Mother Shipton of Knaresborough
I recently came across this little booklet (probably from the 1960s) about Mother
Shipton - a woman who, it was said, had the power to tell what the future would
hold. We often went to Knaresborough,
Harrogate and York for our holidays when I was little, and I remember being
fascinated, and slightly terrified by stories about Mother Shipton.
It is believed that she was born in 1488 and had the power
to tell what the future would hold.
Girls would seek her advice about who they would marry and people would
come from miles around to consult her on all sorts of matters. She even gave the date and hour of her own
death - 1561 at the age of 73.
She saw many things that would eventually come true - "carriages
without horses" - which could mean cars or the railway.
Edited - Several people
have pointed out that the lines -
"Around the world thoughts shall fly
In the twinkling of an eye."
could refer to fax and
email! How amazing is that!
"Iron in the water shall float" - iron ships and the gold rush in Australia and America?
There's a fabulous site here where you can read so much more
about the life and times of Ursula Sontheil, or as she is better known, Mother
Shipton.
Love, Liz
Comments
Thank you for visiting my blog and leaving a comment. I've just had a quick read of some of your posts and you've got a lovely blog here, I'm going to read a bit further back now.
Thea x
Sherry
I am so pleased to meet you. What an interesting story you have told us today. I live in Canada but my grandmother was born in Scotland and she used to make the most wonderful oatcakes -my mother is 93 and still alive and was a wonderful cook but never made the oatcakes.
Your tea cosies are so very beautiful and I am sure that the tea stays very hot with them. Thank you for visiting me.
Cheerio, Karen
Spooky!
Julie x
Paul Danels -the 'magician' - bought the whole site and, it went from being free to the public to being a money-making venture, so I never took my own children who so wanted to go.
I was afraid of her prophecy about Knaresborough bridge falling down 3 times and the world coming to an end after that - it had already fallen down twice.
The poor, deformed woman probably never even made the prophecies - she was just sent out of society for being born ugly. Quite awful to be treated in such a way. If she did give gloomy prophecies, it was probably an attempt to scare the people who treated her badly.
"Around the world thoughts shall fly
in the twinkling of an eye"
Was she prophecying the Internet (emails, txt messaging, FB...) I wonder?
Such an interesting, thought provoking article, thank you, Liz
from Switzerlan, Heidi
She was obviously a fascinating person - quite a character! It is interesting to read into her words a vision of the future.