Yesterday was St. Thomas Eve, or so I gather from the indisputable evidence of my own post about it. Naturally, this means today, 21 December, must be St. Thomas Day—a grand occasion for destitute medieval widows, who marked the day by going “a’ Thomasing.” That is, begging for alms. In some places, it was called going “a’ gooding,” a term derived from the quaint notion that widows were nicknamed “goodies.” How charming. Now I can’t shake off the image of three men on a bike from that iconic BBC children’s TV show. That whimsical earworm is burrowing deep!
The day’s festivities began after morning Mass, when a merry band of elderly women would gather at the church to strategise their begging route. At each house, they stopped to recite a little ditty — this version is from Staffordshire — which is as gripping as you would expect:1“A’ THOMASING” CUSTOMS. Hartlepool Northern Daily Mail – 21 December 1925. https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000378/19251221/166/0008?noTouch=true
Well a day, well a day,
St. Thomas goes too soon away;
Then your gooding do pray
For the good time will not stay.
St. Thomas Grey, St. Thomas Grey,
The longest night and the shortest day,
Please to remember St. Thomas Day.
Meanwhile, in Kent, the young farm labourers preferred their own brand of absurdity, parading around with a man dressed as a horse, known as the “hoodener.” This masked buffoon’s antics apparently loosened purse strings.
Yorkshire, as always, had its own spin. The Rev. Canon Atkinson tells us that young boys would roam the dale and descend upon farmhouses asking for “Thomas’s gifts”—a fine haul of pepper-cake (a thick gingerbread), a bit of cheese, or perhaps a coin or two. Clearly, no one wanted to be outdone in the race for festive handouts2Atkinson, Rev. J. C. “Forty years in a moorland parish; reminiscences and researches in Danby in Cleveland” 1891. Page 379..
Today’s photo is, of course, of Roseberry Topping renowned for its iconic cone-shaped summit.
- 1“A’ THOMASING” CUSTOMS. Hartlepool Northern Daily Mail – 21 December 1925. https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000378/19251221/166/0008?noTouch=true
- 2Atkinson, Rev. J. C. “Forty years in a moorland parish; reminiscences and researches in Danby in Cleveland” 1891. Page 379.
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