Copy 1, Volume 1

Observations on the popular antiquities of Great Britain: chiefly illustrating the origin of our vulgar and provincial customs, ceremonies, and superstitions / by John Brand.

  • Brand, John, 1744-1806.
Date:
1849
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on the popular antiquities of Great Britain: chiefly illustrating the origin of our vulgar and provincial customs, ceremonies, and superstitions / by John Brand. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    138/570 (page 112)
    The mothering cakes are very highly ornamented, artists being employed to paint them. It is also usual for children to make presents to their mother on this day, and hence the name of the festival is vulgarly derived.] A correspondent in the same journal for 1783, p. 578, says : “ Some things customary probably refer simply to the idea of feasting or mortification, according to the season and occasion. Of these, perhaps, are Lamb’s Wool on Christmas Eve ; Furmety on Mothering Sunday; Braggot (which is a mixture of ale, sugar, and spices) at the Festival of Easter ; and Cross-buns, Saffron-cakes, or Symnels, in Passion week; though these being, formerly at least, unleavened, may have a retrospect to the unleavened bread of the Jews, in the same manner as Lamb at Easter to the Paschal Lamb.” Macaulay, in his History and Antiquities of Claybrook, 1791, p. 128, says : “Nor must I omit to observe that by many of the parishioners due respect is paid to Mothering Sunday.” In a curious Roll of the Expenses of the Household of 18 Edw. I. remaining in the Tower of London, and commu- nicated to the Society of Antiquaries in 1805, is the following item on Mid-Lent Sunday. “ Pro pisis j.d.,” i. e. for pease one penny. Were these pease substitutes for furmenty, or carlings, which are eaten at present in the North of England on the following Sunday, commonly called by the vulgar Carling Sunday ? Another writer in the Gent. Mag. 1784, p. 343, tells us, c< I happened to reside last year near Chepstow, in Mon- mouthshire ; and there, for the first time, heard of Mothering Sunday. My enquiries into the origin and meaning of it were fruitless ; but the practice thereabouts was, for all servants and apprentices, on Mid-Lent Sunday, to visit their parents, and make them a present of money, a, trinket, or some nice eatable ; and they are all anxious not to fail in this custom.”1 1 There was a singular rite in Franconia on the Sunday called Lretare or Mid-Lent Sunday. This was called the Expulsion of Death. It is thus described by Aubanus, 1596: “ In the middle of Lent, the youth make an image of straw in the form of Death, as it is usually depicted. This they suspend on a pole, and carry about with acclamations to the neighbouring villages. Some receive this pageant kindly, and, after re- freshing those that bring it with milk, peas, and dried pears, the usual diet of the season, send it home again. Others, thinking it a presage of something bad, or ominous of speedy death, forcibly drive it away from their respective districts.”