsolete, as its stars belong to Hydra. However, the constellations Leo, Leo Minor, and Lynx continue to twinkle. #catlore

Source: C.S. Wharton, “The Folklore of South Warwickshire” (unpublished PhD thesis, 1974). 📷 by me

Plants which grow upwards should be planted by the waxing moon. Plants like root crops which grow downwards should be planted by the waning moon. Moon planting lore found by collector C.S. Wharton to be still current in Brailes in the 1970s #LegendaryWednesday

📷 by me. NB the fox isn’t Frances G’s actual pet from back in the day but she did walk her fox on a lead

Wandered along to the ‘Warwick Castle Unboxed’ exhibition at Market Hall Museum, Warwick, which features documents from the Greville family collection along with museum items. One countess of Warwick, Frances Greville (1861-1938), kept rather unusual pets 👇

New Exhibition 📷 Warwick Castle Unboxed: New Stories from an Old Castle opens Friday 20th March at Market Hall Museum! 📷 Step inside and discover the untold stories of the people who lived and worked at the iconic Warwick Castle.

Disembodied footsteps, a phantom black dog with a serious attitude problem, and the Dun Cow in the courtyard. My post for the Our Warwickshire blog on the folklore of Warwick Castle - all to be found at the end of a ley line.👇 ourwarwickshire.org.uk/content/articl…

@2112Westy Hadn't heard this before. The hounds that run with the Wild Hunt spring to mind but I think that's just a northern European thing (I may be wrong on that tho)🤔

#mythologymonday In the forests of ancient Greece, Artemis did not walk alone. Her hounds moved with her ~ silent, tireless, eyes bright in the dark ~ creatures of the hunt as much as the goddess herself. They were not pets, nor companions in the mortal sense, but part of her domain: the wild made flesh. To hear them before you saw her was already too late.

The squirrel is often seen as a harbinger of winter and used in winter solstice celebrations as a symbol of resilience. Some cultures equate the squirrel’s arrival with the return of longer days and the promise of spring. #FolkloreSunday

@TheRena44620640 Thanks John 🙂 And thanks for giving me the opportunity to write for The Renaissance Garden Guy.

@WarksFolklore It is an honor to publish your article in The RGG, Hilary. Thank you so much for this remarkable, fascinating piece. (Also, I just sent you a DM. Perhaps you can have a look if you get a moment.) Thank you again, Hilary - it's an honor and pleasure to publish your excellent work!

My post for the RGG blog on the ways people protected themselves against bewitchment in Warwickshire 👇

Shrewsbury Morris Dancers hard at work practising for our first dance out of the year at Jenny Pipe’s Day of Dance in Leominster on Saturday 28th March.