We cover here the range of material that comes under folklore and cultural tradition, including legends, customs, folk magic and others
One of the harbingers of spring in the north country was Spaw Sunday. John Billingsley reports on a recent revival The blessing in 2010 (Roy Collinge) About 100 people turned up at Cragg Spa, in Cragg Vale, W Yorkshire, on Spaw Sunday (1st Sunday in May – in 2010 falling on …
Traditional healing takes many forms and can be found in unlikely places… John Billingsley came across some curious Japanese traditions in an Orkney showcase. On a trip to Orkney, I came across a page of a diary written by J J H Scharbau,1 a doctor visiting Japan in 1874 and evidently diligently collecting traditional cures …
The last column addressed the commodification of history as Spectacle; well, that’s modern tourism for you, and I’m not innocent of it. But the Society of the Spectacle is also at work in much humbler surroundings. In our last issue, a reader wrote in to lament ” Time was when it was possible to visit …
#5: Spectacle, consumer capitalism and New Age religiosity Read More »
In 2010, Northern Earth invited readers to send in place-names and lore associated with saints – but not the bona fide type of saint. What we were looking for was spurious saints… here are some of the dubious divines we received.
‘Old Blighty’ has rarely lived up to its nickname as persistently as it has in the last few years. John Billingsley looks at some old techniques used by farmers to keep their animals sickness-free. It’s been a grim spring all round for lovers of rural environments, and especially for British farmers. The spectre of …
Medical Care, Magical Cure: Traditional strategies for a healthy livestock Read More »
Folk cures for humans as well as beasts involved the medical, the magical and sometimes the simply mystifying. Peter Watson reveals some of the techniques in traditional and historical medical practice The library of Chetham’s school in Manchester contains a remarkable if largely forgotten herbal, beautifully written and illuminated in a hand of the …
David Bower relates a case of a concealed ‘witch bottle’ in West Yorkshire I read with interest John Billingsley’s article about witch bottles [1]. It reminded me of a discovery I came across when researching for a book on local Quaker history [2]. A lead plaque was discovered during the late 1980s, concealed in …
Readers may recollect NE’s debate about the ‘blackface’ tradition in British folk performance. NE in general supports established or revival traditions that can be understood as maintaining an element either of disguise necessary in a historical social context, or liminality. Sometimes, however, customs arise where people see things as ‘fun’ and do not realise the …
Mumming plays, like so much of British folklore, have been subject to questionable assumptions as to their age and meaning, but today research has shed a clearer light on their origins and functions, as Eddie Cass describes. Easter! Once again, hundreds of people from miles around – and further – will come into Hebden …
Michael Haslam muses on the Easter mumming play, to make an important observation concerning its age It’s done because it’s done This much, I believe, is agreed: Pace-Egg, a variant of the St. George Play, is a Folk Play and a Calendar Custom. It was once widely distributed across Britain. Two of its most …