All Haunting Impressions Blogs

Garway is a village to the south west of Hereford, near the Welsh border. On the outskirts to the west is a church dedicated to St Michael. The church was established in the 7th century and in the 12th century Garway was gifted to the Knights Templar. It is still possible to see the foundations of the circular nave of their church which was uncovered in the 1920’s. Some parts of the 12th century church remain, including a stunning chancel arch with foliate head.

It attracts a variety of visitors, particularly perhaps because of its Templar associations.

M.R. James was there in 1917 and seems to have had a peculiar experience:
“We must have offended something or somebody at Garway I think: probably we took it too much for granted, in speaking of it, that we should be able to do exactly as we pleased. Next time we shall know better. There is no doubt it is a very rum place and needs careful handling.”
(Gwendolen McBryde, Letters to a Friend, MRJ’s letter of September 30, 1917).

On the 21st April this year (700th anniversary of the disbandment), I took my in-laws for a birthday lunch in The Moon pub and then went on the the church. This must have been my 7th visit at least, and in spite of that I took out my phone to take a few snaps on its camera (particularly of features I hadn’t noticed or photographed before). Amongst these was the exterior view of the east end south chancel window, the corbels of which include a carving of a head as in death.

I have never in all my time there ever felt it to be unpleasant or strange although perhaps I am too familiar. I forgot about the images on my phone until I downloaded them very late one night. What I found there gave me pause and sent me to my bed with a very disturbed feeling. I am sure it is only caused by the distortion in the glass but it wasn’t something I wanted to discover at a lonely midnight hour! I am sure it will inspire many future pictures for me.

East window with scary form in centre

See a close up below:

Close up image of the Ghoul

Throughout the year certain dates in the calendar have associations, direct and indirect with the dead and the supernatural. I have collected some of them together here, from Europe and further afield. The following are associate with the Spring period from 21st March to 20th June.

24th April, - St Marks Eve was the night when one could stand in the church porch at midnight, and witness a ghostly procession of those who would die that coming year, entering the church. The practice was first recorded early in the 17th century until late in the 19th, but was discouraged by the authorities. A correspondent to Hone’s ‘Every-Day Book’ in 1827 wrote that those who were to die soon entered first, whilst those that would last most of the year would not enter until nearly one o’clock. Those who would be gravely ill but not die would approach the church and peep in, but not enter (Simpson & Roud [2000]). There are many tales of watchers who see themselves in the procession and die not long after. Occasionally this tradition is found associated with Midsummer Night or All Saints’ (Roud [2006]).

30th April - The eve of May Day has magical associations. In the British Isles, particularly in Ireland and Scotland, it was customary to light bonfires, usually to protect cattle from witchcraft (Hutton [1996]). The festival is also known as Walpurgisnacht in Germanic countries, and is named after the English missionary Saint Walpurga who was canonised on the 1st of May (her saints day is February 25th). In Estonia, Germany and Denmark the night is associated with gatherings of witches, and with driving out evil spirits with loud noises. In Lancashire and Yorkshire this was Mischief Night when young people traditionally played tricks on their local community. In other areas Mischief Night is November 4th (Roud [2006]).

Shakespeare’s ‘A Midsummer’s Nights Dream’ is set on May Eve (http://inamidst.com/lo/midsummer); although in Britain there are some associations with fairy folk, this is very rare (Roud [2006]). On the Eve of May the people of Kingstone and Thruxton put trays of moss outside the door at night for the fairies to dance upon (Leather [1912]).

Month of May - May has a tradition of being an ‘unlucky’ month; marriages in May ‘never prosper’ and are supposed to be unhappy. In 19th century Suffolk, Sussex and Wiltshire broom flowers should not be brought into the house, nor its twigs used to sweep the floor as this could mean a death in the household (Simpson & Roud [2000]). The May Tree, Hawthorn, is considered unlucky and its blooms should not be taken indoors although they play a part in external decorations. Bringing the plant inside might bring about illness and death although contradictory traditions also exist (Simpson & Roud [2000]). The Rowan tree was also considered a powerful defence against witchcraft and the Evil Eye and was placed above stable doors on May Day (Leather [1912]).

May 27th (2012), Pentecost/Whitsun - The 7th Sunday after Easter marks Pentecost or Whitsun, when the Holy Ghost descended to the remaining eleven disciples. In the medieval church the winter season had the strongest links with the dead and their manifestations; this time was thought to end around Pentecost. This is perhaps no accident as, according to tradition in the early church, the Sunday after Pentecost (the Octave) was a commemorative day for the ‘faithful dead’. This was before it was moved by Odilo, the Benedictine Abbot of Cluny to the 2nd November c.1030. The earlier association did not disappear; the monks at St Bénigne of Dijon prayed for the dead on the Monday of the Octave. On the Thursday, at the monastic community in Cluny, prayers were offered for those buried in the cemetery (Schmitt [1998]).
Many tales of apparitions focus on Pentecost. The monk Raoul Glaber (c.985-c.1047) reported that in the monastery of Reomagensse, a ‘sweet natured’ brother called Wulferius stayed behind after matins to pray in the church of St Maurice on the Sunday of the Octave of Pentecost. Suddenly the church was filled with figures in white robes and they began to celebrate the mass. Wulferius was told they were the blessed dead and that he too would depart from life soon (Joynes [2001]).

9th, 11th and 13th, Lemuria - In ancient Rome the festival of Lemuria (or Lemuralia) was celebrated in private households. The Roman poet Ovid, writing in the early years of the first century AD, claimed that the tradition was of great antiquity (Fasti, Book V). The Lemuria was an exorcism of troublesome ghosts and evils spirits, such as Larvae, Lemures and Manes (as opposed to the Lares and di Manes which were ‘good’ spirits). Those who had not been afforded a proper burial, such as murder victims or those that died on military campaigns, and the wicked, would return in this form and trouble the living because they had not received the appropriate rites and would not be remembered without a proper grave. They were thought of as ‘hungry’ ghosts and the ritual provided them with food and offerings. The Lemuria spanned 3 alternate nights in May, on the 9th, 11th and 13th, the last being the Ides of May (full moon). There are conflicting accounts around the duration of the festival but there is agreement that it only falls on odd numbered days. (Collison-Morley [1912]; Wikipedia [2012])

At night, the head of the family would walk barefooted, make a special sign with his hand for protection, wash his hands for purification and repeat special incantations nine times. He did this whilst throwing black beans behind him, a food associated with the dead (Paton [1921]). The spirit would follow and collect the beans, but the householder was careful not to look back. Another incantation is repeated nine times and finally a bronze instrument or pans are clashed together, to drive the spirits away. Once the ritual was finished, it was safe to look behind. By offering this food directly (possibly from his own mouth) the ghosts would feel they had received their due and leave the family in peace for another year.

Ovid, Book V: The Lemuria
When Hesperus, the Evening Star, has shown his lovely face
Three times, from that day, and the defeated stars fled Phoebus,
It will be the ancient sacred rites of the Lemuria,
When we make offerings to the voiceless spirits.
The year was once shorter, the pious rites of purification, februa,
Were unknown, nor were you, two-faced Janus, leader of the months:
Yet they still brought gifts owed to the ashes of the dead,
The grandson paid respects to his buried grandfather’s tomb.
It was May month, named for our ancestors (maiores),
And a relic of the old custom still continues.
When midnight comes, lending silence to sleep,
And all the dogs and hedgerow birds are quiet,
He who remembers ancient rites, and fears the gods,
Rises (no fetters binding his two feet)
And makes the sign with thumb and closed fingers,
Lest an insubstantial shade meets him in the silence.
After cleansing his hands in spring water,
He turns and first taking some black beans,
Throws them with averted face: saying, while throwing:
‘With these beans I throw I redeem me and mine.’
He says this nine times without looking back: the shade
Is thought to gather the beans, and follow behind, unseen.
Again he touches water, and sounds the Temesan bronze,
And asks the spirit to leave his house.
When nine times he’s cried: ‘Ancestral spirit, depart,’
He looks back, and believes the sacred rite’s fulfilled.
The Lemuria may well have been an influence on the medieval and later traditions in the rest of Europe, the final part of this book is an uncanny an echo of our own folklore:
And the ancients closed the temples on these days,
As you see them shut still at the season of the dead.
It’s a time when it’s not suitable for widows or virgins
To wed: she who marries then won’t live long.
And if you attend to proverbs, then, for that reason too,
People say unlucky women wed in the month of May.
Though these three festivals fall at the same time,
They are not observed on three consecutive days.

The Lemuria may well have had a lasting effect on our calendar days of the dead – as will be from later festivals in the year.

I hope you have enjoyed this brief ramble through the Spring calendar dates and their ghostly and magical associations. I look forward to bringing you the next 3 months of dates when the dead may return.

Sources
Collison-Morley, L., (1912) Greek and Roman Ghost Stories, Oxford, Retrieved from www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17190
Hutton, R., (1996)The Stations of the Sun, Oxford, reissued 2001
Joynes, A., (2001) Medieval Ghost Stories, Woodbridge
Leather, E. M., (1912) The Folklore of Herefordshire, Hereford, reprinted 1991 Lapridge Publications
Paton, L. B., (1921) Spiritism and the Cult of the Dead in Antiquity, Toronto, Retrieved from www.archive.org/details/spiritismcultofd00patouoft
Schmitt, J.-C., (1998)Ghosts in the Middle Ages: The Living and the Dead in Medieval Society, trans. T. Lavender Fagan, Chicago
Simpson, J. & Roud S., (2000) Oxford Dictionary of English Folklore, Oxford
Roud, S., (2006) The English Year, London
Wikipedia, (2012) Lemuria (festival,) Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemuria_(festival) March 2012
Ovid, Fasti, trans. Kline, A. S. (2004), Retrieved from http://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/Latin/OvidFastiBkFive.htm#_Toc69367922

For 3 (or more) alternate days in May (9th, 11th and 13th) the Ancient Romans practised ceremonies to drive away malevolent spirits the Larvae and Lemures. These were hungry ghosts who returned to torment the living, either because they were wicked people in life or because they had not been afforded a proper burial or funeral rites. The Manes is another name for spirits but these were normally ‘good’, as long as the rites were observed.

Barefooted and at night, the head of the household would snap his fingers and wash his hands 3 times to purify himself. Filling his mouth with black beans which he thre behind himself saying: “I throw away these beans and with them I redeem myself and mine.” The formula was repeated nine times. Having completed the offering, the patriarch again purified his hands. He then struck a brazen instrument. He repeated a ritual phrase nine times: “Paternal manes, go.” As the ritual was now finished, he could safely look behind himself.
By taking food out of his own mouth and then offering this food directly to the Lemures, the Lemures would feel they had received their just due and leave the family in peace for another year. The month of May was seen as unlucky and marriages were forbidden or discouraged.

On the 13th May 609, Pope Boniface IV consectrated the Pantheon in Rome to the Blessed Virgin and all the martyrs. The 13th May later became All Saints Day, probably to Christianize the Lemuria festival. However, in 741 All Saints moved to November 1st (by Pope Gregory III) but the assoiciation of the festival with ghosts remained in the eve of the hallowed day being rife with spirits (31st October).

Some believe that the fixing of the anniversary to the 1st November relates to Christianisation of the Irish autumn feast of ‘Samhain’ or Samonios as it would have been known (http://digitalmedievalist.com/faqs/samain.html). But the Christian church in Ireland was the Celtic Church, with its own distinctive traditions which was not under the direct power of the Roman Church. Also it was likely first observed on November 1st in Germany which makes the Irish connection even less likely. (http://www.churchyear.net/allsaints.html)

In Ireland the 1st November is associated with the harvest and the paying of taxes (in food) to the King. According to Stephen Roud there is a tradition of the boundaries between worlds being broken down at this time - but in the Celtic world this is more likely to refer to fairy folk than to the dead. This is all makes for the origins of Hallowe’en to be very confused but I would like to put forward the idea that it comes from the Lemuria festival, a time when ghosts went abroad and had to be appeased does sound rather like the Hallowe’en tradition. Especially when you consider that beans are still sacred to the dead in Italy, and on November 2nd, All Souls Day, Festa dei Morti, they play an important part in the feast. (At the ancient Greek Necromanteon, Oracle of the Dead, beans were given to the supplicants before they were allowed an audience with the Oracle.)

Some of the beliefs about ghosts in classical times are still with us. The idea that ghosts that haunt are the unhappy dead, because they have not received a decent burial is one that survives to this day. The ghost story told by Pliny the Younger is not so different from stories we are all familiar with today. This translation is from Latin teacher Rose Williams (http://ancienthistory.about.com/library/weekly/aa092998b.htm).

“There was a big house in Athens, with an unsavory and unhealthy reputation. The silence of the night was interrupted by the sound of weapons and chains. First they came from afar, but then they were heard nearby. Soon there appeared a filthy, emaciated old man with scraggly hair and beard. He had chains on his hands and feet.

The residents didn’t sleep very well. Some even died from fear. Eventually the house was empty.

Finally, deserted, it remained quiet. When it was put up for sale no one was interested.

Then one day Athenodorus, the philosopher, came to town. He saw the FOR SALE sign on the house, learned the asking price, and asked a great many other questions.

No one held back on the horrific details, but still the philosopher decided to go ahead and buy the place.

That very evening, his first in the house, Athenodorus took a torch, stylus, and writing tablet to the front of his house. He let the slaves off for the night. Then he determined to keep himself busy writing because, he thought, an idle mind is the devil’s playground.

At first, all was still. Then from afar came the rattling of chains. Stoically, Athenodorus didn’t even bat an eye, but kept on writing. The sounds grew closer and closer.

Soon they were in the cottage….

Then they were in his very room….

At this Athenodorus laid down his stylus and looked up. There was the ghost. It beckoned him with a finger, but Athenodorus just took up his stylus again. When the philosopher heard the chains rattling above his head, he picked up his torch.

Slowly the ghost ambled to the door with Athenodorus close behind. As it reached an open area in the house, the ghost disappeared. Athenodorus grabbed a handy nearby clump of grass and placed it on the spot where the ghost had vanished.

The next day, Athenodorus called the magistrate. In his official capacity, he dug up the spot that had been marked. There they found chains and inside the chains, the bones of a man.

The magistrate gathered the bones for a proper burial. Never was the ghost heard from again.”

I wanted to post a ghost story for the holidays and I was recently reminded of a real haunting that I heard about when young. Back in the 1970’s my mother took a cleaning job in the offices of a local firm on the Queen’s road, Peckham in London. It was a large old house (probably Edwardian or Victorian) of four storeys. My mother frequently took one of my siblings with her as a helper and for companionship as she normally worked late in the evening or early mornings when the offices were unoccupied. It had its creepy corners and a bit of an atmosphere but you could have put that down to it being empty and dark except for a few occurrences which suggest otherwise.

One of my sisters recalled: ‘Ohhhh I didn’t like that [place] especially in the evening…There was a distinctive feeling in that building. It made you frightened. It wasn’t just spooky… There were certain rooms that once finished you wanted to leave them very quickly.’ My brother agreed ‘Once we’d finished a room I never liked going back in it.’ Personally, it felt like you couldn’t be sure a room was empty until the door was opened wide. Sometimes I thought I could see shadows moving from under the door, and wondered if someone was working late but when we went in there was no one. One time someone appeared to move across the floor - but I had only just shut the door after leaving the room.

My sister said: ‘It wasn’t nice in the evening but some occurances were in the early morning too. The room at the top and middle landing being particularly horrible. The feeling in the building made you want to leave; like something didn’t want you in there.’

One evening my sister was coming up the stairs towards my mother, ‘I was on the middle landing and I moved towards her … Suddenly her legs gave way and I said ‘What’s wrong’ she said ‘Oh, its just my legs’ and she didn’t feel well. I was worried because she was acting strange although we carried on cleaning, she seemed a bit distracted. She never said anything until weeks later. She said on the stairs behind me there was a man coming down the stairs and she was so shocked when she realised what it was that her legs just gave way. I think he was wearing period clothes, Victorian or Edwardian.’

On another occasion a man dressed in a top hat and cloak was spotted hanging around the top most landing which let to a single room in the garret.

Early one morning, around 6 o’clock, both my brother and mother had just arrived and as they entered the lobby and removed their coats a hoarse voice called out from above, ‘Who is that? Who is there?’ They were both surprised to hear some ones voice when they expected no one to be there but also a voice they did not recognise, a croaky voice like an old mans. They looked at each other worriedly and searched the building but there was not any one around except for them.

Today the offices have closed and they have been converted into accomodation, I wonder if the current residents have experienced anything ghostly there. My brother commented ‘I never saw any ghosts in B********y …having done countless shifts there,’ then he added nonchalantly ‘…but did hear a few moans and groans!’

For more information on ghosts in this part of London please visit http://dulwichonview.org.uk/2009/10/30/scary-monsters-and-super-creepy-stories/

I have been trying to discover more about the association of ghost stories with Christmas (particularly Christmas eve) in Britain. I have read more than once that Charles Dickens was responsible for this but I am not convinced; I think there is enough evidence to suggest that other things have helped to add a ghostly element.

It was Pope Julius 1 in the 4th century who set the 25th of December as marking the birth of Christ. Why it was chosen has been argued back and forth by many scholars, but it is accepted that the festivals of other religions and cultures (Jewish and Pagan) which were also celebrated around this date influenced the choice and the traditions. It was because of these non Christian connections that the Puritans tried to suppress Christmas in the mid-17th century(as well as being kill-joys, of course).

So where do the ghosts come in? At first I thought I was looking at a simple tradition of ghost story telling: between Hallowe’en and Christmas are dark days; the natural world hibernates and the weather is inclement [for something sensible on Samhain see http://www.digitalmedievalist.com/faqs/samain.html]. What would be more natural than to huddle around a fire and tell stories for entertainment – including ghost stories? The ghost story at Christmas is an oral tradition which Dickens drew upon when he published his stories (people were not shocked by their arrival and he writes himself: ‘I like to come home at Christmas…for we are telling Winter Stories – Ghost Stories,…around the Christmas fire’). M. R. James read his stories aloud to friends on Christmas Eve and the BBC continues to entertain us with ghostly stories on radio and television.

However, there may be something more here which links the dark days at the end of the farming calendar to the other world. Christmas itself is a borrowed feast in many ways, it is no accident that it falls on the date of what was in the Julian calendar the winter solstice. In Imperial Rome this date was a celebration of Sol Invictus - ‘the unconquered sun’. It is the ‘rebirth’ of the sun after reaching its furthest distance away it begins the long journey north again. Christmas and the other festivals in one form or another mark the winter solstice, for people living in the northern hemisphere this is a time of minimal daylight with considerable physical and psychological effect; for pre modern man it was a difficult and harsh time of the year.

In the mid winter celebrations of other cultures, some at least of which have contributed to our Christmas traditions, there are many references to the dead or to ghosts. (For a very long list of winter solstice feasts see Wikipedia.)

From the 17th to the 24th December the Romans celebrated Saturnalia, the feast of the god Saturn and essentially a harvest festival, but it has influenced our Christmas celebrations. It was a time when the normal social rules were turned upside down (the master served his slaves during the feast – also found later in medieval Christmasses) and people took on fancy or opposite dress, there was gift giving and feasting and a lot of merry making (people calling ‘Io Saturnlia!’ to each other), and mischief making. Two days of the latter part of the festival celebrated the Laeres. These were part of the canon of household gods in traditional Roman religion, they were spirits of the ancestors of the household. Good spirits, but very definitely they were the spirits of the dead.

The Greek equivalent was called the Kronia (Kronos and Saturn were identified with each other). In folklore malevolent goblins called Kallikantzaroi appeared from below ground from the 25th December to 6th January. It was believed that children born during the festival were in danger of turning into Kallikantzaroi. Interestingly, in Greek mythology the Gods gathered on Mount Olympus at the winter solstice and were joined by Hades, from the underworld of the dead.

In Germany and Scandinavia, there was the Yule festival that was marked by bonfires, story telling and feasting. This was an amalgamation of a number of other mid winter festivals including one called the Feast of the Dead.

Most strikingly there was a Slavic mid winter festival called Karachun, Korochun or Kračún and Khorovod in Russia and the Ukraine. It was celebrated on the longest night of the year when something called the Black God and other evil spirits were most potent. Hors (symbolising the dying sun) is defeated by the dark and evil powers of the Black God on that day. Hors is then resurrected on December 23rd and becomes the new sun. On this day, they burned fires at cemeteries to warm the spirits of the departed, invited the dead to the dinner feast and lit wooden logs at local crossroads. The household gods could join with the family in the festivities at the hearth. (The name of this festival looks like it might be related to the ancient Greek ‘Kronia’; the name of the god Hor looks like it might be borrowed from the Egyptian god ‘Horos’ who, by classical times was a sun god and the reference to household gods sounds Roman.)

The winter festival on December 21st in ancient Latvia was called Ziemassvētki, and was preceded two weeks before by ‘Veļu laiks’, the ‘Season of Ghosts’. During the Ziemassvētki feast, a space at the table was reserved for Ghosts, who would arrive on a sleigh (Ho Ho Ho!).

Archaeological monuments particularly in northern Europe have demonstrated that the mid winter solstice was significant far back in antiquity for which there are no written records. There are many examples, including tombs that are aligned with the solstice. Stonehenge has a solsticial alignment (both mid winter and mid summer) but it is likely the more significant of these was the mid winter. Newgrange is a large passage tomb in the Boyne Valley in Ireland. Built around 3300 BC it has a very special alignment with the mid winter sun. Above the entrance in the north east is a ‘roof box’ (window) in which the sun appears after it rises on the winter solstice, its rays reach right to the back of the chamber where the dead would have been.

Dowth, another chambered tomb in the same group, is aligned with the setting sun. The entrance of Maes Howe in Orkney is also aligned with the mid winter sunset. Do these ancient monuments point to a belief where there is a link between the dead and the solstice? Did the sun wake them or set them in their tombs? We will never really know what they believed. Although it is a tomb, that may not have been its only purpose, for us the monument itself is the attractor and back in time the symbolism of the building may have been just as important or more so, it could have been seen as the entrance to another world. Michael O’Kelly the archaeologist that excavated Newgrange and who discovered the phenomena is reported as saying ‘I expected to hear a voice, or perhaps feel a cold hand resting on my shoulder, but there was silence. And then, after a few minutes, the shaft of light narrowed as the sun appeared to pass westward across the slit, and total darkness came once more.’ (See http://www.knowth.com/new_grange.htm) Today people gather inside Newgrange on the morning of the solstice to watch the spectacle of the sun reaching down to the chamber. In prehistory, the entrance to the tomb was sealed and the only witnesses to the solstice would have been the dead. The position of the sun at the solstice remains about the same for around a fortnight of the actual longest day so the special alignment can be seen at Stonehenge and other monuments on more than one night - at Newgrange a quartz stone shutter had been used in antiquity on the ‘roof box’ to control the penetration of the suns rays into the tomb.

The mid winter then seems to be full of ghosts, the ancestors and less savoury figures. Is it really surprising at the darkest time of the year that this should be on peoples minds? The ghosts of our Christmas Eve are a reflection or a memory of old fears, remembrance of the departed and very old traditions.

Ghosts, the dead, darkness are but one side of the equation. Light and life are the other: bonfires and the yule log were burned in northern Europe and evergreen plants symbolised life. It was a fitting choice for the Christian celebration. The winter solstice is often a major festival – marking the change in day length and the hope of spring. The dying of the sun and its revival, the winter and darkness become symbols of life and death. Many mid winter festivals also mark this time as the new year – as we do.

I hope this rambling will enrich your celebrations, whether Christmas or otherwise. When you unravel your Christmas tree lights and reach for the collection of M. R. James stories, you can wonder at the strange and very long history of the mid winter feast. I hope you will lucky enough to hear a ghost story this year!