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The Ghosts of Cornwall: A Spooktacular Tour of Haunted Pasties and Cream Teas

14 May

Well hello there, my fellow spooky enthusiasts! Today we’re going to dive into the fascinating world of Cornish folklore and ghost stories. So sit back, grab some popcorn (or should I say, cornish pasties?), and let’s get started.

First things first, let’s talk about the history of ghosts and folklore in Cornwall. As you may know, Cornwall has a rich history of myths and legends, dating all the way back to the Bronze Age. The ancient Celts who inhabited the area believed in a whole host of supernatural creatures, from piskies (mischievous little folk) to bucca (sea monsters) to the dreaded knockers (mine-dwelling spirits who helped or hindered miners). And of course, no discussion of Cornish folklore would be complete without mentioning the infamous Morgawr, a giant sea serpent said to inhabit the waters around Falmouth.

But what about ghosts, you ask? Well, Cornish ghosts are a varied bunch, with a wide range of spookiness levels. One of the most well-known haunted locations in Cornwall is Jamaica Inn, made famous by Daphne du Maurier’s novel of the same name. This 18th-century coaching inn is said to be haunted by the ghosts of smugglers, who used to use the inn as a base for their illicit activities.

Another spooky spot is Tintagel Castle, legendary birthplace of King Arthur. Visitors have reported seeing ghostly knights wandering the ruins, and hearing strange noises that some say are the echoes of long-dead battles.

And then there’s the tale of Jan Tregeagle, a notorious Cornish rogue who made a deal with the devil to avoid damnation. He was tasked with an impossible task of emptying Dozmary Pool on Bodmin Moor with a leaking limpet shell. He never finished the task and ended up being chased by a pack of demonic hounds, which is said to be heard on the moor on stormy nights.

Of course, these are just a few examples of the many ghosts and legends that can be found in Cornwall. Whether you’re a believer or a skeptic, there’s no denying that the tales of Cornish folklore and ghost stories are fascinating and spine-tingling.

So there you have it, folks! A brief (and hopefully amusing) overview of the history of ghosts and folklore in Cornwall. If you’re ever in the area, be sure to keep an eye out for any mischievous piskies or ghostly knights. And don’t forget to bring plenty of pasties for the journey!

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The Haunted and the Haunters

19 Dec

With Christmas fast approaching and the ghost story season with it, this is perhaps a useful time to ask where the phenomenon of the Haunted House story first came from. For some, what effectively launched the genre of Haunted House stories was The Haunted and the Haunters, described by H P Lovecraft himself as “one of the best short haunted house tales ever written.” It is based on reports the writer, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, had heard about a building in the heart of London’s Mayfair, but it is also perhaps based on his own real life experiences. Lytton was born in London in 1803 and, despite his noble birth, was forced to earn his living as a writer, until he inherited the title of Lord Lytton in 1866. In the interim, he had become popular with readers for his historical novels – notably The Last Days of Pompeii (1834) – and a number of stories of the occult and supernatural. Highly regarded among these are his novel A Strange Story (1861) and short story Glenallan. The family seat of Lord Lytton was Knebworth House, a notable Tudor mansion, with a beautiful Jacobean banqueting hall, overlain with a 19th century Victorian Gothic exterior. Knebworth House has been the home of the Lytton family since 1490 and boasts some hauntings of a deeply personal nature. For example, the family is warned of an impending death by the sound and occasional sighting of a girl named Jenny, spinning. Other phenomena include a presence in the rooms once frequented by Edward Bulwer-Lytton himself, who died in 1873, and some believe he may have decided to remain there. “The pen is mightier than the sword” – an iconic proverb coined by Lytton in 1839 – is a phrase which makes regular appearances to this very day; just like its creator, the ghost of whom is said to haunt the gothic stately home where he once lived.

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The Most Haunted Places in Dorset

19 Sep

The distant past is perhaps more tangible in Dorset than in any other part of England. Predominantly rural, this county overlaps substantially with the ancient kingdom of Wessex, whose most famous ruler, Alfred the Great, repulsed the Danes in the ninth century and came close to establishing the first unified state in England. Before Wessex came into being, however, many earlier civilizations had left their stamp on the region. The chalky uplands of nearby Wiltshire boast several of Europe’s greatest Neolithic sites, including Stonehenge and Avebury, while in Dorset you’ll find Maiden Castle, the most striking Iron Age hill fort in the country, and the Cerne Abbas Giant, source of many a legend. The Romans tramped all over this southern county, leaving the most conspicuous signs of their occupation at the amphitheatre of Dorchester – though that town is more closely associated with the novels of Thomas Hardy and his distinctively gloomy vision of Wessex. None of the landscapes of this region could be described as grand or wild, but the countryside is consistently seductive, its appeal exemplified by the crumbling fossil-bearing cliffs around Lyme Regis, the managed woodlands of the New Forest, or the gentle, open curves of Salisbury Plain. With this weight of history it is hardly surprising to hear that Dorset has often been called one of the most haunted parts of the British Isles. You can feel your skin crawl as you stand amidst the ghostly occupants of Dorset’s spooky pubs, stately homes and historic buildings, where paranormal activity haunts the grounds and current residents. From whispering voices and swirling white mists to eerie spirits and ghastly ghouls, Dorset is full of haunted locations and ghost stories, guaranteed to leave you with a chill.

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The doppelgänger effect

15 Aug

A doppelgänger is a mysterious, exact double of a living person. It’s a German word that literally translates to “double walker” or “double goer”. A doppelganger isn’t someone who just resembles you, but is an exact double, right down to the way you walk, act, talk, and dress. A friend or even a close relative who encounters your doppelganger will swear it was you, even though you can prove you were not in the location the double was sighted. Although the word doppelgänger is often used in a more general and neutral sense, and in slang, to describe any person who physically resembles another person, in German folklore it is used to described a wraith or apparition of a living person, as distinguished from a ghost. The concept of the existence of a spirit double, an exact but usually invisible replica of every man, bird, or beast, is an ancient and widespread belief. To meet one’s double is a sign that one’s death is imminent. The doppelgänger became a popular symbol of horror literature, and the theme took on considerable complexity. In The Double (1846), by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, for example, a poor clerk, Golyadkin, driven to madness by poverty and unrequited love, beholds his own wraith, who succeeds in everything at which Golyadkin has failed. Finally the wraith succeeds in disposing of his original. An earlier, well-known story of a doppelgänger appears in the 1815 novel The Devil’s Elixir, by the German writer of fantastic tales E.T.A. Hoffmann. In fiction and mythology, a doppelgänger is often portrayed as a ghostly or paranormal phenomenon and usually seen as a harbinger of bad luck. Other traditions and stories equate a doppelgänger with an evil twin. In modern times, the term twin stranger is occasionally used.

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Shakespeare’s Dark Lady

15 Nov

The seductive Dark Lady who inspired some of Shakespeare’s most famous and explicit sonnets has remained a mystery for centuries. This mysterious woman is described in Shakespeare’s sonnets and so called because the poems make it clear that she has black wiry hair and dark, brown, “dun” coloured skin. What was to become perhaps one of the most famous poetic works of all time was a slim volume on publication in 1609, containing 154 poems over 67 pages, and the edition is now extremely rare: only 13 copies survive. But its influence has been all-encompassing, providing a template for language, for literature, for love, ever since. Recent years have seen the sonnets disseminated in ways that Shakespeare could never have imagined. “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” is quoted 5m times on the internet. Apps have been created in which famous voices recite the poems, sonnets are tweeted, T-shirts are printed, and poetry that was once said to circulate only among Shakespeare’s “private friends” is now stored for ever in the cloud. But what remains one of the great mysteries of English literature is who, exactly, was the “Dark Lady” of Shakespeare’s Sonnets? Did she even exist? And, if so, who was this tantalising woman with “raven” brows and black hair to whom Shakespeare addressed a string of overtly passionate and sometimes explicit poems? Scholars have debated the issue for decades — potential candidates include Aline Florio, wife to a translator, Mary Fitton, a lady-in-waiting, and “Black Luce”, a brothel-owner.

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What became of the Bunyip?

24 Mar

Australia is famous for its huge swathes of untouched wilderness and for the unique, often deadly animals that wander there. You wouldn’t expect that a nation with the likes of the platypus and the killer box jellyfish would need to invent a new creature to add to its allure, yet reports of a mysterious, massive creature lurking in the waters of Australia abound. This creature, the Bunyip, is as much a part of Australian culture as any of its other fantastic beasts. The Bunyip (translated in Aboriginal Australian to mean devil or evil spirit), also known as the Kianpraty, is a creature of Aboriginal mythology. It lives in swamps, billabongs, creeks, riverbeds and waterholes all over Australia. The Bunyip has many descriptions. Some say it has a dog-like face, dark fur, a horse-like tail, flippers, walrus-like tusks, and a duck-like bill. Others think the creature has an appearance similar to a snake with a man and a beard. Some even think that the Bunyip is actually the prehistoric marsupial, Diprotodon australis, that managed to escape extinction. But the figure of the Bunyip was part of traditional Aboriginal beliefs and stories throughout Australia, while its name varied according to tribal nomenclature. In his 2001 book, writer Robert Holden identified at least nine regional variations of the creature known as the Bunyip across Aboriginal Australia. Europeans recorded various written accounts of Bunyips in the early and mid-19th century, as they began to settle across the country.

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Krampus: The Devil of Christmas

17 Dec

Krampus is the dark companion of St. Nicholas, the traditional European winter gift-bringer who rewards good children each year on December 6. The kindly old Saint leaves the task of punishing bad children to a hell-bound counterpart known by many names across the continent — Knecht Ruprecht, Certa, Perchten, Black Peter, Schmutzli, Pelznickel, Klaubauf, and Krampus. Usually seen as a classic devil with horns, cloven hooves and monstrous tongue, but can also be spotted as a sinister gentleman dressed in black, or a hairy man-beast, Krampus punishes the naughty children, swatting them with switches and rusty chains before dragging them, in baskets, to a fiery place below. Krampus himself historically comes around the night of December 5, tagging along with St. Nicholas. He visits houses all night with his saintly pal. While St. Nick is on hand to put sweets and other goodies in the shoes of good children and birch twigs in the shoes of the bad, Krampus’ particular specialty is punishing naughty children. Legend has it that throughout the Christmas season, misbehaved kids are beaten with birch branches or can disappear, stuffed into Krampus’ sack and hauled off to his lair to be tortured or eaten. Krampus is celebrated on Krampusnacht, which takes place on the eve of St. Nicholas’ Day. In Austria, Northern Italy and other parts of Europe, party-goers masquerade as devils, wild-men, and witches to participate in Krampuslauf (Krampus Run). Intoxicated and bearing torches, costumed devils caper and carouse through the streets terrifying child and adult alike. Krampusnacht is increasingly being celebrated in other parts of Europe such as Finland and France, as well as in many American cities.

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Canterbury Tales

13 Nov

One of England’s most venerable cities, Canterbury offers a rich slice through two thousand years of history, with Roman and early Christian ruins, a Norman castle, and a famous cathedral that dominates a medieval warren of time-skewed Tudor dwellings. The city began as a Belgic settlement that was overrun by the Romans and renamed Durovernum, from where they proceeded to establish a garrison, supply base and system of roads that was to reach as far as the Scottish borders. With the Roman empire’s collapse came the Saxons, who renamed the town Cantwarabyrig; it was a Saxon king, Ethelbert, who in 597 welcomed Augustine, dispatched by the pope to convert the British Isles to Christianity. By the time of his death, Augustine had founded two Benedictine monasteries, one of which – Christ Church, raised on the site of the Roman basilica – was to become the first cathedral in England. Canterbury, like any other city with such rich history, has its fair share of spooky ghost stories, including the Girl in Grey in St Margaret’s Street, the mysterious figure in white at the Marlowe Theatre, and the Robed Man of Sudbury Tower.

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The Ash-Tree

19 Apr

Although it is far from the best known of his ghost stories, The Ash-Tree is perhaps the most explicitly grisly of all M R James’ tales of the supernatural. This particular short story is also very personal, for it is the one that most powerfully reflects his near-pathological fear of spiders, hints of which also appear in The Tractate Middoth. In European folklore the ash tree does have occult significance, but it is generally positive: there is Yggdrasil, the World Tree in Norse mythology; the Christmas log was of ash and was thought to bring prosperity to the family that burned it; tools made of ash were thought to allow the persons using them to do more and better work etc. Conversely, witches were believed to ride through the air on ash branches – a point of relevance in that witchcraft plays a critical role in the story.

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The Ghosts of Haddon Hall

7 Jun

Haddon Hall, perhaps the most simple and understated of English stately homes, is also one of the finest medieval manor houses in Britain. Nestled in the heart of the Peak District National Park, it certainly enjoys a picturesque setting, two miles south of Bakewell (known for its eponymous tarts) on the banks of the River Wye. In the mid-twelfth century the hall passed from its Norman founders to the Vernon family, who owned it for four hundred years until the most famous event in its history occurred. In 1558 the sole remaining Vernon heir, Dorothy, married John Manners, scion of another powerful family who later became Dukes of Rutland. Their union is commemorated in their joint tomb in Bakewell church, but the romantic story of their elopement may be apochryphal. Dorothy Vernon was 18 at the time and it is said that the couple eloped during the wedding of one of her sisters. There must have been some sort of reconciliation, as Dorothy and John later became owners of Haddon Hall. The hall has been owned by the Manners ever since then, but curiously enough has never been sold. The mansion fell into two hundred years of neglect from the start of the eighteenth century until the 9th Duke began restoring Haddon Hall when he moved there in 1912. No one quite knows the reason for the building’s neglect and seeming lack of interest to buyers – although this may have something to do with the fact that the ghost of Dorothy Vernon is said to appear there on a regular basis, usually seen on the steps leading up to Haddon Hall, as if being chased.

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