The Bacon Over Sea
A few years ago Mr. Hastings Worrin, J.P., a churchwarden of the
Priory Church of Little Dunmow, and a well-known collector of
memorials of the Bacon ceremonies and of the old Priory, to whom the
writer of this record is greatly indebted, received a letter
addressed to "The Prior of Dunmow." It was from a New York lawyer
and his wife, also a member of the legal profession, who had had a
little Flitch celebration on their own account, and seemed to think
(as the _Times_ of August 21, 1803, actually did) that the old Priory
still existed--
Whereas, (runs a little fly sheet which they issued to their friends)
Girdwood Mulliner and Gabrielle his wife, in reverence for the old
tradition, its quaint basic thought so sweetly resting in the
sanctity of the marriage relation, knowing in their hearts that they
have earned the Flitch of Bacon by the sure right of their living,
although far from the Priory and the pointed stones, do here and now
kneel and lay claim to it--
I, Leslie Allen Wright, the chief attendant to the Bridegroom upon
his day of wedding, praying a grace of pardon for usurping the
Prior's rightful duty, yet feeling the fine prompting spirit of the
ancient custom, do now bestow upon these two worthy persons, Walter
Girdwood Mulliner and Gabrielle his wife, a Flitch of Bacon.
May they in all the added years of their life grow in Ripeness and in
Spirit. Amen.
A Bacon custom in Brittany has been referred to. Mention may also be
made of a German story, "The Man and the Flitch of Bacon"; also of
the Flitch which hung in the old Red Tower of Vienna with doggerel
below it which Dr. Bell has thus translated--
Is there to be found a married man
That in verity declare can,
That his marriage him doth not rue,
That he has no fear of his wife for a shrew,
He may this Bacon for himself down hew?
The tale goes that a would-be possessor of the Red Tower Bacon asked,
when a ladder had been brought for his assistance, that some one
should cut down the Flitch for him, as if he got a grease-spot on his
best clothes his wife would scold him! Needless to say, this
applicant was not allowed to have the Bacon.
Dr. Bell traces to the earliest times the origin of all customs of
hanging up Bacon. Does not Dionysius Halicarnassus mention the
presence of a fine Flitch in the chief temple at Alba Longa?
Jewellers still sell as charms little pigs of gold, silver and bog
oak, and in time past the side of what had once been a sow was no
doubt displayed as an emblem of fertility.
APPENDIX
The Last Prior of Dunmow
In the Manuscript Department of the British Museum one may turn over
in Latin and in an old English transcript, the household accounts
kept by Geoffrey Shether, the last Prior of Dunmow. During the last
four years of the Priory's existence, 1531-5, that is up to the time
of the dissolution of the minor monasteries, the Prior entered up his
accounts every Sunday in a long narrow book such as one sees on
bakers' counters.
The entries at the very end of the book are in regard to the payment
to one "Purcas"--still a Little Dunmow name--"for iiij days' werke,
xxd," and to two "labryng" men for their "werke." Earlier in the
book a payment "to my stuarde for kepying of my Curte at Dunmowe" is
chronicled. A large proportion of the expenses are in respect of
farm work or stock. There is an entry more than once for "stoor
bolox." On several occasions expenditure was incurred for the
ringing of pigs and the destruction of rats. There are also various
sums for work on the steeple.
The fishponds of our illustration do not appear to have yielded all
the fish needed by the Priory, for there are two entries for
"fyscche" bought. If there is no mention of Bacon, there are
"rewardes for venison," and if no allusion occurs to the Flitch
ceremony, it was not, apparently, because the Prior would have been
above being interested in such a mundane thing, for twice or thrice
he puts down "my costs at the feyr," and he gave a "reward to the
Lord of Mysrule of Dunmow." Moreover, is there not an entry, "For
sugar candy I bowte"?
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[Illustration: THE WICHNOR FLITCH, SILVER RING, RELIQUARY, IMPRESSION]
THE WICHNOR FLITCH.--The wooden flitch over the fireplace at Wichnor
Hall, near Lichfield, where there was a local Bacon custom.
SILVER RING with Clasped Hands, no doubt a Betrothal Ring; also
RELIQUARY, both found near the Priory Church.
IMPRESSION of a Seal, found at Little Dunmow, which probably belonged
to one of the Priors of Dunmow. The inscription is: "Ave Maria,
gratia plena, Dominums tecum." The words are from the Missal. The
ring is of silver.
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[Illustration: THE PRIORY CHURCH IN ITS SADLY MODERN GUISE.]
The Fair Matilda
The story of the poisoning of the Fair Matilda is in the Cotton MS.,
Cleopatra, C. iii., folio 291 (British Museum), a sixteenth or early
seventeenth century copy of or extract from the _Dunmow Chronicle_.
The original of the _Chronicle_ has not been traced. Tanner in his
_Notitia Monastica_ does not mention it, but only the Cotton MS. and
the Harley MS. referred to in the Introduction to this booklet. The
story is entered under the year 1211, in which "mota est discordia
inter Regem Johannem et Barones suos occasione Matildis," etc. The
Chartulary of Dunmow Priory (page 20), a register of charters, deeds,
etc., is quite a different thing from the _Chronicle_, and does not
contain the story. The Chartulary is in handwriting of the
thirteenth century. The rubric at the beginning gives the date of
its compilation as 1275. A few documents have been copied into it at
later times.
The photographs of the effigies and of the chair in Little Dunmow
Church are by Mr. F. T. Morris, of Felsted; of the modern trial scene
and procession by Mr. R. Stacey, of Dunmow; of the Counsel for the
Bacon by Mr. J. Willett, of Dunmow; of the rest of the subjects (with
the exception of the manuscripts) by Miss Arundel, B.A., of Great
Canfield, by kind permission of Mr. Hastings Worrin, J.P., of Little
Dunmow, in whose possession they are. The photograph of carving in
the Church was taken for Mr. Worrin. The photograph of the fireplace
in Wichnor Hall is by Mr. J. S. Simnett, Guild Street,
Burton-on-Trent.
For the List of Winners of the Bacon on page 47, we are indebted to
the Misses Carter, Dunmow.
Butler & Tanner The Selwood Printing Works Frome and London