Angel Touch Piece: James I. Part 2.

It takes an Angel to relieve your pain.
   It was believed that a prayer and a "royal touch" by the king (or queen) could cure scrofulous conditions. This belief became popular around the time of Edward the Confessor (1042-66), but only one healing is documented for this king. Rather, the touching ceremony was codified by Henry II (1154-1189). It became a Divine Service.

Gold Angel of James I
Obverse shows St. Michael slaying the evil Dragon.

   The Angel gold coin made it appearance about 1470. It is named for its obverse design: Saint Michael slaying the dragon of Evil. It is supposed that the value of the coin (6s. 8d.) represented the typical fee for a physician visit.
   The practice of hanging the holed piece about the neck of the sufferer while the king touched the sores of the afflicted might stem from an earlier tradition wherein naked children were instructed to pass through a hole in a tree or large stone three times. A re-birthing perhaps?
   Numismatists tend to call Angels used during the touching ceremony "healing pieces" thereby reserving the name "touch pieces" to the medalets specifically designed for the ceremony about the time of the Restoration of Charles II. Still, it appears that the Angels were produced with the ceremony in mind.
   The notion of coins being used to spark magic was widespread in post-medieval England. For example, silver pennies were often folded in half to make a vow to a saint in times of sickness. The idea was that the saint could produce a cure once a pilgrimage was made to a church whereat a saintly relic was present. The folded coin was offered with a prayer in hopes that a miraculous cure would be forthcoming. In this context, the Angel healing pieces fit well within the beliefs of the common folk.
   A nice overview of these coins has been provided by Noel Woolf in a monograph entitled: The Sovereign Remedy: Touch-Pieces and the King's Evil (published by the British Association of Numismatic Societies). For the necromancer, magical coins are perhaps the most potent pieces you can collect. Just imagine: James I slipped this very Angel about the neck of a sufferer. From the looks of it, the coin was worn for some time and then lost in a field.
   What more do you want from a coin?

Old Sails. James I Touch Piece. Part One.

Yes, he touched it.
James I touched this thin flan of gold.
I dusted it with flour to see if his fingerprint could be revealed (an old FBI technique), but the King was not in the data base. Great swirl though.

This Old Sails has much to offer the necromancer.
   First off, it is a beautiful ship. A fully-rigged galleon on a starboard tact. The Arms of England are blazoned on a billowing burgee. The gunwales are embellished with lions and fleur-de-lis. Gun ports just above the water-line signal England's sea power.

Gold Angel minted 1619-20 and pierced for use as a King's Touch amulet.

   Secondly, this coin represents a piece of post-medieval magic. It is a touch piece that was given to folks ailing from Scrofula (a tubercular infection of the lymph nodes). The piece was pierced so that it could be strung with a white silk ribbon and hung around the neck of the sufferer. The king himself conducted the ceremony -- it was believed that the almighty worked though his hands to produce a miraculous cure.
   James I was known as a "reluctant toucher." He was concerned about the Catholic overtones, as the reformation was in full swing, and the use of "old church" magic was discouraged. Still, he held touching ceremonies twice a year on Easter and Michaelmass.
   The first "royal touch" was by Edward the Confessor (1042-66), but the ceremony was made popular and codified by Henry II (1154-1189). A new gold coin was introduced called the Angel in about 1470 -- this became the amulet for the touching ceremony (also known as the Sovereign Remedy). The legend reflects this purpose: A DOMINO FACTVM EST ISTVD ET EST MIRABILE IN OCULIS NOSTRIS; this translates to "It is the Lord's doing and it is marvelous in our eyes."
   A third feature of this particular Angel is that it is a field find from Northern England. It was likely worn by a sufferer and lost. Many touch pieces were eventually melted for its gold, but some sufferers wore the piece as intended.
   I wonder who lost this one? I can imagine the poor soul enlisting his family to search and search again the rows of dirt in the planting field. I know I would have combed the ground on my hands and knees if I had lost an amulet given me by the king.
   I also muse: Is the magic in this touch piece still active?
   I will explore this magical piece further next week.

Sixpence Witch Piece. Is your Butter protected?

The necromancer is among friends when hanging out with cunning men and wise women. We are in the same business -- namely, relieving the bewitched or haunted.
   No one likes to suffer from the foretelling of a witch. Even cows could be affected by an evil spell. If the milk did not flow, then perhaps the cow was bewitched.
   There were several remedies. One strategy described in the 1400s was to boil the milk over a fire and beat the kettle -- hard -- with a stick. This would harm the witch since the casting of a spell "connected" the witch to cow. Another strategy used in colonial times was to cut the tongue of the cow with a sharpened silver coin; this would hurt the witch and end the spell.

   It seemed that dairies were particularly vulnerable. Milk production and butter churning were not well understood in medieval and early modern times. Few folks appreciated the impact of environmental variables on dairy processes -- temperature, bacteria, and the like were mysterious. Hence, sour milk and failed butter were attributed to maleficia -- that is, the harms due to witches.
   Coins were used as talismans to keep witches away.
   A bent sixpence was placed in the milk pail. Or, a bent sixpence was buried in the yard where the cows were milked. Sometimes, four bent sixpences were needed: one placed at each corner of the barnyard, thereby protecting the entire square.
   The bending -- often a single bend down the middle -- was important. This allowed the coin to pass into the spiritual world. It was an ancient tradition. In medieval times, a bent weapon or tool was buried with the deceased so that the same would be available in the afterlife.
   Previously in this blog, I described love token benders that were unearthed at Jamestown. These pieces were bent so that the vow extended beyond the corporeal world.

So imagine my surprise to find a so-called "witches piece" for sale by a UK dealer. It was a bent Elizabethan sixpence. As it turns out, these pieces are quite common. It has been estimated that one in ten pieces were bent for magical reasons. Witchcraft was a daily fear. There were many accusations and trials. One needed to take action.
   Of course there is no way to know how this particular sixpence was used. Was it just a mutilated coin? Was it bent to make change, but the break never completed? Was it bent by a plow blade? Maybe the dealer bent it so as to raise its value as a curiosity piece? These are all good questions.
   Still, the prevalence of bent sixpences in UK hoard finds and metal detecting reports suggest that many "witch pieces" have been discovered. After all, the English liked milk and butter.
   Perhaps I'll put this one in our milk so that it will be protected from the witches down the lane. I saw a hare in the yard yesterday, and now I am worried.

Relic Coins are akin to Rat Rods & Worn Pie Safes

I live among relics.
Some folks regard me as a relic. And that's okay -- I've been around.
As a necromancer, I enjoy relics.

For most coin collectors, oldness is something special. But a small group of die-hard collectors enjoy the actual wear and tear of circulated and lost coins -- relic coins.
   Some date/mint and variety collectors will "tolerate" a relic coin because it is the only option, but this is not the same thing as loving the unloved. They will unload the relic as soon as a better one becomes available.
   But, some of us will treasure the relic coin above all else.
   Worn or corroded surfaces tell it like it is. This is our only connection to the secret lives of our coins. Coins with surfaces smoothed by fingertips and corrugated by corrosion are exciting because they reflect life. They connect us with the past -- a past that was full of action.
   There is an aesthetic here that is more common than you might think. Many folks have developed an eye for the relic. Some like to use the gentle word "patina" to describe what they love. Others, more boldly, just call it the "battered" look -- they like to say: "There is beauty in decay." Still others, like to put oldness at the forefront, as in the "primitive" look.

Consider the following: a crusty rush light, a tattered pie safe, a rusted C10 rat rod ... the old look is cool. It makes us feel a certain way -- only Dr. Freud can tell us why. But we know that the feeling is powerful and runs deep.
   Why not crusty, tattered, and rusted coins?