Not for the first time I'm sharing a picture of the display of mummified animals they have out in Chippenham Museum when I was there back in the Spring. I always take photos of such things because the magical practices of everyday folk is of great personal interest to me, but I wasn't planning to show them.....so what changed my mind?
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One of the things I particularly enjoy about adventuring is the researching and teasing out of any tales that may emanate from the things I encounter on my travels. I'd looked forward to reading more about this set of a cat, rat, toad and frog upon my return in my well thumbed copy of "Magical House Protection" by Brian Hoggard so was a little surprised to find that it made absolutely no mention of it. Being a bod who likes to help I decided to send a message to Dr Hoggard about it, but fully expected him to know about it. He replied immediately to confirm that he'd not heard of this example, so with an apology about the quality of my photos I sent the above two over to him. We left it that he'd drop in and see them for himself next time he was in that general area.
Six weeks later and Dr Hoggard followed through with his own visit...the only difference being, that as the expert in the field [he organises the annual Hidden Charms conferences about this and other related topics], he was invited to see inside the case! At this point my involvement ceases, but it's been so interesting to read the comments from other knowledgeable people about it. There is a simple theory that if you get a cat and a rat found up a chimney together then it might simply be the case that the feline chased the rodent up there and then both perished without there being any human intervention. What apparently made this particular example different is the survival of the leather bags in which the amphibians had been contained. Not only are they rare to find, but they also prove that they were placed there deliberately by someone. Sadly it still doesn't provide a definitive as to why, but I do feel that maybe I have made a small contribution in moving the story forwards by signposting the evidence to the right people who are in the field. It's a very satisfying feeling💜
Arilx
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That is so very interesting! We redo old houses here and have never found a skeleton, but we find bottles and shoes. We thought it was a fluke, but it happened multiple times. I googled it and found out that it was thought to keep evil away.
ReplyDeleteIt is most probable one of a number of practices to keep evil spirits or witches away and was used even in the 19th century. We have the bottles and shoes here too and I would imagine that it came to the USA with the pilgrims. Arilx
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