I offer displays and talks that are suitable for historic sites, history groups and schools.

 

 I play and sing the songs that medieval pilgrims would have sung to keep up their spirits as they walked.

 

I have a good collection of the sort of medals that pilgrims could buy as souvenirs of their pilgrimage. Some show scenes from the saint’s life. One particularly gory one shows St Alban’s executioner with his eyes popping out of their sockets as he kills St Alban.

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Some souvenirs were designed to hold holy water or oil. The Holy Water of St Thomas of Canterbury was highly valued as a cure for just about anything. It would be put into an ampulla and the ends sealed. It could be taken home to a person who was too ill to make the pilgrimage themselves.

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I have a collection of relics, many are as dubious as those that medieval churches claimed to possess.

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Relics were the main attraction for pilgrims. Anything that could have possibly come into contact with Jesus, or his mother, Mary, were the most highly prized relics.

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Most relics were connected with the saints; bones or parts of a saint’s body, parts of their clothing, things that they owned during their lifetime; were thought to offer medical cures or religious benefit. Medieval religious sites vied with each other to offer the most valuable relics in order to persuade as many people as possible to visit them, along with their monetary offerings or gifts.

 

Most medieval relics were probably fakes.

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The relics were held in shrines, many of which were very elaborate and expensively decorated.

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