Free association thread

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Brother Cadefael
['the Potters Field']

Saint Winefride or in Welsh - Gwenffrewi;

Last Sunday was her Saint's Day, marked with a large (Catholic) procession through Holywell.

300px-Saint_Non%27s_Chapel_-_Fenster_1_St.Winifred.jpg


The mark around her neck in the window is not a necklace. It is the scar where her head was cut off, only to be replaced by St Beuno.
 
Saint Winefride or in Welsh - Gwenffrewi;

Last Sunday was her Saint's Day, marked with a large (Catholic) procession through Holywell.

300px-Saint_Non%27s_Chapel_-_Fenster_1_St.Winifred.jpg


The mark around her neck in the window is not a necklace. It is the scar where her head was cut off, only to be replaced by St Beuno.

Why did Winifred get St. Beuno's head? Wouldn't she have preferred her own? Was St. Beuno's the only head available at the time? I'm confused, Og. :confused: Perhaps even bewildered...
 
Why did Winifred get St. Beuno's head? Wouldn't she have preferred her own? Was St. Beuno's the only head available at the time? I'm confused, Og. :confused: Perhaps even bewildered...

She got her own head back, of course. I shouldn't have been writing at speed. :rolleyes:

According to legend, Winefride was the daughter of a chieftain of Tegeingl, Welsh nobleman, Tyfid ap Eiludd. Her mother was Wenlo, a sister of Saint Beuno and a member of a family closely connected with the kings of south Wales. Her suitor, Caradoc, was enraged when she decided to become a nun, and decapitated her. In one version of the tale, her head rolled downhill, and, where it stopped, a healing spring appeared. Winifred's head was subsequently rejoined to her body due to the efforts of her maternal uncle, Saint Beuno, and she was restored to life. Seeing the murderer leaning on his sword with an insolent and defiant air, St. Beuno invoked the chastisement of heaven, and Caradoc fell dead on the spot, the popular belief being that the ground opened and swallowed him. St. Beuno left Holywell, and returned to Caernarfon. Before he left the tradition is that he seated himself upon the stone, which now stands in the outer well pool, and there promised in the name of God "that whosoever on that spot should thrice ask for a benefit from God in the name of St. Winefride would obtain the grace he asked if it was for the good of his soul." She later became a nun and abbess at Gwytherin in Denbighshire.

The water from her well at Holywell is supposed to have healing powers but the spring dried up when mining operations in the hill behind it diverted the water.

So the Catholic authorities in the 20th Century decided to tap another source. According to those who make the pilgrimage, the source of the water is irrelevant. It is the prayer to St Winefride that matters, and your personal belief in the effectiveness of prayer.

It is still one of the most popular pilgrimage sites in the UK.
 
I'm a bit disappointed, Og; my students often claim that their case study skeleton has a male cranium and a female pelvis. Your tale could have gone some ways towards resolving that problem.

So the water is akin to Tinkerbell and other imaginary beings - you have to believe to make it real.

Oh, the free association! Sorry...

Robert Ripley
 
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