Shop

Pack of 5 christmas cards.

Hereford Cathedral, St Thomas Cantilupe enters the Cathedral Christmas day 1276.

It is Christmas Day 1276. Thomas Cantilupe, Bishop of Hereford enters his cathedral in state. Residents of the city look on and children play games in the winter weather. Even the cathedral cat comes out into the cold to join in the festivities.

A few years later Thomas Cantilupe's tomb in the cathedral became a great draw to pilgrims and many miracles of healing occurred there. He was made a saint in 1320.

Although considered by some to be an effete and degenerate practice, "an hote bath of swete watre" presented medieval bathers with the opportunity to clean and preen themselves, while medicinal baths were also prescribed to treat the symptoms and ease the pains of the sick. Manuscripts list when and with whom baths might be taken, and give details of the most effective herbs and potions to be added to the water. The rich might bathe in marble or stone baths. More commonly, portable wooden tubs were used.

Pack of 5 christmas cards.

Born in 1357 in Pauntley, Gloucestershire, the Dick Whittington of pantomime fame was a real historical character who became one of the greatest cloth merchants in medieval England. Here he leaves from the wonderful carved Norman doorway of Pauntley Church and sets out for London where he was appointed four times as Lord Mayor in 1397, 1398, 1407 and 1420. Martlets from the Royal Coat of Arms fly out to meet him and lead the way to London.

Based on illustrations in a mid-fourteenth century English psalter, the girls play tabor, cymbals, recorder, symphony (hurdy gurdy), fiddle and organ.

The popular game given an eleventh century twist.

Pack of 10 Christmas cards and envelopes.

The historical Wenceslas of the popular carol was a Christian prince and martyr born in Bohemia in about 907AD. The words of the carol were written by John M.Neale (1818-1866) and first appeared in Carols for Christmastide in 1853. The tune (Tempus Adest Floridum) is a thirteenth century Swedish carol first published in Sweden in 1582

The Green Man sleeps.

Stylised Green Man heads, disgorging leaves from their heads and faces, were commonly found during the Middle Ages in Christian contexts carved into stone and wood.  They probably symbolised creation and resurrection. However, the tradition of The Green man undoubtedly dates back even further to more ancient pagan folk lore and customs associated with the veneration of trees and the changing seasons of the year.

The founding of Hailes Abbey by Richard, Earl of Cornwall in 1246.

Hailes Abbey was founded by Richard, Earl of Cornwall in 1246 as a thanksgiving for surviving a shipwreck, and dedicated on November 5th 1251 at a lavish ceremony attended by the King and Queen, and all the 'great men of England'. The Abbey went on to become one of the richest and most popular centres of pilgrimage in all Christendom after Richard's son, Edmund, presented Hailes with a phial of the Holy Blood in 1270.

An illustration from the classic story by The Brothers Grimm.

Pack of 5 christmas cards.

Eton College 'Wetbobs' sailing into Bethlehem.

Pack of 5 christmas cards.

Green Man dreams of quieter times and greener Christmases.

SORRY!

SOLD OUT