The Modern Antiquarian. Stone Circles, Ancient Sites, Neolithic Monuments, Ancient Monuments, Prehistoric Sites, Megalithic MysteriesThe Modern Antiquarian

Tinkinswood

Burial Chamber

Folklore

..at St. Nicholas, near Cardiff, a man told me that his mother took him to 'Castle Corrig' (a cromlech near St. Nicholas, perhaps the biggest existing in Britain), when he 'had a decline' as a boy, and she spat upon the stone, rubbed her finger in the spittle and rubbed him on the forehead and chest.

... I feel convinced there is a good deal of this sort of thing, but I cannot get it out, or else it exists among a residuum which feels such a gap to exist between student and peasant that freedom of speech becomes impossible. But I have felt the sort of thing to underlie many ordinary stories, from certain turns of expression.
From 'A Fisher-Story and Other Notes from South Wales' by E. Sidney Hartland and T. H. Thomas, in Folklore, Vol. 16, No. 3. (Sep. 29, 1905), p339.

Perhaps he could have got more out of his informants if he didn't use words like 'residuum' on them. It's a shame though.
Rhiannon Posted by Rhiannon
25th September 2006ce
Edited 27th April 2007ce

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