The tombstones in St Margaret’s churchyard, Rochester are arranged like teeth along one wall. It faces out onto the Medway and, if you’ve got the strength, to look over there’s also a steep slope beneath. But it was here that I found the Good Samaritan headstone.  Never underestimate the power of a lovely sunny day to really bring out the beauty of a good carving.

A man is depicted on it, lying half naked being comforted by another man while a horse, presumably the victim’s, stands nearby.  In the distance two figures, presumably men, walk away with their backs to the scene.  It’s a well carved little picture and  I immediately thought of Parable of the Good Samaritan.

I am indebted to the Kent Archaeological; Society for the transcript of the epitaph. .  Even at 400% magnification, all I could make out was

‘…….Wife….

….this life…

…1777…..

…Children..’

It actually reads:

(In memory of)

Catherine Wife of Will Bromley

Departed this life

The ( ) Feb 1777

aged 33 years

Also Six Children

Will Bromley

departed this life

( ) June 1783 aged 41 years

Also William Gerrad Bromley died

the 30th of January 180(7) aged (36 years)

The Parable of The Good Samaritan comes from the Gospel of Luke, verses 10:25-37 and here is a shortened version taken from the World English Bible:

‘Jesus answered, “A certain man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who both stripped him and beat him, and departed, leaving him half dead. By chance a certain priest was going down that way. When he saw him, he passed by on the other side. In the same way a Levite also, when he came to the place, and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a certain Samaritan, as he travelled, came where he was. When he saw him, he was moved with compassion, came to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. He set him on his own animal, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. On the next day, when he departed, he took out two denarii, gave them to the host, and said to him, ‘Take care of him. Whatever you spend beyond that, I will repay you when I return.’ Now which of these three do you think seemed to be a neighbor to him who fell among the robbers?”’

He said, “He who showed mercy on him.”

Then Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”

The Samaritan who stopped to help is described as Good but in reality Jews and Samaritans hated each other. They were known to destroy each other’s temples but few people have heard of the Samaritans nowadays. According to Wikipedia, the parable is now:

‘…….often recast in a more modern setting where the people are ones in equivalent social groups known not to interact comfortably. Thus, cast appropriately, the parable regains its message to modern listeners: namely, that an individual of a social group they disapprove of can exhibit moral behaviour that is superior to individuals of the groups they approve.’

At the time in which the Parable is set, the Jerusalem to Jericho road was known as ‘The Way of Blood’ due to the amount of blood that was spilt on it from attacks on travellers by robbers.  It was extremely dangerous.  In fact Martin Luther King Jr in his ‘I’ve been to the Mountaintop’ speech given the day before his death, had more sympathy for the Levite and priest who ignored the victim and went on with their journeys. He described the road as:

‘As soon as we got on that road I said to my wife, “I can see why Jesus used this as the setting for his parable.” It’s a winding, meandering road … In the days of Jesus it came to be known as the “Bloody Pass.” And you know, it’s possible that the priest and the Levite looked over that man on the ground and wondered if the robbers were still around. Or it’s possible that they felt that the man on the ground was merely faking, and he was acting like he had been robbed and hurt in order to seize them over there, lure them there for quick and easy seizure. And so the first question that the priest asked, the first question that the Levite asked was, “If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?’^’]

Wikipedia

There are several other interpretations of the Good Samaritan parable and if you are interested you can find them here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_Good_Samaritan

The phrase ‘Good Samaritan’ has become part of modern language and denotes someone who helps a stranger. There are several worldwide hospitals named after him and it has inspired art, fiction, photography and sculpture amongst others.   This is a 17^th century painting from 1647

and here is a modern sculpture from Nova Scotia.

However, the only images that I could find that resembled the headstone carving were from 19^th century bibles which were much later than the carving on the headstone. This is taken from the 1875 Children’s Picture Bible Book.

So was the wife or the husband buried in St Margaret’s churchyard the Good Samaritan or was the image chosen to remind the viewer to be one to their fellow men?  We may never know.

©Text and photos Carole Tyrrell unless otherwise stated

References and further reading:

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+10%3A25-37&version=KJV

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_Good_Samaritan

https://www.kentarchaeology.org.uk/research/monumental-inscriptions/rochester-st-margarets-church#03

It’s snowdrop time again and already they are beginning to put out their heads and make passers by feel that Spring is finally on its way. But there’s more to snowdrops than their pristine white colour.

February 2 was Candlemass and it seemed appropriate to revisit an older post featuring one of the first, and perhaps one of the most symbolic, flowers to appear in the New Year….

Imagine yourself in a gloomy medieval church on the festival of Candlemass. You, and your fellow parishioners, have each brought your candles to be blessed by the priest and, after the procession which will fill the church with light, they will all be placed in front of a statue of the Virgin Mary.   Candlemass marked the end of winter and the beginning of Spring and the blessing is to ward off evil spirits.  It traditionally falls on February 2 and is shared with the Celtic festival of Imbolc.  And in the churchyard outside you can see green shoots forcing their way up through the hard winter earth.  The snowdrop’s milk-white flowers show that spring is on its way as they begin to emerge into the light.

The placing of the lit candles in front of the Virgin Mary’s statue gave the snowdrop one of its many other names – Mary’s Tapers.  But there are many others such: Dingle Dangle, Candlemas Bells, Fair Maids of February, Snow Piercer, Death’s Flower and Corpse Flower.

The snowdrop’s appearance has also inspired many comments . According to the Scottish Wildlife Trusts website they have been described as resembling 3 drops of milk hanging from a stem and they are also associated with the ear drop which is an old fashioned ear ring.  Anyone who has seen a group of snowdrops nodding in the wind will understand what they mean.   The snowdrop’s colour is associated with purity and they have been described as a shy flower with their drooping flowers.  However, the eco enchantments website reveals that the flower is designed in this way due:

‘to the necessity of their dusty pollen being kept dry and sweet in order to attract the few insects flying in winter.’

Snowdrops have been known since ancient times and, in 1597, appeared in Geralde’s ‘Great Herbal where they were called by the less than catchy name of ‘Timely Flowers Bulbous Violets’.  Its Latin name is Galanthus nivalis.  Galanthus means milk white flowers and the nivalis element translates as snowy according to the great botanist, Linnaeus in 1753.   In the language of flowers they’re associated with ‘Hope’ and the coming of spring and life reawakening.

However, yet despite all these positive associations, the elegant snowdrop has a much darker side. Monks were reputed to have brought them to the UK but it was the ever enthusiastic Victorians who copiously planted them in graveyards, churchyards and cemeteries which then linked them with death.  Hence the nickname name ‘Death’s Flower.’

They were described by Margaret Baker in the 1903 ‘Encyclopedia of Superstitions, Folklore and the Occult of the World’ as:

‘so much like a corpse in a shroud that in some counties  the people will not have it in the house, lest they bring in death.‘

So that’s where the ‘Corpse Flower’ nickname came from.

Snowdrops are also seen as Death’s Tokens and there are several regional folk traditions of connecting death with them. For example in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries it was considered very unlucky to bring the flower into the house from outside as it was felt that a death would soon occur.  The most unlucky snowdrop was that with a single bloom on its stem.    Other folk traditions were described in a 1913 folklore handbook which claims that if a snowdrop was brought indoors it will make the cows milk watery and affect the colour of the butter.  Even as late as 1969 in ‘The Folklore of Plants’  it was stated that having a snowdrop indoors could affect the number of eggs that a sitting chicken might hatch.  A very powerful plant if these are all to be believed – you have been warned!

It’s amazing that this little flower has so many associations and legends connected with it but I always see it as a harbinger of spring, rebirth and an indication of warmer days to come.

But the snowdrop also has a surprise.  This came courtesy of the Urban Countryman page on Facebook – not all social media is time wasting!  If you very gently turn over a snowdrop bloom you will find that the underside is even prettier and they also vary depending on the snowdrop variety.

Here is a small selection from my local churchyard and one from Kensal Green cemetery.

So don’t underestimate the snowdrop – it’s a plant associated with life and death but watch out for your hens and the colour of your butter if you do decide to tempt fate…..

©Carole Tyrrell text and photos unless otherwise stated

References:

http://www.plantlore.com

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/naturestudies/bright-in-winters-depths-why-the-flawless-flower-of-candlemas-is-ajoy-forever-8483967

http://www.flowermeaning.com/snowdrop-flower-meaning

http://www.ecoenchantments.co.uk/mysnowdropmagicpage.html

Nature’s “death tokens”

Queen Alexandra’s memorial ©Carole Tyrrell

The memorial is set into the garden wall of Marlborough House which had been Queen Alexandra’s London home and was sculpted in bronze by Alfred Gilbert who also designed the Eros monument in London’s Piccadilly.  Alix’s memorial was his last great work and he worked on it during 1926-1932. It was his biographer who brought him back to England after his scandalous flight to Bruges with creditors chasing after him. He had left the tomb of Alix’s son, the Duke of Clarence, unfinished after going wildly over budget. It’s in Prince Albert’s Chapel near St George’s Chapel in Windsor. The tomb was also in the Art Nouveau style and is wildly extravagant. The Duke lies on top of the tomb dressed in a Hussar uniform while above him a kneeling angel bends over him to place a crown upon his head. Alix never fully recovered from his death and kept the room in which he had died as a shrine. So Gilbert was an obvious choice for Alix’s memorial despite Edward loathing him.  After 20 years of silence, it was presumed that Gilbert was dead.  However, he had been living in Rome on a Civil List pension. But, despite his antipathy to Gilbert, Edward knighted him and made the Royal Academy re-admit him. And, finally, the missing figures in the Duke’s tomb were completed.

Alfred Gilbert by Frederick Hollyer 1887. Shared under Wiki Commons

Arthur Sanderson, drawing of the tomb of the Duke of Clarence, Prince Albert’s Chapel, near St George’s Chapel, Windsor. from Pinterest.

Queen Alexandra’s memorial has been adapted from Perpendicular Gothic architecture with 3 buttressed and pinnacled canopies over the 4 allegorical figures and linenfold motifs on the screen behind them.  On either side of the central figure there are 2 more smaller figures; one holds a cross and represents Religion and the other has no attribute. The two pillars on either side of the figures have lamps in them at the top and I imagine the effect must be quite ghostly and mysterious at night.

The figure called ‘Religion’ ©Carole Tyrrell

The unattributed figure ©Carole Tyrrell

Faith ©Carole Tyrrell

Hope ©Carole Tyrrell

Love Enthroned ©Carole Tyrrell

I think it’s a Marmite statue in that you either love it or loathe it and, admittedly, it’s not for everyone. The four figures, all female, remind me almost of a Pieta as they surround a young girl whose arms are in the shape of a cross. I am indebted to the Victorian Web who quote Richard Dorment’s comments on the composition:

‘The four figures, all female, two of whom appear to be asleep, and three are crowned. In the central group, the crowned woman behind the young girl represents ‘Love Enthroned’ and she is supported by Faith and Hope on either side of her.  She is directing a young girl on the cusp of womanhood setting out across the river of Life which springs from beneath her throne.  This represented Alix’s charity to children and her coming to Great Britain across the water from Denmark.  

The three crowned women are bowing and ministering to the young girl and the central figure draws out the child’s limp arms to form a cross.’ The Victorian Web, Richard Dorment

Dorment then goes onto compare elements of the memorial’s composition to the depiction of the Lamentation which is:

‘where three women who either attend the prostrate Virgin Mary at the foot of the cross, or mourn over the body of the dead Christ at the Crucifixion.’

He also adds that:  

‘Now we come to the girl whom he positions between the legs of the figure of Charity. In Renaissance painting the placement of an infant or adult between its parent’s knees symbolises parturition and therefore descent from the preceding generation: the placement of the child in the Alexandra monument implies that she is born from a Trinity of Faith, Hope and Charity and that the Queen, who possessed, all these virtues, has passed them on to a younger generation of women’

The Victorian Web, Richard Dorment

I think that it’s an interesting interpretation and I haven’t found any others with different meanings.

The memorial was described at its unveiling in 1932 as having ‘

‘A ghostly, neo Gothic appearance’

and

‘inspected from across the road, it was of great bronze doors to an Italian cathedral’

On the bronze base are the words:

‘a tribute of the Empire’s love 1925.’

and

 ‘Faith, Hope and Love. The Guiding Virtues of Queen Alexandra’

is inscribed on the granite base. and the memorial. in its enigmatic way, is a representation of it.  When I visited a cut rose and a bunch of roses lay on top of it, presumably in tribute.

Inscription to Queen Alexandra ©Carole Tyrrell

There is a more conventional statue of Alix in the grounds of the London Hospital in Whitechapel. She was its President, was keenly involved in its work and was reputed to have visited the Elephant Man while he was a patient there.  In 1904 she introduced the Finsen light cure for Lupus to England and presented the first lamp to the hospital. The statue was erected by the Friends in 1908. But I know which one I prefer. 

Queen Alexandra memorial ©Carole Tyrrell

©Text and photos Carole Tyrrell unless otherwise stated.

References and further reading:

Alexandra Rose – Our mission is to give families access to fresh fruit and vegetables in their communities

https://www.londonremembers.com/memorials/queen-alexandra-statue

https://www.rct.uk/collection/people/queen-alexandra-of-the-united-kingdom-1844-1925#/type/subject

https://www.glasgow.gov.uk/CHttpHandler.ashx?id=31484&p=0

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/7467/alexandra_of_denmark (info on children etc)

https://monumentaustralia.org.au/themes/people/imperial/display/33671-prince-and-princess-of-wales

https://cgregoryroses.com/princess-alexandra-potted-uk-rose  -the Alexandra rose

https://www.nationaltrustimages.org.uk/image/552667

https://www.lieder.net/lieder/get_text.html?TextId=45876  words to Ode written by John Masefield music by Elgar

https://www.hastings.gov.uk/parks_gardens_allotments/parks/alexandra/ Alexandra Park Hastings – details of opening

https://victorianweb.org/sculpture/gilbert/38.html

The Marriage of the Prince of Wales with Princess Alexandra of Denmark

https://www.kat58.co.uk/the-marriage-of-the-prince-of-wales-with-princess-alexandra-of-denmark/ statue of Alexandra in Whitechapel within the ground sof the London Hospital

https://statues.vanderkrogt.net/object.php?webpage=ST&record=gblo194 useful quote

.’. Queen Alexandra Memorial .’.

Queen Alexandra – SW1 : London Remembers, Aiming to capture all memorials in London

Caroline’s Miscellany: The guiding virtues of Queen Alexandra (carolineld.blogspot.com)

Queen Alexandra Memorial – Marlborough Road, London, UK – Figurative Public Sculpture on Waymarking.com  

Alfred Gilbert – Wikipedia