Custom survived: Arundel’s Corpus Christi Carpet of Flowers

Sitting high above the town of Arundel forming a skyline with its equally impressive neighbouring Castle, is the Catholic Cathedral. The site is impressive enough but go inside around the date of Corpus Christi and you will see a unique spectacle. A carpet that leads between the aisles towards the High Altar, the oldest such carpet in Britain.

Swept over the carpet

Corpus Christi Carpets of flowers are often outside displays and ca be found across Catholic southern countries such as Spain and Italy. The most famous carpet of flowers is in the town of Genzano near Rome and it is said that Duke Henry saw this whilst on holiday close by. So impressed was he that he decided to encourage the custom at Arundel in 1877. Originally these flowers were picked from the Duke’s garden being picked on the morning of the feast by his estate workers. Nowadays, the demand to see the flowers has resulted in it being lad earlier in the week to allow more visitors to see it. Indeed the visitors swell the Cathedral during the days and it is full with people leaning over pews to get a greater look or contorting, bending and standing in curious ways to get the best photo.

Do tread on the carpet

The reason for the carpet is like other carpets to be walked over. To the lay person’s eyes this seems a terrible thing to do the hours. Corpus Christi (the body of Christ) is a Catholic feast day which celebrates the ritual of the Eucharist on the eighth Thursday after Easter. As a feast it was lately adopted in the Christian faith in the 13^th century and did not survive into the Reformation, returning to England with the Catholic faith. In the ceremony, the importance of the Sacred Host representing the body is emphasised by the use of a carpet of finery. Despite shocked faces it is intended they walk on it – despite taking two days to lay!

Carpet bagging

The custom looked in peril when in the mid-1950s, the Norfolk Estate begun to reduce its ground staff, but the headteacher of Tortington Park Girls School offered to supply flowers. Her school gardeners and some pupils would then help lay the carpet. However, when in 1969 the school closed the carpet again seemed in peril! Fortunately, in 1970 the Cathedral stepped in and since ladies from the parish obtain the flowers from nurseries, supplemented by donations from local people’s gardens.

Each year the carpet boasts a different design often taken from the focus the church is given by the Papal authority. However notable special events are recorded such as the celebration in 1990, the silver jubilee of the formation of a new diocese of Arundel and Brighton back in 1965 and 150th anniversary of Saint Bernadette’s apparitions of the Virgin Mary at Lourdes.

Laying the carpet

The flowers have their stems removed so they can lie flush to the ground, are sorted in colours and shades. An evergreen foliage background is used. Originally the carpet was 98 foot long going right up to the altar but now it has lost five feet to enable visitors to walk around the carpet.

The designs are lined out in chalk on a black paper and templates are used to outline the more intricate shapes used and maintain the symmetry as the flowers are laid.

Flowery procession

Of course, it is not just the carpet but the full celebration of the Feast of Corpus Christi, a festival of prayer, sacrament, song, procession as well as the flowers.

The climax being the solemn High Mass. When I attended this mass, the Cathedral was full with no space hardly to sit. Those non-Catholics rather lost in ritual awaited for the moment. Then at the end of this mass that the Blessed sacrament is carried down and over the carpet by the Bishop. It’s a shame they have to walk on it could be overheard from behind but after all that was the reason for it.

The procession then makes its way outside where a special canopy awaits. For many years this processional canopy was that presented by Henry XVth Duke of Norfolk and was first used in 1883. Now a more modern but no less splendid one is used. Beneath this canopy the Host in its golden monstrance is carried.

This procession is led by a cross bearer followed by a banner of the Sacred Heart. This is followed by girls dressed in white carrying posies and then boys carrying sprays of flowers and wearing sashes. Once the petal strewers walked backwards in respect and reverence now the girls do, often those who have had their first Holy Communion.

All along the route speakers are affixed to the walls and the voices of the priest back in the cathedral can be heard as they continue the mass, everyone is the town is enveloped in the ceremony.

In the procession banners are proudly carried which show Blessed sacrament, Mary Mother of Jesus and depict saints associated with the church as well as local parish organisations. Amongst them Knights of the order of chivalry and of the Papal order of Gregory XVI. These include the Order of the Knights of Malta wearing black cloaks with white Maltese crosses who walk nearest the sacrament, the Knights of St Gregory in green, and the Knights of Holy Sepulchre white caped with red Jerusalem cross. Once the procession has travelled down the street it enters the castle and around the gardens to assembly in the quadrangle of the castle. Here there is the continuation of the Mass, here the people gathered are blessed by the sacred host. After the Benediction the congregation leave the castle and process back to the cathedral. Back at the cathedral a second Benediction is celebrated with the Sacred Host is transferred to the Cathedral’s finest monstrance, a wedding gift to Henry Duke of Norfolk in 1904 and apparently every Catholic contributed 1d to its purchase. The mass is long, longer than some could cope with and many had disappeared after the castle benediction – the carpet now looking a little worse after its second trampling – it’ll soon be swept away for next year!

Custom revived: Winster Morris and Winster Wakes

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This is it and that is it and this is Morris dancing

Think Morris, think Cotswolds perhaps, however Derbyshire has a long tradition and Winster is without doubt the oldest traditional team in the county which survives, Tideswell’s team although mentioned in the late 1700 appears to have vanished. Winster also does not fit into the other types not boarder nor clog, molly or Cotswold. Winster of course have many interesting customs, its pancake race and the Guisers, which themselves are made up of Morris team members.

It was 1863 when Morris groups are first mentioned in the town and it is believed that they were well established by then. Renowned English Folk Music enthusiast Cecil Sharp visited the town in 1908 to record the dances in his Morris Book Part 3 1924. The team then wore white shirt and trousers, with cross-belts with rosettes, black shoes and bells. They continue to do so. The team consists of 16 dancers, rather than the traditional six, who split into two files of eight and an unusual four characters. This is a unique feature.

Another unique feature is its nature of its dance which consists of processional and stationary dances: The Processional, The Blue-Eyed Stranger, The Morris Reel, The Morris Gallop and The Morris March.  The most famed the Gallop is now performed by Morris teams across the world.

Dancing in and out of time

However, despite surviving until 1908, its demise was just around the corner and as men went to fight in the First World War the dancing disappeared. However, it was revived in the 1920s and could be seen throughout the county at fetes but again another war happened of course and the Morris died out. It was revived however in 1951 on the back of Festival of Britain by the headmaster of Winster School, George Noton, and as such the Morris team was made up by school boys. The revival lasted 4 years. It was revived again in 1977 on the back of the Silver Jubilee, but apparently lapsed and the modern team dates from 1979.

In 2008 the team decided to celebrate the 100^th anniversary of Cecil Sharp’s visit called ‘Look Sharp’. The Derbyshire Times recorded that involved a that was a re-enactment of Sharp’s arrival in Winster by an actor Steve Tomlin. He arrived by steam train at Darley Dale and took a pony and trap to the town. The Times noted:

“On Saturday there will be a “mass morris” when more than 100 dancers from as far away as Oxfordshire and Essex will get together on Winster’s Main Street to dance. Six teams will also tour at least eight Peak District villages on their way to Winster.”

Wake up

The Winster Morris today are one of the main features of the town’s Wake week – a unsurprisingly week-long celebration of the town which originated from the patronal festival connected with the church.

On their day of dance is the best time to see this team and see its unique featured characters. These traditional characters were a King (in a military uniform), Queen (a man dressed in Victorian dress), Jester and a Witch (another man dressed in black). These survive today. The later two go around entertaining the crowd, although I could not see what the King did another than march around looking ceremonial which he did very well.

The event started with a procession in which the Winster team and their invited team, the equally fascinating Ock Street Morris with the freshly appointed Mock Mayor. However the main attraction are the Winster team who on the bright summer’s day are radiant as they jump and skip in and out of each other to the sound of the music. The Morris Gallop is the set piece of course and to watch this classic piece of folk dance in its natural home is a privilege.

“This is it and that is it

And this is Morris dancing

The Piper fell and broke his neck

and said it was a chancer

 

you don’t know and I don’t know

what fun we had at Brampton,

a roasted pig and a cuddle duck,

and a pudding in a lantern.”

 

 

 

Custom demised: Midsummer Fire Cartwheel rolling

Cartwheeling Leusdon, Devon. From The Country Life book of old English customs. by Roy Christian

Rolling a flaming wheel into a stream or river down a hill may seem an oddly dangerous enterprise but it was one which was undertaken until recent times across Britain on the eve of St. John the Baptist otherwise known as Midsummer Eve. An account from the 1820s from South Glamorgan reported in 1909 by Marie Trevelyan in her Folklore and folk stories of Wales. It notes that:

“People conveyed trusses of straw to the top of the hill, where men and youths waited for the contributions. Women and Girls were stationed at the bottom of the hill. Then a large cart wheel was thickly swathed with straw and not an inch of wood was left in sight. A pole was inserted through the centre of the wheel, so that the long ends extended about a yard on each side. If any straw remained, it was made up into torches at the top of tall sticks. At a given signal the wheel was lighted and set rolling downhill. If the fire-wheel went out before it reached the bottom of the hill, a very poor harvest was promised. If it kept lighted all the way down, and continued blazing for a long time, the harvest would be exceptionally abundant. Loud cheers and shouts accompanied the progress of the wheel.”

Ancient origins

In the fourth-century Acts of the Martyr St. Vincent there is a description how in Aquitane, south-western France pagans rolled a flaming wheel towards a river and the charred remains were reassembled in their Sky God temple.

Widespread custom

The custom was also undertaken in Devon. At Buckfastleigh in the mid 1850s, aptly Bonfire Hill was the location and the wheel was moved down the hill using sticks by the use of sticks. Like South Glamorgan, if it reached the stream the village would have a good year.  In the village of Leusdon it was done until recent. Eric Hemery in his 1983 High Dartmoor book records:

“An old custom on Mil Tor was the ‘Rolling of the Wagon Wheels’ on Midsummer Day: discontinued in the war years, it was revised for a time during the late 1950s, since which it has again lapsed. The aim was that the wheels should reach the river, but so rock-strewn is the six-hundred foot slope that few ever did. In consequence, the old iron tyres of long-rotted wheels lie about Miltor Wood – some now encircling the trees.”

At point this custom died out to be revived in 1962 but now streamers were added to give a flame effect. Without the added spectacle of fire danger it doubtless seemed even more pointless indeed Roy Christian notes in his Old English Customs

“Within the last few years the villagers of Leusdon, in Devon, have abandoned their ancient and apparently pointless practice of rolling a cartwheel down the slopes of Mel Tor on the eve of St. John the Baptists Day. Preservationists may deplore the end of his and other customs but artificial respiration will no keep them alive. A custom will only survive if a spontaneous desire by a  large body of folk to keep it going”

Yet, as the online

Minutes of Widdecombe on the Moor Parish council note:

“Leusdon Church 150th Anniversary: We were informed that Leusdon Church will celebrate its 150th Anniversary of its dedication on 28th April 2013. It is understood that the church was dedicated in 1863 and its patron Saint is St John the Baptist. It was noted that historically on the Eve of St John the Baptist Day 24th June, there was held the ‘cartwheel rolling’ ceremony at Meltor. Will this be revived in 2013?”

I don’t think it was sadly