Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

  • The Holy Maul

    Such of your readers as are members of the Camden Society may remember that in the volume of Anecdotes and Traditions, among other curious illustrations of our folk-lore, which Aubrey has recorded in his “Remains of Gentilism and Judaism,” there occurs the following remarkable allusion to a very repulsive superstition : “The Holy Mawle, which […]

  • A Word Charm

    As from your earliest years you have shown a true appreciation of literary curiosities of all kinds, I send you “a charm” which in some degree explains itself. The copy from which I take this was made by a Lincolnshire clergyman, from one in the possession of an honest farmer’s wife at Saltfleetby St. Clements, […]

  • Ancient Charm Against Fire

    Among the figured tiles in Great Malvern Church engraved in your Magazine for (844, plate 1, figure vii. (and at large in Nichol’s ” Specimens of Encaustic Tiles,” fig. 75, where it is mentioned as having been found also at Shrewsbury) is one which I will request you to introduce again to the notice of […]

  • Charms, Omens, And Cautionary Denouncements

    I recognize every one of your correspondent, Mr. Noake, charms, omens, and cautionary denouncements, but do not admit their exclusive application to Worcester. [See ante, p. I 33.] I have had the benefit of their inculcation in every county in England, and I have rigidly and reverently obeyed, as my fingers and toes will testify, […]

  • A Ring Superstition

    Popular superstitions are always worth recording ; they illustrate tradition, and exemplify manners. I do not remember to have ever seen mention of a notion which prevails in Berkshire, and, for aught I know, in other parts of England that a ring, made from a piece of silver collected at the communion, is a cure […]

  • The King’s Evil Cured By A Royal Touch

    Having just seen Mr. Carte’s “History of England,” I found the following remarkable story, which he has laboriously introduced by way of note to illustrate his history a thousand years preceding. Speaking of the unction of kings, and the gift of healing the scrophulous humour call’d the king’s evil, exercised by some European princes, anointed […]

  • January 6th – Twelfth Day

    Being twelfth-day, his majesty went to the chapel royal, with the usual solemnity, and offered gold, myrrh, and frankincense, in three purses, at the altar, according to ancient custom. Your anonymous correspondent, vol. H. p. 928, having said that he never heard of Lamb’s-wool, or Christmas-eve, and cannot guess the meaning, I am induced to […]

  • Hair Of The Same Dog

    When a person, after drinking too much, finds himself disordered next morning, the advice is, to take a hair of the same dog, or of the old dog. Quaere, upon what ground this notion is taken up? Is it from an opinion, that poisonous animals carry their own antidote, as the exungia viperina is good […]

  • Remedies For The Headache

    The following receipt is literally transcribed from “The most excellent and perfecte homishe Apothecarye, or homely Physick Book, translated out of the Almaine Speche into English, by John Holly-bush. Collen, 1561.” [See note 32] The credulity and superstition of the early practitioners of physic are so singular as scarcely to merit belief in the present […]

  • Ancient Book Of Medical Recipes

    About twenty years since, I procured several curious MSS. from a mass of papers which had belonged to Mr. William Pickering, an apparitor of the Consistory Court, at Durham ; and among these was a neatly written folio book, with the title-page, ” EDWARD POTTER. ijs. iiijd. HERE BEGINNETH A Booke of Phisicke and Chirurgery, […]

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