An English
folk tradition dating back over 450 years connects Holy Cross Day on September
14th with another custom called ‘nutting’.
Originally, the feast day took place to commemorate a piece of the True
Cross that was recovered and stored safely in Constantinople, in 629 BC. But as is
the nature of events, in 1560 some Eton schoolboys were granted a
half-day holiday on Holy Cross Day and decided to amuse themselves by gathering
nuts.
“All the youths are now a-nutting gone.”
Grim the Collier of Croydon- a popular
17th century play.
The nuts in
question are hazelnuts with the nuts ripening in hedgerows from September
onwards. Hazelnuts have many links to folk lore and have associations with wisdom
and power (it is a hazel rod that should be used for water divining) The phrase
‘going a nutting’ crops up regularly
in 17th century songs and plays, and was a by word for sex and
seduction – young people being alone in the woods ...! Such was the link between
collecting nuts and more risque activities that a popular expression in 1660 was:
“A good year for nuts, a good year for
babies.” |
| Eton College in 1690 |
Over the
years the Devil became associated with the collecting of nuts, although exactly
how these two things became linked is not clear, (perhaps parents invoked the devil to
discourage their offspring from getting pregnant!) Country folk were warned not
to go nutting on Sundays as the Devil would be disguised as a gentleman and trick them by
offering to pull down the top branches.
Another time
the Devil was likely to be abroad was Holy Cross Day, as poet John Clare, writes
in 1825:
“On Holy Rood [Cross] Day it is faithfully…believed both by old
and young that the Devil goes a –nutting…I have heard many people affirm that
they thought it a tale until they ventured into the woods on that day when they
smelt such a strong smell of brimstone as nearly stifled them before they could
escape…”
 |
| Victorians collecting nuts. |
And finally,
in Warwickshire there is a legend that a particular hill, The Devil’s Nightcap
near Alcester, was formed when the Devil met the Virgin Mary on the road and
dropped his nutting bag in fright!
This blog post is part of an Absolute Write blog hop. To read the other posts in this hop follow the links below:
DevilChilde
Lurking Musings
Morning Glory
D R Slaten
Do Not Tamper With...
Lizzy's Dark Fiction
Tara Quan
The title had my mind going somewhere else. lol
ReplyDelete*winks* - perhaps you were meant to be misled...
DeleteG x
Very interesting. And I love all your pics, especially the cat and the squirrel. So cute.
ReplyDeleteThanks for that, Linnea. I'm rather partial to pics with cats in...it's always fun finding the appropriate photo to go with the post.
DeleteG x
“A good year for nuts, a good year for babies.”--I've heard that before. Now I know how it came about. The squirrel picture is adorable.
ReplyDeleteTara, I must admit I hadn't heard that expression before - but I do love finding out the origins of these things.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, the squirrel pic is gorgeous! I wonder if it was hand reared - he doesn't look fully grown and I can't imagine under normal circumstances he'd let a cat snuggle up to him.
G x
Hiya Grace,
ReplyDelete14th September is Nutting Day -when you should collect nuts
21st September is Devil's Nutting Day - when you should not collect nuts!