Saint Agatha, detail from a painting of Francisco de Zurbarán – she is carrying her severed breasts
She is a Sicilian Saint, who refused to sleep with a powerful Roman in the third Century AD, and was imprisoned, tortured, had her breasts pincered off, still refused to sleep with him and died in prison. She is remembered by cakes shaped as breasts eaten on her feast day of February 5th (I kid you not).
She was martyred in the last year of reign of Emperor Decius (c. 201 AD – June 251 AD) and is thus an early martyr whose cult was established in antiquity, although details of her life and death are, as usual, much later traditions.
Minne di Sant’Agata, Sicilian (Wikipedia)
‘She is also the patron saint of rape victims, breast cancer patients, martyrs, wet nurses, bell-founders, and bakers, and is invoked against fire, earthquakes, and eruptions of Mount Etna.’
(Wikipedia).
St Agatha’s Church, Kingston on Thames
It is suggested that illustrations of her severed breasts led the bell founders and bakers to mistakenly adopt her as patron saint as they thought the platter shown in illustrations of the Saint held bells or loaves not breasts! If you seach Google images, you will find most look clearly like breasts, but I guess you could mistake one or two for cakes, but I’ve never seen a bell that shape.
Results of a search for images of St Agatha in Google
Murder of Becket at Canterbury Cathedral on 29th December 1170 (Late 12th Century Manuscript from British Museum
On the fifth day of Christmas my true love sent to me: 5 Golden Rings; 4 Calling Birds; 3 French Hens; 2 Turtle Doves and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
The fifth day of Christmas is dedicated to Thomas Becket, our most famous Archbishop’s of Canterbury. He was martyred at Canterbury on this day in 1170 and made a Saint in 1173 in double-quick time, in order that the Pope could rub Henry II’s nose in his complicity with the murder. Becket was a Londoner from a well-known London family, who became a friend of Henry II. Henry was having trouble with the freedoms and fees owed to the Catholic Church. So he thought it would be a good idea to make his friend Archbishop. But as soon as Becket became Archbishop he went rogue, became a very stubborn and adamant defender of the Pope’s privileges in Britain. Henry is said to have said, in anger, ‘Who will rid me of this troublesome priest?’ And three knights took him at his word, and Becket was murdered in the Cathedral in Canterbury.
Next year I will add the story of Becket’s lousy habit.
Soon, a new magnificent bridge was built to replace the wooden London Bridge and in the centre of that Bridge was a grand Chapel dedicated to St Thomas Becket. It was refurbished by the renowned architect Henry Yevele (c. 1320 – 1400). It was here that pilgrims began their pilgrimage to Canterbury, i.e. from where he was born, to where he was martryed.
Stained Glass window showing St Thomas’s Chapel on London Bridge (Window is in St Magnus the Martyr’s Church on the site of the approach to London Bridge
In London, there was a legend that his mother, Matilda, was a Muslim who fell in love with Thomas’s dad, Gilbert, during the Crusades. She helped him escape captivity and then found her own way from Acre to London, knowing only the name ‘London’ in English and walking most of the way. It is said that on St Thomas Day, people used to walk around St Paul’s multiple times to remember her walk of love. The story was told as true from the 13th Century until the 19th Century found Matilda had more prosaic Norman origins. The story is told here:
Medieval St Thomas’s Pilgrim’s Badge showing the murder of Becket. The ampullae contained holy water.
Wassailing.
Bringing in the Wassail Bowl (from Washington Irving’s ‘Old Christmas’)
The Twelve Days of Christmas are full of wassailing. This has at least two different facets. Firstly, it is a formal drinking tradition at the centre of Christmas hospitality. Secondly, it is part of the tradition of the Waits, the Mummers, and Carol Singers who go around the village singing or playing in exchange for a drink or some food, or money.
The name comes from the Anglo-Saxon version of ‘Cheers’ or good health, and its ceremonial use is described by Geoffrey of Monmouth in 1135.
‘From that day to this, the tradition has endured in Britain that the one who drinks first at a banquet says “was hail” and he who drinks next says “drinc hail.”‘
Geoffrey is explaining how Vortigern betrayed Britain for the love of Rowena, the Saxon Hengist’s daughter, and speculating on the origins of the tradition of wassail.
A Wassail bowl would be full of some form of mulled alcohol or hot punch. A couple of pints of ale or cider, a pint of wine/brandy/mead, sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg. You should have an apple or crab-apple floating in the bowl. To find out more, look at ‘British Food, a History’ here.
First Published on 29th December 2022, republished in December 2023
Saint Lucy, by Francesco del Cossa (c. 1430 – c. 1477) (Wikipedia User:Postdlf)
The name Lucy is from the same Latin origin (Lucidus) as lucent, lux, and lucid. It means to be bright, or to shine. It is similar to the Ancient Greek λευκός (leukós, “white, blank, light, bright, clear”. Luke has the same origins (bright one, bringer of light and light of the sacred flame) and is very appropriate for the most literate of the evangelists. At this time of the year, we are in need of a festival with bright lights to cheer us up!
And St Lucy’s Day is the beginning of the winter festival that culminates with the Solstice, where the old sun dies, and the new one is born. December the 13th was the Solstice until Pope Gregory reformed the Calendar in the 16th Century, as nine days were lopped off the year of transition.
The festival of Sankta Lucia is particularly popular in Sweden, where Dec 13th is thought to be the darkest night. Every year, the Swedish community in the UK has a service to Lucia in St Pauls. I have several times tried to get tickets, but so far, have failed miserably. But if you look lower down, you will see a link to the beautiful procession and service at St Pauls.
I found out about Sankta Lucia from a Swedish choir who hired me to do a tour of the City of London some years ago. I took them into Christopher Wren’s marvellous St Stephen’s Church and, under the magnificent Dome, they fancied the acoustics and spontaneously sang. I recorded a snatch of it.
Swedish Choir singing in St Stephen’s London
Sankta Lucia at St Paul’s Cathedral (2011)
Recent medical research has shown the importance of light, not only to our mental health but to our sleep health, and recommends that work places need to have a decent light level with ‘blue light’ as a component of the lighting. It is also an excellent idea to help your circadian rhymes by going for a morning walk, or morning sun bathing, even on cloudy days.
St Lucy is from Syracuse in Sicily, said to be a victim of the Diocletian Persecution of Christians in the early 4th Century. She is an authentic early martyr, although details of her story cannot be relied upon as true. She was said to be a virgin, who was denounced as a Christian by her rejected suitor, miraculously saved from serving in a brothel, then, destruction by fire, but did not escape having her eyes gouged out. Finally, her throat was cut with a sword. Her connection to light (and the eye gouging) makes her the protectress against eye disease, and she is often shown holding two eyes in a dish.
St. Aldhelm (English, died in 709) puts St Lucy in the list of the main venerated saints of the early English Church, confirmed by the Venerable Bede (English, died in 735). Her festival was an important one in England ‘as a holy day of the second rank in which no work but tillage or the like was allowed’.[1]
Roman Hoodie ~Part two – the Sequani
Roman tombstone to Philus from Cirencester.
Yesterday I made a long digression which began with a discussion of Roman Winter clothing. Our picture of the hoodie from a tombstone in Cirencester, said it was of
Philus, son of Cassavus, a Sequanian, aged 45, lies buried here.
One of our readers from France alerted me to the Wikipedia page on the Sequani which explains that the name comes from the Goddess Sequana who is a water goddess. The centre of the territory is Besançon which is on the Doubs River part of the Haute Saône Doubs and near to the springs that are the source of the Seine (west of Dijon). Here, the Fontes Sequanae (“The Springs of Sequana”) gave her name to the River Seine, and a healing spring was established in the 2nd/1st BC. Enlarged by the Romans, it became a significant health centre. as Wikipedia explains in the clip below:
Image of Sequana in a duck boat by Wikipedia FULBERT • CC BY-SA 4.0
‘Many dedications were made to Sequana at her temple, including a large pot inscribed with her name and filled with bronze and silver models of parts of human bodies to be cured by her. Wooden and stone images of limbs, internal organs, heads, and complete bodies were offered to her in the hope of a cure, as well as numerous coins and items of jewellery. Respiratory illnesses and eye diseases were common. Pilgrims were frequently depicted as carrying offerings to the goddess, including money, fruit, or a favourite pet dog or bird.’
