Legends in British postcards. Occasional quiz. Whose oak is this? A major major legendary figure ... Last seen in the 1970s. No longer exists.
02.03.2026 00:12
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Legends in British postcards. Occasional quiz. Whose oak is this? A major major legendary figure ... Last seen in the 1970s. No longer exists.
Near Cathedral Cave in the Lake District - it's beautiful! X
Spent the first full day of my 40s how I mean to go on - with beautiful views and muddy boots
Haha indeed!! But I had those in lovely cupcake form, remember? 😍
From now on it won't be a birthday unless my book is turned into a cake 😍🥲 Thank you family!
Photo of a woman talking to some students in a university class.
Yesterday I had the honour of talking about my folklore-related work at the Folklore Studies Master's in Herfordshire Uni. Dr. @cerihoulbrook.bsky.social takes are something I could listen to for hours, and sharing perspectives with other fellow Folklore Nerds™ (as we are) makes for the best days.
🤣 It probably is because of a surplus of Yule logs one year!
Used my upcoming birthday as an excuse in class to talk about the caterpillar cake (be it Colin, Morris, Cecil, Maisie, Vic, etc) as a contemporary British birthday tradition - the American students were bemused, asking why a caterpillar. I had no pearls of wisdom to share. But I did have cake.
Gibbets. Bit of fieldwork yesterday. Name this replica gibbet! It would originally have been four or five times higher, though. Strange juxtoposition of a macabre historical location with fast food and speed limits...
Today we welcomed the amazingly talented @diesclara.bsky.social to class @herts.ac.uk who talked to us about her journey to folklore, her artworks & her myriad projects (including a very exciting delve into witchcraft in northern Spain). Thank you so much for joining us!
Some of our amazing folklorists about to graduate and already doing amazing things, making the world a better place by caring about people's stories, customs & beliefs. You make me so proud 🥲
Folklore out and about, bringing delight at every stopping point.
Thank you very much for sharing 😊
This issue also includes my review of @odavies9.bsky.social and @cerihoulbrook.bsky.social's Folklore: A Journey through the Past and the Present
In Folklore Studies class last week @herts.ac.uk we were celebrating Lunar New Year and exploring the ways it's adapted to the present day. Then I head over to Liverpool and amidst the Lion Dance am handed a red envelope by the God of Fortune - with a chocolate 2p coin inside it
Invasion of the Saucermen is a new exhibition at the Old Head Post Office at @sheffieldhallamuni.bsky.social, opening next month. We caught up with Andrew Robinson to hear about its conception - and how the Survey feeds into the display: www.nationalfolkloresurvey.co.uk/news/invasio...
Episode four of Folklore Matters has landed and it’s a special one: a recording of @cerihoulbrook.bsky.social and @odavies9.bsky.social at Off The Shelf in October discussing their latest book, Folklore: a journey through past and present. It’s a corker if we do say so ourselves!
If you've ever been a Girl Guide and collected badges for a blanket, please consider filling in this survey by one of my brilliant Folklore students: forms.office.com/pages/respon...
Waiting to cross the tram tracks at Manchester's Lunar New Year parade
Cover of the book Folklore, A Journey Through the Past and Present by Owen Davies and Ceri Houlbrook
This is a solid reference book. I expected to read of folk revivals, pleasantly surprised by inclusion of rituals like the ice bucket challenge, #goblincore and other subcultures. Honestly hadn't thought of them as folklore, an eye opening treat. @odavies9.bsky.social @cerihoulbrook.bsky.social
Aww thank you very much ☺️
I hope so too...
Today was spent ostensively playing ATU 122E - and if you get what I'm saying, you're my kind of person
Really grateful to the incomparable Terry Gunnell for zooming in from Iceland to chat with the Folklore Studies students @herts.ac.uk about digital archives, folk motifs & TROLLS🧌
You know all about The Wicker Man… now hear from one of the Children of The Wicker Man. On Folklore Matters today, we talk to Dominic Hardy, son of Robin, to hear all about the film’s legacy and its impact on his family. Source it wherever you get your podcasts…
Thank you very much for sharing 😊
Contested Commons
Formidably erudite, compellingly argued, and dryly humorous, Contested Commons will change the way you think about the politics of space, the "myth of the commons", and the history of England since the eighteenth century: MATTHEW KELLy, author of The Women Who Saved the English Countryside "Starting with Kennington Common, and ranging from Steeple Bumpstead to Sheffield, Stonehenge and Brixton, and with a cast that includes ramblers, ranters, revolutionaries and ravers, this is a superb, sweeping but fine-grained history. It's also a highly necessary, politically urgent reminder of what public space is - places for everyone, owned by everyone, accessible to everyone, whether carefully tended or wild - and what it isn't, the tradition of pseudo-public space that runs from Victorian parks to privatised malls.' OWEN HATHERLEY, author of A Guide to the New Ruins of Great Britain
A reminder that my book on the history of protest is now published. It is superbly produced with a great cover. Buy it now from @reaktionbooks.bsky.social
Legends in postcards. I give you the "Joe Stone" of Gretton. Known enough in early 20thC to be turned into a postcard. Unknown now. Still there, though. But no one knows how it got its name. Possibly used as a customary stone for farmers' transactions. Who knows! Who was Joe?
Ooh excellent! Sounds great fun 😊
