Witch heart

As I promised I have just one more tale to tell you of Kings Lynn. One of the main squares in the town is the Tuesday Market Place (There's a Saturday Market Place too.) and the boundaries of the square feature some attractive old buildings. On the north side is a large red brick house with segmental arches above its windows. On the keystone above one window is a carved diamond with a heart at its centre. The mark is known as the witch's heart.

In 1590 townswoman Margaret Read was accused of witchcraft and sentenced to be burned at the stake in the public execution space at the Tuesday Market Place. She protested her innocence, but to no avail, and the execution was carried out as ordered by the court. She swore she would be avenged against her accusers, and on the morning of her death, just as the flames reached her chest, her heart burst through her ribs and marked the house of the Chief Magistrate who had condemned her.


There is, of course, one significant flaw in this story. Witches in Britain were rarely burned at the stake, in spite of all the stories you've been told. They were hanged.

The pedlar of Swaffham

The village sign

One of the first ever stories on the children's TV series Jackanory was a traditional tale from Norfolk, read by actor Lee Montague: The Pedlar of Swaffham. There's a village sign in Swaffham that shows the pedlar, with his dog and his pack, over an inscription that reads: Ye tinker of Swaffham who by a dream did find great treasure.

The story goes that many years ago a pedlar from the Norfolk market town of Swaffham dreamed that he should travel to London where a man on London Bridge would tell him where to find a buried treasure. The pedlar's name was John Chapman (an old word for pedlar) and he told his family of his dream but they laughed and said he would be wasting his time. But Chapman ignored them and, taking his dog and his pack, set off for the capital.

15th century original

It took five days to walk to London, and once there he sat for another three days on London Bridge. Eventually a local shopkeeper asked what he wanted. Chapman explained about his dream and the man replied that if he traveled to the town of Swaffham, to the home of the pedlar John Chapman, he would find a treasure buried under a hawthorn tree.  So Chapman returned home and dug under the hawthorn tree in his own garden, where he found a pot full of old coins.

He told no-one of his find, and placed the pot among the others in his home. The surface was decorated and had a Latin inscription around it, but the pedlar could not read Latin. Then one day a monk on his way to a pilgrimage in Walsingham told Chapman what it said. The inscription translated as "Where you find me, dig to find another." So Chapman went back into his garden and dug in the same spot, where he found an even bigger pot full of gold coins.

Chapman's wife

Around the same time the village church collapsed, and all the residents were taxed to pay for a new one. Chapman went to see the builders and asked what the building would cost. Then he agreed to pay for the whole north aisle. The villagers were so grateful that they put stained glass portraits of John, his wife and their three children in the aisle. They also created a family pew for them with carvings of John, his wife and his dog.

Enough money was left over to build the tower and spire.

And now the facts:
There really was a churchwarden called John Chapman who paid a great deal of money towards the church restoration in 1460. Contemporaneous carvings of a pedlar carrying a pack, a dog, and a woman using rosary beads are currently incorporated into the clergy stalls. They are believed to be from the original Chapman family pew. When the Victorians replaced the old-fashioned box pews they put a replica carving of the pedlar on the front row of the new seating.

The fiddler and his dog

Round here they tell a tale of a fiddler and his dog who discovered a tunnel under the Guildhall at Blakeney. Everyone warned him that there might be dangers hidden, but he was determined to explore it, and set off, with his dog, playing a merry tune as he went.

All was well for a while, until the music stopped suddenly, and the dog howled. No-one dared go to see what had happened, and neither the fiddler, nor his dog, were ever seen again!

The tale is commemorated in the village sign, which also has a ship to represent the town's former role as an important port. Village signs in Norfolk frequently offer clues to local history and folklore and some are extremely attractive and complex works in wood or iron.