Pub Crawl

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Re: Pub Crawl

Postby hvered » 10:31 am

Distributing dole is one of a mayor's duties, now seen more as a quaint custom. In Penistone, Yorkshire, the dole given by the mayor doesn't consist of pennies as the name would suggest but of flour, given to children rather than 'the poor'. It's distributed not in church but on the steps of the town hall, the market-place.

Penistone is a market town with a bridge over the River Don, on the modern Trans-Pennine Way. As a Countryfile programme discovered, bridges are a huge expense and only worth maintaining for well-used routes. Towns with mayors are the ones on major droving/trade routes, and the accompanying customs of giving out pennies/sweets/bread or, more commonly, collecting pennies are embedded in the old network of tolls.
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Re: Pub Crawl

Postby hvered » 10:11 am

Mickle or muckle is said to mean 'great' as in big, hence much in English. The large tidal ranges we've noted often seem to be associated with Michael places and/or chapels as at Mont St Michel, St Michael's Mount, l'Ile de Brehat off the north coast of Brittany with a St Michael chapel on a mound or hill.

These places were important, perhaps as navigational aids or in their own right, but what the advantage is of a large tidal range is still not clear, to me anyway.
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Re: Pub Crawl

Postby Boreades » 10:48 pm

I know I'm making a TME mistake of using common sense, but shoot me down anyway...

Anywhere with a large tidal range means you can get a boat much further inland on the tide (as compared with rivers with small tidal ranges). For folks that travel mainly by sea, it makes trading logistics easier. The only drawback is that if you go as far as you can up a river on a spring tide, you might get stuck and have to wait two weeks or so for the next spring tides to lift you free.
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Re: Pub Crawl

Postby Boreades » 10:08 pm

Here's another chance for the TME Rapid Intervention Squad.
Plus, there are very nice pubs nearby.

Your chance to make a White Horse in Wessex.
This is no ordinary White Horse, this is the Uffington White Horse.
On the Michael Line?
Also on the Spine of England Line?

Just watch out for the National Trust's Dragon Ladies who patrol their car park.

See: https://heritageaction.wordpress.com/20 ... -monument/
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Re: Pub Crawl

Postby hvered » 6:48 pm

Is the white horse a horse? All those cleanings/scourings, over the millennia...the outline may have been faithfully maintained. Or not.
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Re: Pub Crawl

Postby Boreades » 9:22 pm

Hattie is, once again, right on the ball.

The Uffington White Horse is the least horse-like of all the White Horses in Wiltshire. Its special place near Dragon Hill ought to give a clue. Or at least, raise our suspicions.

Image

Dragon Hill

Not forgetting the Manger, which is such a strangely shaped valley, it raises the hairs on the back of my neck each time I drive past.

Image

http://www.mysteriousbritain.co.uk/engl ... -hill.html

Some say that: "In the ancient Celtic world the constellation of Pegasus (coupled to Andromeda on its back) represented the goddess Epona riding her white horse and is probably symbolized in the British landscape by the great chalk figure of the white horse at Uffington."

http://www.lablit.com/article/341

Others say the Uffington White Horse is really Taurus.
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Re: Pub Crawl

Postby Boreades » 9:24 pm

Has Visit Wiltshire (the local tourist misinformation service) jumped on the TME Pub Crawl bandwagon?

They've just "partnered" (grrr, I do loath that word) with the Churches Conservation Trust and invented the "Saints and Sinners Trail".

http://www.visitwiltshire.co.uk/media/m ... ners-trail

The four churches are All Saints’ in Alton Priors, St Leonard’s in Sutton Veny, St Mary’s in Old Dilton and St John the Baptist in Inglesham. With The Red Lion Freehouse in Pewsey, The Beckford Arms in Fonthill Gifford, The Three Daggers in Edington and Stanton House Hotel in Stanton Fitzwarren.

The All Saints’ in Alton Priors is significant to us.

The presence in the floor of the church of trapdoors giving access to Sarsen stones, and the presence of the 1,700 year old Yew tree in the churchyard, suggest it was a sacred site long before the church was built. There is also an unusual brass plaque to local landowner William Button, with a complex inscription. It has been speculated that the message on the plaque, and Sarsen stones may be connected with the nearby Milk Hill.

Milk Hill has featured in our other discussions on routes and alignments.
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Re: Pub Crawl

Postby hvered » 8:12 am

Alton Barnes and Alton Priors are it would seem paired, like gate-posts at strategic points on the road, whether going north-south or east-west.

Image

The road allows a shortcut across the Wansdyke. Otherwise, presumably, you and your wares/animals would have to take quite a long detour to reach, say, Avebury.
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Re: Pub Crawl

Postby Boreades » 1:40 pm

Re that "unusual brass plaque to local landowner William Button, with a complex inscription".

Here on Prosenet ( https://www.prosebox.net/entry/17192/en ... on-priors/ ) somebody has kindly published a picture of the plaque.

It's all a bit grainy, which makes it difficult to see the finer detail. But it does appear to be rather unusual, and not at all the normal kind of Christian symbology. Sun, moon, planets and stars? A Templar Cross? A phoenix wing? What else can you see? Something about "the gate" and "shall enter in at it"? Top centre there's some kind of face but indistinct.

If I'm reading the bottom of the plaque correctly(?) his daughter Dorothy married a John Drake from Devon. Didn't we once talk about other Drake family connections to Wiltshire? (Draco/Dragon etc)

Intriging, and well worth a trip to get better pictures.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Drak ... ed_1628%29

The Button family is still in the Wilts & Somerset area. F1 driver Jenson Button being one notable descendant.

Image
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Re: Pub Crawl

Postby TisILeclerc » 5:38 pm

The inscription seems to be fairly straightforward apart from the top line which is a bit indistinct. This is what I made of it. The squiggles at the top of words represent missing letters such as 'm' and 'n', Y is Th as usual and the V is a U.

So:

But one through taking room for three ( not sure if that is accurate but it is followed by the three virtues)

Religion, wisdom, hospitality

but since Heaven's Gate to enter is straight

His flesh's burden here he left to wait

Till the last trump blows open the wide gate

To give it entrance to the soul, its mate.

In other words his body is here and body and soul will be reunited at the blowing of the last trumpet. Fairly orthodox religious belief I would assume.

What is also interesting is the reference in the inscription below to Mount Drake in the County of Devon.

Is there a Mount Drake there?
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