The Mummy of the Golden Tower

The pictures below show the Torre del Oro (the Gold Tower) which was a military watchtower in Seville constructed in the early 13th century. The tower sits alongside the Canal de Alfonso XIII, and was originally intended to guard the waterway access into Seville and also acted as a prison. The tower is known as the gold tower due to its colour. Today the tower is home to Seville’s Maritime Museum.

The Torre del Oro is linked to a tragic legend of a women who was pestered by a king into a horrific act of self-mutilation. The woman in question was Maria Fernandez Coronel who was born in 1334 and is reported to have grown into an immensely beautiful woman over the years.

King Peter I (Don Pedro I) who was the king of Castile and León from 1350 to 1369 met Maria (who was married to Don Juan de la Cerda, the lord of Gibraleon) and he was instantly besotted by her beauty. It is said that King Peter was so besotted that he commenced a campaign of harassment against Maria, constantly pestering her, trying to get her to give herself to him. King Peter’s campaign was so intense that Maria opted to withdraw from social life, hoping that being out of sight would help to remove her from King Peter’s mind.

In 1366 the Castilian Civil War began, which saw King Peter in conflict with his illegitimate brother, Henry of Trastámara. During this civil war Maria’s husband Don Juan de la Cerda was in the service of the king’s brother and had the bad luck of being captured by the king’s men. Hearing of her husband’s capture Maria visited King Peter to plead for her husband’s life, but it was too late as he had already been executed at the Torre del Oro. The execution of her husband and the subsequent seizure of all the family’s assets left Maria destitute and she eventually sought refuge at a convent.

Coming to the king’s attention again meant that Maria was again subject to harassment by the king who remained insistent that she should give herself to him. Eventually the king sent his men to the convent to find Maria and bring her to him, but she managed to elude their searches by being temporarily buried alive. Displeased with his men’s failure to find Maria, the king eventually went to the convent himself in order to capture Maria, and he eventually cornered her. Finally having had enough of the king’s advances it is said that Maria picked up a pan of boiling olive oil and poured it over her face to remove her beautiful looks and dissuade the king in his advances. Unsurprisingly Maria was severely disfigured by this act of self mutilation.

After this tragic event it is said that King Peter was so remorseful for his actions that Maria’s family assets were returned to her, and these assets enabled her to found the Convent of St. Agnes in Seville. Maria eventually died on December 2nd 1411 at the ripe old age of 77. In the mid sixteenth century construction work uncovered Maria’s tomb, and her body was found to be very well preserved, with her characteristic burns still visible. Her body was subsequently placed into a glass box and today is still preserved in the Convent of St. Agnes (Convento de Santa Inés on Calle Dona Maria Coronel), and it can be viewed on the anniversary of her death each year (December 2nd). Some pictures of her persevered body can be found on this blog.

King Peter met a suitably nasty end for a sex pest; in 1369 he was apparently stabbed in the face by his illegitimate brother Henry of Trastámara.

Torre del Oro (the Gold Tower).

The Canal de Alfonso XIII.

Pictures: Seville, Spain (November 2014).

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The Home of the Spanish Smurfs

The Spanish region of Andalusia is known for its white towns and villages,  where all of the buildings are uniformly whitewashed making the settlements stand out against the earthy colours of the countryside. Not all of these settlements are white however, one town known as Júzcar is painted blue, Smurf-blue!

In 2011 this small and remote Spanish town was selected as the location for the worldwide premiere of the 2011 movie “The Smurfs”, which was held on June 16, 2011. Prior to the screening of the premiere Sony Pictures arranged to have the town painted Smurf-blue. It is reported that circa 4,000 litres of paint were used in this undertaking, which saw the entire town including the church and its gravestones painted. This transformation of the town from a traditional whitewashed settlement to a blue haven for Smurfs drastically increased the number of visitors to the town, and as a result of this the inhabitants have kept the new colour scheme to this day.

These little blue creatures, which were first created by Belgian cartoonist Peyo (Pierre Culliford) in 1958 are not just responsible for turning a Spanish town blue. According to the "Topless Robot" website it seems that the Smurfs may have inspired modern day Zombie fiction with their 1963 storyline "The Purple Smurf". The same website also recounts that Smurf figurines may have been responsible for creating a lead poisoning scare in the UK in the 1970s.

For those who care to investigate I am sure there are also many other Fortean themes lurking in the long history of theses little blue creatures.

Looking across the roof tops.

Smurf murals adorn the town.

Pictures: Júzcar, Spain (November 2014).

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Barge(ing) Inn to Crop Circles

Every year across Wiltshire tens if not hundreds of crop circles appear in the countryside during the night, as if by magic. The bulk of these crop circles or crop formations (as they are not always circular) tend occur near ancient sites such as Stonehenge, Avebury, Silbury Hill, the West Kennet Long Barrow or near chalk hill figures, which comprise the mystical landscape of Wiltshire.

The phenomenon of crop circles first came to prominence in the United Kingdom in the late 1970s. This new phenomenon soon caught the public’s attention and it was not long before they were attributed to visitors from outer space or in some cases freak weather, such as tornadoes or ball lightening. The reality of crop circles is much more prosaic however. In the early 1990s two Southampton artists claimed to be responsible for a significant number of the circles stating that they were made using planks of wood, rope and a baseball cap fitted with a loop of wire. The latter tool was apparently used to help them walk in straight lines. It is now widely accepted that crop circles are the product of artistic humans as opposed to visiting extra-terrestrials or rare atmospheric phenomenon.

Crop circles still however have significant appeal for many, and each year a considerable number of people from around the world travel to Wiltshire to be the first to see the new batch of crop circles that appear. The hub of crop circle hunting in Wiltshire is the Barge Inn in Honeystreet on the Kennet and Avon Canal. The Barge Inn which dates from 1810 is positioned on the Duke's Ley Line (running from Avebury to Stonehenge) and lies in the centre of the Wiltshire mystical landscape close to both the Ridgeway (Britain’s oldest road), the ancient complex of Avebury. The Inn is also overlooked by both the Alton Barnes White Horse and Adam’s Grave Long Barrow. The Inn has a crop circle room where an up to date record is kept of the current batch of crop formations, with a map showing their location and pictures showing aerial views of the designs. Each summer this room becomes the hub from which circle spotters deploy to try to be the first to explore new crop formations.

The Barge Inn also shows an interest in other aspects of the mystical and unusual.  The ceiling of the crop circle room has a detailed and exquisitely painted mural which shows the ancient Pagan sites that fill the nearby countryside. Some call this mural the "Sistine Chapel of Wiltshire". Taking the Pagan theme even further, the Inn hosts Handfasting ceremonies. During these ceremonies couples can pledge their love for each other by the ceremonial binding of hands. The practice of Handfasting originates from an old Norse custom, and the Norse term “hand-festa” means "to strike a bargain by joining hands". This Pagan ceremony is still practiced today and the ceremony ends by the traditional act of jumping over a broom.

If beer is more your thing, then at the Barge Inn you can partake in numerous suitably named beverages including Area 51 Cider, Alien Abduction Green Ale, Croppie Ale and Roswell Ale. The Inn is also currently seeking planning permission to erect an observatory in its grounds to enable customers at the bar to be able to keep an eye on the stars and to watch out for incoming flying saucers on their way to create a crop circle nearby!

The Barge Inn.

The circle gallery showing the current batch of crop formations.

The circle gallery showing the current batch of crop formations.

The map, showing the locations of the crop formations. 

Pictures, Wiltshire (August 2014).

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Wiltshire's Italian Church

The Wiltshire town of Wilton, which is synonymous with English carpet manufacture, is not the sort of place that you would expect to find an ornate Italian Church. But that is exactly what Wilton has.

The church in question is the Church of St. Mary and St. Nicholas, which was built on West Street between 1841 and 1844, as a replacement for the town's 15th century Church of St Mary.

The Church of St. Mary and St. Nicholas was commissioned by The Lord Herbert of Lea with support from his mother the Dowager Countess of Pembroke, who was of Russian descent. The Lord Herbert of Lea had a passion for Italian architecture and as a result the architects created the church in a Romanesque style, with considerable Byzantine influences. It has also been proposed that the church was built as an imitation of a basilica in Lombardy, Italy.

One of the most striking features of this impressive building is its 105ft high campanile which is connected to the church by a short cloister, which is adorned with carved columns. The church also boasts crafted items that were imported from Europe to be incorporated into the building, such as 2nd century B.C. marble columns from the Temple of Venus at Porto Venere, and 12th and 13th century stained glass from France. The church even contains a 17th century engraved metal chest from Germany.

Not all of the church's adornments are from exotic locales however, the church bells were recycled from the melted down bells of the old St Mary's Church.

The church also has an unusual alignment, with it lying on a north-east to south-west axis, as opposed to the more traditional easterly alignment. This highly unusual parish church was consecrated on 9th October 1845 and is well worth a visit!

The Church of St. Mary and St. Nicholas on West Street in Wilton. 

A decorative lion supporting the archway over the main entrance.

The ornate interior of the church. 

Carved columns in the cloister between the church and the campanile. 

A rear view of the church.

Pictures, Wiltshire (August 2014).

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The Home of Halley

The house shown below is on New College Lane in Oxford and is adorned by a small wooden plaque which reads: Edmond Halley Savilian Professor of Geometry 1703 - 1742 lived and had his observatory in this house.

It seems that the English astronomer and mathematician Edmond Halley (1656-1742) spent a significant period of his life in Oxford, firstly as a student at Oxford University and latterly as a professor.  Halley is most famously known for calculating the orbit of the comet that was named after him.

Halley spent some of his career calculating the orbits of 24 comets that had been observed between 1337 and 1698. During these calculations he postulated that three of the observed comets which appeared in 1531, 1607, and 1682 were likely to be the same object returning to the solar system time and again. Based on his calculations Halley postulated that the comet would return in 1758 and on the 25 December 1758 (16 years after Halley’s death) the comet did return. The comet was posthumously named after Halley.

Halley’s Comet is known as a “short period comet” and is the only comet of this type to be visible from Earth with the naked eye. Halley’s Comet is also the only known short period comet that can appear twice within a human lifetime, as its periodicity is around the 75 year mark. Because Halley’s Comet is visible to the naked eye its appearance over the Earth has often been recorded within human history.

The first confirmed historical account of Halley’s Comet dates from 240 BC when its appearance was recorded in a Chinese chronicle. Babylonian records from 164 BC and 87 BC also record visits by the comet. Chinese astronomers recorded the comet’s visit to Earth in 12 BC, and some propose that this visit may have inspired the biblical story of the Star of Bethlehem, as the appearance of the comet was only a few years distant from when Jesus is believed to have been born (circa 7 to 2 years BC).  The comet continued to be observed and recorded over the years and the next most notable appearance was in 1066 when the comet was most famously recorded in the Bayeux Tapestry which chronicled the Battle of Hastings and the death of King Harold II of England.

Calculating the return of the comet was not Halley’s only accomplishment, during his illustrious career he is also known for a number of other achievements. Between 1676 and 1678 Halley recorded the celestial longitudes and latitudes of 341 stars in the southern hemisphere. In 1691, Halley built a diving bell, and with five companions he dived to a depth of 18m in the River Thames where they are reported to have remained for over 90 minutes. Halley further refined his diving bell design and was eventually able to execute dives of up to 4 hours in duration. Halley also pioneered a basic model of a magnetic compass, and established the link between barometric pressure and height above sea level.

Not all of Halley’s work and theories were sound however. Halley was a “hollow-Earther” and in 1692 he proposed the idea that the Earth was hollow and comprised of an outer shell that was 800km thick with two further inner shells and a core at the centre. He proposed that each shell was separated by an atmosphere and that each shell had its own magnetic poles and that they all rotated at different speeds (potentially explaining anomalous compass readings). In Halley’s model of the Earth each shell had its own atmosphere, and he proposed that it was the escape of this gas that caused the Aurora Borealis. Halley also suggest that each shell was illuminated and may also possibly harbour life.

In 1694 Halley proposed that the biblical story of Noah's flood might be an early account of the result of a comet impacting the Earth. This was an idea that was not well received by The Royal Society!

1720 saw Halley participating in the first known attempt to scientifically date Stonehenge. The working assumption being that Stonehenge had been laid out using a magnetic compass and extant magnetic records where used to try to calculate a construction date. Based on this method the earliest proposed date for the construction of Stonehenge was estimated as 460 BC, which as we know today is somewhat wrong, with the current accepted date being somewhere between 3,000 and 2,000 years BC.

So next time you visit Oxford look out for Halley's house, and if you happen to still be alive in 2061 keep an eye on the sky, you may get to see his comet!

New College Lane, Oxford.

The house where Halley lived. 

The memorial to Halley's time in residence.

New College Lane also features this interesting foot bridge that was erected in 1914 to link two buildings of Hertford College. Some say that this bridge is reminiscent of the Venetian Bridge of Sighs. 

Pictures, Oxfordshire (October 2014).

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Oxford Curiosities

During a recent scamper around the free museums of Oxford, I spotted two items on display that piqued my curiosity. Here is what I found:

The Dangers of Metal Wallpaper

The below two pictures show an Electrostatic Lightning House on display in the Oxford Museum of the History of Science, which was manufactured by W. & S. Jones, London circa 1830.

The Electrostatic Lightning House is a small wooden model of a house, which is home to three women (who seem to be made of paper), who are attached by small wires to a lightning conductor on the roof of the house. The model seems to be a representation of an event that occurred in the 18th century.  The occupants of a property were injured when it was struck by lightning and the metal in the wallpaper of the property brought the electricity into contact with them. The label accompanying the model explains:

Lightning House

Unique model replicating an actual event described in the 18th century: the occupants of a house received severe shocks from the metal patterns in their wallpaper as a lightning bolt coursed through the house to earth. In the model, the figures are placed in front of small spark-gaps made by wires in the walls of the house. They were knocked over by the sparks when a Leyden jar was discharged through wires. 

Sadly a search of the Internet revealed no further information on the curious events that are depicted by the model. But it stands without saying, be careful if you have metal wallpaper!

The Bottled Witch

The next curiosity was seen in the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford. The diverse collection that forms the Pitt Rivers Museum includes a display of magical items. One of these items is a small silvered bottle that apparently contains a witch. The label that accompanies the bottle reads:

EUROPE, ENGLAND, SUSSEX, HOVE.
Silvered and stoppered bottle said to contain a witch, obtained about 1915 from an old lady living in a village near Hove, Sussex. She remarked “... and they do say there be a witch in it and if you let un out there it be a peak o' trouble.”
Donated by Miss M. A. Murray. 1926.6.1

Here's to wondering what the bottle really does contain!

Pictures, Oxfordshire (October 2014).

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Finding Sweet F.A.

The gravestone pictured below can be found in the town cemetery of Alton in Hampshire. The gravestone commemorates a young girl called Fanny Adams who was murdered in 1867. The inscription of the gravestone reads:

 Sacred to the memory of Fanny Adams aged 8 years and 4 months who was cruelly murdered on Saturday August 24th 1867.

Fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul but rather fear Him which is able to destroy both body and soul in hell. Matthew 10 v 28.

It seems that on Saturday 24 August 1867 Fanny Adams (aged 8) was out walking along Tanhouse Lane in Alton with her friend (also aged 8) and her sister (aged 7). During the course of this walk they encountered a local solicitor's clerk named Frederick Baker. After offering the girls some money, Baker abducted Fanny and took her into a nearby field.

When the two girls (without Fanny) returned home the alarm was raised and Fanny’s mother and a neighbour went up the lane to find her. Walking up the lane they encountered Baker but did not suspect him of any wrong-doing due to his respectability in the community.

The search for Fanny continued into the early evening and her body was eventually found in the field. It is said that her body had been butchered, with her head, legs and eyes removed and her torso emptied of its organs. Over the course of the next few days all of her missing body parts where eventually found.

Baker was duly arrested, and although he claimed innocence, he apparently had blood on his shirt and trousers and was in possession of two blood-stained knives. The piece of evidence that finally removed doubt of his guilt was his diary entry for the day, which read “24th August, Saturday – killed a young girl. It was fine and hot.”. At his trial Baker was found guilty of the murder and he was hung on 24th December 1867 outside Winchester Jail.

The horrible nature of this murder and the widespread reporting of the crime led to the name Fanny Adams becoming widely known and eventually being perverted into a form of slang.  In 1869 new rations of tinned mutton were introduced into the British Navy and they were widely reviled by the Sailors. It became a Navy joke that some parts of Fanny’s body may have found its way in to this new tinned provision. So the phrase Sweet Fanny Adams sprang up as a slang for this worthless form of tinned meat. Over the years this phrase became generalised to mean “nothing at all”.

If you want to find Sweet FA for yourself, then Alton town cemetery can be found on Old Odiham Road. Fanny’s gravestone is in the south side of the cemetery, to the north of Spitalfields Road. The approximate location is 51.153286, -0.975730.

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Fanny Adam's gravestone in the distance.

A close up.

Tributes to Fanny. 

Pictures, Hampshire (September 2014).

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