In time to come perhaps, men will build time machines and if I'm still alive, maybe I'll be able to book a trip back and see for myself.

If you are not a historian or an archaeologist, legends are fascinating but frustrating. You are magnetised to something enshrouded in mist. You want the mist to clear, but it won't. You can merely pass the stories on as others have done before.

The are several strands of stories regarding Christ's visits to Britain in the West Country, but the most prominent is as follows:-

Mary had a wealthy uncle - Joseph of Arimathea who traded in tin between Cornwall and Phoenicia. He brought Jesus with him when he was a boy. There is nothing in the Gospels regarding the childhood of Jesus until his barmitzvah in the Temple when he was twelve, and after that, very little until his actual ministry. Where was he?

The legends say they went to Glastonbury - then known as the 'Glassy Isle,' because it was surrounded by sea. Like their own land, Britain was under Roman occupation. The Druids were friendly and amiable and Joseph's trade with them flourished.

Joseph and Jesus were said at some stage to have built a hut made of wattle which was representative of the first Christian Church. Jesus is said to have prepared himself for his ministry here.

Joseph, who supplied the tomb for Jesus' burial, then returned after the Crucifixion and with his companions, he sat down upon the side of what is now called Weary-All Hill, striking his staff into the ground. The staff sprouted and flowered and became known as the holy thorn.

Joseph had also brought with him the Chalice used by Jesus at the Last Supper and hid it in a well after which the waters gushed forth red.

There are variations on the legend of course, but there is indirect support for them in Gildas, the earliest British historian, St. Augustine and the Domesday Book.

Other stories abound and kindred to them are those found in Cornwall which tell of St.Anne - a Breton, who was blessed for her goodness and her boundless pity for the humble and unhappy. Her husband was hard and jealous and did not wish to have children. When he discovered that she was pregnant he tossed her out of the house like a beggar, whereupon, somehow, she found her way to Palestine. She gave birth to Mary in that land and brought her up piously.

There are the conflicting legends of the holy grail, a prominent one being that Mary Magdalene, said to be the wife of Jesus, took the Chalice to Marseilles after the crucifixion.

What is the truth of it all? The stories don't just tease, they itch with possibilities. In 2000 years, practising or not, our minds have been dominated by Christian consciousness, but even the Gospels are fragmentary. There are many gaps to fill. Without written records we can only guess.

Joseph of Arimathea is said to be buried in Glastonbury and stories about his sojourn there are to be found in the West of Ireland. This could be accounted for by the fact that St. Patrick is said to have been in Glastonbury in the Fifth Century and was the first Abbot.

This Easter I felt compelled to go to Glastonbury again, since it is several years since I visited that place.Despite vertigo I climbed the Tor, accompanied by my husband, my daughter and a neighbour from Cork. We walked the Abbey runins, noting all including the graves of Arthur and Guinevere. We drank from the waters of the Chalice Well. Most significant of all for me though, was on Easter Sunday morning, when I returned to our hotel after taking Communion in St. John's Church:

We stood in the bar of the CROWN. A friendly, homely place, staffed by a kind-hearted family who make you most welcome, and the cooking is excellent. My daughter had chocolate on her face from her Easter egg. An old man, stocky, with a kindly round face approached us and introduced himself with that soft Somerset Drawl.

'I'm the gardener of the Church' he said. 'Saw you there a while ago.' I was jolted by the words. It was like an echo of the Gospel reading I'd just been listening to.

He used to be a shepherd boy and later joined the fire service. Then he'd become the gardener at St. John's, and one of his jobs was to tend the holy thorn and send a branch of it each Christmas to the Queen. Yes, it really did bloom at Christmas!

He was friendly with the gardener at the Catholic Church, St. Mary's. The two communities were one and the same.

'If you come back in July,' he said, 'I'll take you to where they cut the peat, and show you the rivers. And I'll give you a cutting from the holy thorn.'

He told me it has to be grafted to a common hawthorn. Where in Ireland, I wonder, could I find an appropriate home for it?

It was such a matter-of-fact conversation, and yet I felt caught up and enshrouded in the mythology of the place.

There are several folk songs and carols which have sprung from the West Country which are pregnant with legendary possibilities. the most notable of them are: 'Bells in Paradise,' 'Joseph was a tin man,' 'I saw three ships' and of course, Blake's 'Jerusalem' :

'And did that countenance divine

Shine forth upon our clouded hills

And was Jerusalem builded here

On England's green and pleasant land?'

 

***I did go back to meet old Bill, although in 2006 at this current time of writing, it is several years ago now, but he gave me a grafting from the thorn of Glastonbury. We had to travel to Nottinghamshire on that holiday, having stayed in Glastonbury first. We stayed at what was then 'The Nottingham Knight' and the weather was hot.

I took the graft to St. Finnbarr's Church in Cork but unfortunately it didn't take. Although I was disappointed I felt an overwhelming sense that it was the journey which was the most important factor of this little story!!! A metaphor for life perhaps!!!

I am not surprised by coincidences as they seem to happen so often but that particular year, at the Rural Life Museum in Glastonbury, I saw two carts sitting next to each other:- one had the surname Taylor on it and the one next to it had the surname Bowring. Taylor was my natural father's name and Bowring was my natural mother's name!!! Hmmm!!! ( I was adopted as a 4 year-old by my natural mother's sister, Lillie, so the Bowring nee Doubleday line still applies but I didn't see any Doubleday names in Glastonbury apart from the name of the publishing company in books in the book-shops!!!!)

This Easter (2006), my friend Pam and I revisited Glastonbury but we saw only one of those carts. Luckily I have kept photographs!!! I never expected to return to live in Nottinghamshire - yet another series of coincidences!!! But here I am in the heart of Sherwood Forest along with the Robin Hood legends!!!

Legends and Landscape of Glastonbury http://www.isleofavalon.co.uk/

***Back to home page http://uk.geocities.com/christinemichael