SOME FOREIGN CURIOSITIES - France 1

 

On my travels abroad I have managed to accumulate a variety of interesting curiosities
which are outlined as follows : 

 

Breton legends

 

 

 

St Thegonnec

 

Few regions of France are as pious as Brittany and thousands of saints are venerated in the churches and parish closes.  Many of them are undoubtedly apocryphal but there is a strong legend that St Thegonnec tamed a wolf after it had eaten his donkey and used it to draw his cart.   This is depicted on the very fine calvary at St Thegonnec.

 

 

 

 

Meanwhile at nearby Guimiliau the elaborate carvings on the church calvary include the horrific scenes of a young girl being torn apart by demons.  Catell Gollet loved dancing and other supposedly sinful activities.  She took a handsome lover and discovered all too late that he was the devil in disguise.  Her final damnation was to steal consecrated wafers for her lover. Her dreadful punishment is publicized on the calvary as a warning to all 'bad girls’.

 

 

Ankou is the Breton incarnation of death.  This skeletal figure of the ‘grim reaper’ is depicted throughout the region.  He drives a creaking cart piled high with bodies, he spares nobody.  On the side of the 17^th century ossuary at La Roche-Maurice  Ankou is depicticted above a holy water stoup. The inscription reads ‘I’ll kill you all’.  Of course, Ankou spares nobody.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Salaun

 

 

 

 

 

There is a very strong legend at le Folgoet where the village and its church are a place of pilgrimage.  The name Folgoet or Fool’s Wood, recalls the miraculous legend of Salaun who, in the 14^th century, lived in a wood near a spring on which the church now stands.   The boy was a poor half-wit and could only speak a few words – the Breton for ‘Hail, Lady Virgin Mary’, which he constantly repeated to himself.  When he died in 1358, a white lily grew on his grave bearing the words ‘Ave Maria’ in gold letters.   Duke Jean 1V built a chapel over Salaun’s spring, which subsequently grew into the fine basilica we see today.   Salaun’s holy well situated on the east side of the church, springs from under the altar.

 

 

 

The Holy Well

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yves Helori

 

 

Yves Helori (1253-1303) now venerated as St Ives and buried in Treguir cathedral was indeed a real person.  He was a lawyer and is the patron saint of lawyers.  He was a champion of the poor and as a magistrate Yves was famously incorruptible.  The image of him standing between a well-dressed man and a man in rags recalls a story when a rich man sued a beggar for loitering by his kitchen door and ‘stealing’ his cooking smells.   On this occasion, Ives declared for the rich man and awarded him appropriate damages – the sound of a coin rattling in a tin.

 

 

 

 St Yves

 

 

 

A shrine to St Guirec

 

The Bay of St Guirec is situated on Brittany’s ‘Pink Granite Coast' near to Ploumanach.   A little stone shrine on the beach is dedicated to St Guirec who landed there on the sixth century.   There is a granite statue of St Guirec inside the shrine.  Originally the statue was of wood, but it suffered greatly because of the old tradition by which girls wanting to find a husband, stuck a pin into its nose, and it had to be replaced.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

St Cado

 

The tiny village of St Cado is on a circular islet on the Etel estuary on Brittany’s Atlantic coast, an idyllic place connected to the mainland by a substantial stone bridge.

 

 

 

The Romanesque church is dedicated to the island’s patron saint, St Cado.  This Celtic monk is said to have been able to cure deafness in all who placed their ears against his stone bed which is to be found inside the church.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Legend has it that St Cado persuaded the Devil to build the bridge to link the island to the mainland in return for the first soul to travel across.  It is said that St Cado sent a cat across the bridge before anyone used it.

 

 

St Cado

 

 

 

 

 

 

The chapel of St Barbe

 

The tiny white 17^th century chapel of St Barbe stands on a small hump of cliff at the eastern end of the harbour at Roscoff on the north coast of Brittany.  Apparently St Barbe was entrusted with the task of protecting Roscoff from Pirates and enemies of the church.  A nearby plaque tells us that it is still used as a landmark for sailors and was built as a expression of devotion to beg St Barbe for protection against the dangers of the coast. 

 

 

 

 

Roscoff is the port where ‘Onion Johnnies’ left for England with their bikes and bunches of onions to sell.  We are told that the ‘Johnnies’ never failed to salute the saint by hoisting their flag three times.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our Lady in the Marshes

 

A unique statue is to be found in the church of St Sulpice at Fougères in Normandy.

In the 11^th century the Chapel of St Mary was built within the castle walls at Fougères but the castle was destroyed in the 12^th century.  In the 13^th century the Lusignan family rebuilt the mighty castle and at the same time, the nearby parish of St Sulpice decided to extend their church.  Whilst digging the foundations, the people found a statue which they called Our Lady in the Marshes in reference to the marshy area.

Thirty inches high, the statue is made of Caen stone with the Virgin Mary in a sitting position holding the baby Jesus, who is suckling his mother’s breast.    Throughout the centuries devotion to this statue has not weakened and in 1923 Pope Pius X1 honoured the Virgin of the Marshes with a solemn coronation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Little Flower of Jesus

 

Building of the huge hilltop basilica at Lisieux, visited by some 100,000 pilgrims each year, commenced as late as 1926, a year after the canonisation of its patron St Thérèse of the Child Jesus, and was completed in 1954 as her shrine.

 

 

 

Known as ‘The Little Flower of Jesus’, Marie-Francoise-Thérèse Martin, the youngest of nine children, was born in 1873 into a very pious family.  She was a frail child  and at the age of nine she nearly died, but a vision of Our Lady smiling at her, effected an immediate and complete cure.   At the age of 13 years, Thérèse  and her father began a campaign for her to enter a convent before the normal age of 16 years and she was subsequently admitted to the Carmel convent as Thérèse de l’enfant Jesus in 1888 when she was fifteen.  She was ordered by the Mother Superior to try her hand at writing which resulted in her autobiography, ‘The story of a Soul’, the most famous passage being fusion with Jesus in the form of a wedding invitation.   Racked by consumption, the ‘little flower’ died in 1898, at the age of just twenty five.  Following her canonisation she was made a doctor of the Church in 1997

 

 

 



 
The Black Madonna

The annual Pardon at Guincamp in Brittany brings pilgrims to pay homage to the much venerated Black Madonna in the Basilica of Notre Dame de Bon Secours. There are several such icons in France of medieval origin but the exact origin is not easy to determine.

 

 

 

 

 

Another wooden Black Madonna can be seen at Rocamadour, an amazing village in The Dordogne.
The village is named after St Amator and the icon in the pilgrimage church of Notre Dame high in the rock above the village is said to have been carved by the Saint himself.

 

 

SOME PUBS WITH A STORY TO TELL - Wales.

 

 

 

The Randolph Turpin

 

 

The Randolph Turpin (Randy's Bar) is part of the Summit Complex, a former hotel at the top of The Great Orme at Llandudno. Randolph Turpin was a world boxing champion. He was born at Leamington Spa in 1928, the son of a man from Guyana who died when the boy was just 9 years old. Randy, as he was known, had to battle with colour prejudice and became a skilled boxer. He eventually notched up British and European middleweight titles but his moment of glory came when he defeated the renowned American world champion, Sugar Ray Robinson, to become world middleweight champion in 1951. Sadly he lost a re-match a few months later. Known as The Leamington Licker, he later became British and Commonwealth light-heavyweight champion. When he retired he became licensee of this pub but he seemed to be unable to cope with obscurity and missed the trappings of fame. He became bankrupt and in 1966 he committed suicide. He was just 37 years old. The bar is now completely renovated and themed on the boxer. Filled with pictures,posters and other boxing artifacts,and a large wooden statue of the man himself.

 

 

 

The Tanronnen Inn

 

The sign on the village inn at Beddgelert in North Wales reminds us how the village got its name.

Llewelyn was Prince of North Wales back in the 13^th century and he had a palace in a lovely valley not far from Caernarfon.  Legend has it that one day the Prince went hunting leaving his faithful dog, Gelert, to guard his baby son.   When he returned the dog, covered in blood, sprang to meet his master.   The Prince was alarmed and when he found his son’s cot empty with bloodstains everywhere he assumed that the dog had savaged the child.  He promptly killed the dog with his sword.  He then heard a child crying and found the boy unharmed but nearby lay the body of a mighty wolf which Gelert had slain.   The Prince buried the dog nearby and the village, near to the stone which marks the grave, is called Beddgelert.

 Gelert's grave

 

 

 

 

The Harp Hotel

 

The estate village of Llanwrog on the Lleyn Peninsular in North Wales has a very fine stone built pub with two octagonal towers and a nice porch over the entrance.  On an old slate tablet attached to one of the towers an inscription reads :

On level land, the finest inn,

with plenty of food and beer within,

 and every hour of the day

the song birds, to make one gay.

on holidays and Sundays too

beware of drunkenness, be true.

enjoy your life, but don’t betray

the good old beer, come what may.

 

 

 

 

The Royal Oak

 

 

Above the doorway of the Royal Oak pub in the centre of Fishguard in Wales are the words   ‘Last invasion of Britain peace treaty was signed here here in 1797.’

 

It refers to the last landing of a foreign army on British soil which occurred during the Napoleonic Wars. In 1797 a force of 1,400 men was put ashore at nearby Carregwastad Point with ambitious orders to march north through Wales to take and burn the port of Liverpool. Half soldiers, half released  jail prisoners were under the command of an Irish-American named Colonel Tate. They were immediately attacked by a mixed force of yeomanry and villagers including women, and in two days their surrender was accepted. The French invasion force was lined up on Goodwin Sands and Colonel Tate signed a surrender document in the presence of British commander Earl Cawdor at the Royal Oak. The table on which this took place can be still seen inside the pub.

 

 

 

 

St Govan’s Inn

 

 

St Govan’s Inn at Bosherton on the Pembrokeshire coast of south Wales reminds us about the legends surrounding St Govan. A short distance from Bosherton there is a small crevice in the cliffs wherein there is the tiny chapel of St Govan which can be reached down a steep flight of 52 steps. It is said that the steps never count the same going up as going down. According to legend,  in the 6^th century hermit St Govan was being chased by pirates when the fissure miraculously opened up to hide him and closed over him until the pirates has gone. St Govan decided to build a cell at the spot and remained there for the rest of his life preaching and teaching Christianity to the local people. Outside the chapel is the Bell Rock and legend has it that a silver bell in the chapel bell tower was stolen by pirates and when St Govan prayed for its return, it was placed inside the rock by angels for safe keeping. St Govan used to tap the rock to produce a sound a thousand times stronger than the original bell. There was also a well near the chapel said to be a healing well.

St Govan's Chapel

© Copyright Pete Wise and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence

To whom I am grateful for the use of his Geograph photograph

 

St Govan is said to have been buried under the chapel altar when he died in 586. 

 

 




 

 

SOME PUBS WITH A STORY TO TELL - South & West 2

 

 

The  Grosvenor Arms Hotel

 

 

In the 18^th century  Grosvenor Arms Hotel  at Shaftesbury in Dorset is one of the finest pieces of carved furniture to be seen anywhere.  It is an enormous  Victorian  sideboard,  carved from a single block of oak in the 1860’s by Gerrard Robinson.  This fine piece depicts the events immortalised in ‘The Ballad of Chevy Chase,’ an ancient border song dealing with the rivalry between the English Earl Percy of Northumberland and the Scottish Earl Douglas.

 

 

 

 

 

The  Smith’s  Arms

 

 

There is not much room in  The  Smith’s  Arms  at Godmanstone in Dorset, in fact the outside dimensions of the building are just 39’ 6” by 11’6”, and  warranting a place in the Guinness Book of Records, it is a claimant for the smallest pub in England title.

It was a blacksmith’s shop back in the 17^th century when Charles 11 called in to have his horse shod.  Apparently the King asked for ale and when the blacksmith told him that he had no licence for ale, the King granted him one on the spot and it has been a pub ever since.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The  Smoking  Dog  Inn

 

 

The inn sign at  The  Smoking  Dog  Inn  at Malmesbury in Wiltshire depicts a dog smoking a pipe!   So what is it all about?  Little seems to be known about the strange name of his pub but apparently the inn was so named after the owners of the building found a picture of the smoking dog in the cellar.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cannard’s  Grave  Inn

 

Situated on the A37 some two miles south of Shepton Mallet in Somerset, the curiously named  Cannard’s Grave Inn,  displays a sign depicting a man hanging from a gibbet.   A simple story surrounding this is that the 18^th century landlord of a previous inn on the site, Giles Cannard, was hanged for sheep stealing and buried in front of the inn.   However, there is another story that Cannard in fact hanged himself.  Either way, Cannard was undoubtedly a rogue who was involved in a variety of illegal activities, and his pub was frequented by rogues and vagabonds.   It seems to be a well known fact that several travellers who spent the night at Cannard’s pub failed to reach their destinations, whilst other guests were often persuaded to part with their possessions.  In the end it seems that Cannard became closely involved with a plan to defraud the town of its common land and when the news leaked out the furious townsfolk marched to his pub and, one way or another, Giles Cannard ended up having his neck stretched.
This pub has been refurbished and has changed its name to Cannard's Well. It is now  a modern, welcoming pub.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The  Pack  of  Cards  Inn

 

The curious architecture of a striking white building at Combe Martin in North Devon results from the whim of  a 17^th century landowner, Squire George Ley, who apparently had a handsome win at cards.  He built this  pub with his winnings,  to resemble  a pack of cards,   and in keeping with the theme,  this unusual building has 4 floor,  13 doors  and 52 windows.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The  Ship  Inn

 

A culinary delight in Cornwall is  Starry Gazy  Pie  -  a fish pie, which legend has it once saved the inhabitants of the tiny fishing village of  Mousehole from starvation.  Apparently the villager’s were almost on the breadline due to bad weather and local fisherman, Tom Bawcock,  bravely went to sea in a huge storm to return with seven different types of fish, which were all baked together in a huge pie to feed the starving locals.

They still celebrate ‘Tom Bawcock’s Eve’ every year on 23^rd December at  The Ship Inn at Mousehole.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The  Admiral  Benbow  Inn

 

As you walk down Chapel Street in Penzance in Cornwall, you will be surprised to see the figure of a smuggler on the roof of  The  Admiral  Benbow  Inn.   This fine model draws attention to a fine old nautical inn with its very interesting unspoilt interior, taking us back to a former time.

 

 

 

 

 

The  Logan  Rock  Inn

 

 

 

The inn sign at  The  Logan  Rock  Inn  at Treen near Penzance in Cornwall depicts a huge ‘rocking stone’ which is situated on the cliff top nearby.   The Logan Rock derives from the Cornish word ‘log’ = to move.

The story goes that back in 1824, an army officer, Lt Goldsmith and some of his friends, pushed this curious rock off the cliff, and such was the local outcry that the Lt. had to restore the rock to its original position on the cliff top at his own expense.  It was no mean feat considering that the rock weighed some 65 tons and apparently cost £100 to achieve, a huge amount in those days.

The rock is now in the care of The National Trust.

The Logan Rock at Treryn Dinas





Although logan stones (naturally occurring stones that can be 'rocked' by human effort alone) are found on many granite and limestone tors, this one is sufficiently famous to be named on British road atlases! This 80 ton rock was already a tourist attraction in the early 18th century, but achieved notoriety in 1824 when it was dislodged by a naval lieutenant called Goldsmith and his band of men. After a public outcry he was forced to replace it at his own expense, a task which took at least 60 men almost seven months to complete. The process of restoring the stone to its lofty perch has left various holes and slots cut into the surrounding granite, and they still didn't get it quite right as it is very difficult to rock now.

  © Copyright Jim Champion and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

I am grateful to Jim Champion for the use of his photographs and text.

 

The Hole in the Wall

This pub in Crockwell Street in the centre of Bodmin in Cornwall was originally a debtor’s prison (1749-1779). Families of the inmates would pass food through a hole in the wall which gives the pub its name. This unusual pub is situated in  the old courtyard and is full of memorabilia including a stuffed lion.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The First and Last Inn

Just 1 mile from Lands End this pub in the little village of Sennen dates back to 1620 and was once the haunt of smugglers and wreckers around Sennen Cove. The northern side of the pub sign declares it to be the Last Inn, whilst the southern side declares it to be the First Inn.

Secret tunnels and passages were dug around the pub and a glass covered well inside the pub is known as Annie’s Well is thought to have been one of these.
Joseph and Annie George ran the inn in the 1800’s and Annie made many enemies in the village when she gave evidence against some of the smugglers. To punish her the villagers staked her out on the beach at low tide and she was drowned. Her body was laid out in her bedroom at the pub which is said to be haunted by her spirit.