The Curse of Stone

Hello everyone, and welcome to LukeLore. A quick deep dive into a folklore topic, where I share

some of the stories from around the world that have piqued my interest.

I have something of a linked three episode topic to begin today. It's not going to be all three in a row, but they DO have a connecting theme, and I'll be interested to see if anyone works it out ahead of the third and final episode in the trilogy where I will reveal what I was up to as well as giving the theme its own entry. I will clearly mark these three out as we go.

This is the first, and we're kicking it all off with tales of Magic Stones.

SECTION BREAK – Monarchy Makers

Stones and monarchies seem to have some amount of overlap. There are the precious stones that Royals adorn themselves with, of course. Crowns, sceptres, rings; all come bejewelled to show off wealth and power. That's a little mundane, however. Well, unless they're cursed jewels, but we'll swing back around to that later.

Scotland has the Stone of Destiny, otherwise known as the Stone of Scone.

This is an incredibly significant, going on sacred, cultural artifact of the Scots. A reddish sandstone that connects to an iron ring with a figure of eight, or possibly infinity symbol, link that is itself covered with centuries of wear from usage as well as repairs. It isn't known quite how old the Stone of Destiny is, or for how long it was a vital part of crowning the reigning monarch of Scotland.

We do, however, know precisely when the English stole it off them, for the English were quite the gits throughout history and there's many a reason the Scottish don't much like us. King Edward I stole it in 1296, and had it worked into the English throne so it could be sat upon in conquest all the way up to 1996, where the Scottish were finally allowed to have it back. Of course, on the condition it gets returned for English coronations as and when needed, because some things have no intention of ever changing.

The English do have their own legendary rock for its royalty, however.

So some of the stories go, and please bear with me as this is a pretty messy legend, at some point in the 5th Century King Uther Pendragon died without a clear heir. While he was King of the Britons, this was not a United Kingdom in the slightest at this time, and all of Uther's forces turned upon each other in a bid to grab power. This is already bad, no common people do well when the nobles get it into their head to raise armies to bash together. That Uther was fending off Saxon invaders and Norse raiders at the time means that all this infighting was self inflicted divide and conqueror for England, but as with most of history's self appointed leaders ego was the top priority. The country being razed, every last peasant being butchered or enslaved, and the very earth being salted is all minor details compared to who gets to wear the cool hat.

Fate, the soul of the country, and the wizard Merlin had other ideas. Overnight, a stone with an inscription appeared:

“Whoso pulleth out this sword from this stone, is right wise King born of all England.”

The solution was now in place, which is great, but the newborn Arthur had been spirited away by Merlin to be raised in secret by the loyalist Sir Ector. No one knew the true identity of Arthur but Merlin, and when no Lord could pull the sword from the stone England was in for 15 years of what could be lightly termed as “further ruin”. Arthur was raised by Sir Ector as a scorned bastard alongside Ector's legitimate heir Kay (the adopted brother being no slouch himself in Legend, going on to be Sir Kay of the round table). The secret heir was kept humble the whole time and tutored by Merlin in many skills and scholarly pursuits, with an emphasis on using brains over brawn. When Arthur the bastard turned 15, it was time to reveal to the world he was in fact Arthur Pendragon.

So, the moment finally came, that young Arthur did draw from the stone, that enchanted blade of legend...

Clarent.

Yeah, it wasn't actually Excalibur, or Caliburn depending on the translation. Some later poems rolled the two together for simplicity but the sword in the stone was Clarent, a ceremonial sword. To make it more confusing, Clarent was the sword for the rightful heir to the throne and Excalibur grants the divine right to rule over England, so there's some thematic overlap to further muddy the waters. It does indeed make a measure of sense that the sword that determined the ruler was one with the purpose of being used in ruling rituals. Clarent was mentioned in older texts as being too fragile to use in battle, and would go on to be used for such duties as knighting people. It did come back to haunt Arthur in a pivotal part of his eventual downfall, for Mordred steals Clarent as a part of his coup to insist he has the mortal right to rule by law. In 'Alliterative Morte d'Arthur' where this is a big plot point, the two swords actually shattered upon each other in battle, so as fragile as Clarent was while only being good for fielding in one battle, it remained a magic sword dangerous enough to break Excalibur.

It's worth bearing in mind that Arthurian myth is weird in more than one way. It can, depending on how you interpret it, be viewed as a folkloric invasive species – a statement which is going to take a bit of unpacking, so bear with me. The historic tales of Britons, Saxons, and the Norse all fighting over the isles played out in reality in 1066. King Edward the Confessor died childless in January of that year. Harold Godwinson was then crowned the King of the Anglo-Saxons, and proceeded to have a very bad year.

Harold's brother Tostig used Harold's crowning to proclaim his own legitimacy, and teamed up with the Norwegian King Harald Hardrada. King Harold III of Norway is what happens when you round up thousands of vikingr raiders and make them into an organised army, so Hardrada and his Anglo-Saxon sock puppet Tostig easily crushed a thrown together army of whatever Englishmen were lying around in The Battle of Fulford on the 20th of September. The Scandinavians coming knocking with a claim to the throne did not go unnoticed, however, and five days later Harold himself led a unified all infantry English army, including such elite infantry as the Housecarls who went into battle with massive two handed Danish battleaxes no one in the right mind wanted to tangle with.

This led to the bloody but decisive Battle of Stamford Bridge on the 25th of September, which was considered to be the end of the Viking Age after King Harald Hardrada and Tostig Godwinson were killed in the encounter. King Harold left half his army behind in Yorkshire, which to be fair did have quite the ongoing tradition of turning Viking if you didn't watch it closely enough, and began a return to London.

He was about half way home when he received word that the Duke of the Normans, William the Bastard, had landed and claimed the throne for himself.

King Harold raised as many more troops as he could along the way, and met William at Hastings on the 14th of October. Now, I mentioned that the English army was all infantry, because that's going to become decisive in the Battle of Hastings. While there were some horses, they weren't trained cavalry shock troops, they were for the nobles to ride so they didn't get tired until they dismounted to fight. Not that the English weren't a fearsome fighting force! Awesome, elite, professional infantry were present as was perfectly competent shield wall rank and file; safely from behind which javelins, throwing axes, and some small number of arrows got launched over. The Norman force was half infantry, in a similar composition to the English, but then one quarter of their force was cavalry and the final quarter was well trained professional archers as well as crossbowmen. The all infantry English army had just had to leg it back from Yorkshire where they split their surviving main battle force in half, and then proceeded to get hammered by mounted and ranged forces they could not match, while their infantry was matched just fine by the combined Breton, Norman, and French equivalents who came over the Channel to pick a fight. Harold infamously took an arrow to the eye, giving a default win when it came to throne claiming as the Anglo-Saxons were now Kingless. See the game of chess for more details on that being a lose condition.

William the Conqueror was crowned King on Christmas Day. From January to December, this was a momentous year of battles and rapid shifts in management. The Normans proceeded to make French the official language of the aristocracy, while under their tenure Classical Greek and Latin became the foundations of academic learning (since they were clearly not ever going to go out of style), all of which laid the foundations for the English language being the incredible mess it is today. They also brought French folklore traditions with them, stories spun and retold as entertainment that had the added bonus of backing up royal birthrights and destinies.

Arthurian myth as we would come to know it was imposed by the Norman conquest.

Okay, that's a smidge reductive. Britain has always been a multi cultural melting pot across some 5 or so millennium, and good stories would happily be stolen from everywhere people could get them. The Legend of King Arthur was heavily married and merged with Welsh heroic traditions, it just went on to be developed under the Normans where it also moved back out to France then on to wider Europe. Folktales and myths just spread, merge, and grow with a life of their own; but to say that The Battle of Hastings was a significant development in the history of Britain is a tad understated, this impact can also be felt in British legends. Very do take note that Arthur, a divinely appointed King, repeatedly smashed the evil Saxons – it may not have been State led propaganda, but I doubt the Norman victors hated to hear about it.

When you look at the absolute historical madness that was 1066? Arthurian legend sounds plausibly grounded from the court intrigue side of things! I certainly would never encourage anyone not to enjoy these stories, but to see a deeper look at their context and cultural impact as a fascinating way to expand upon them. Hastings itself had a boring lack of magic, though, which is probably why the Norman invasion succeeded.

Skill issue.

SECTION BREAK – Lincoln's Mischief Makers

The city of Lincoln, the heart of Lincolnshire in the East Midlands of England, is one of those beautiful cities of Britain with an ancient heritage to explore. Starting out as an Iron Age settlement founded by the Celtic Britons, a Roman Legionnaire fortress called Lindum Colonia got plonked down upon it as the River Witham was strategically important, and some irrelevant barbarians had already put some houses there the Empire could make use of. Over time, Lindum Colonia became shortened to Lincoln, and pride of place in the city is an awesome medieval Cathedral that's got a devilishly delightful story to its name.

Lincoln Cathedral is impressive, putting it lightly. A massive edifice of stunning Gothic Architecture, it's earliest parts date back to 1072. For some 200 years after it was fully rebuilt in 1311 after an earthquake in 1185 damaged it, this was the tallest building in the world. As a nice segue from the previous section, William the Conqueror had a hand in establishing the Cathedral and its status as a power centre for the church in the district. While the earthquake was an outstanding moment in the Cathedral's history, described as having “split from top to bottom” the original building, it's a small detail within the building I find most fascinating...

The Devil isn't too big on Christianity all told. Some sort of beef with Jesus's dad. So, one day, in a mix of boredom and spite, he sets two imps upon the Lincoln Cathedral. Tiny creatures both, but intensely concentrated mischief on little humanoid/animal legs, they were a whirlwind of big little asshole energy even before they got to their target. Stopping first at Chesterfield, which was presumably along the way from wherever they burst upon the mortal plane out of hell, they twisted up the spire of St Mary and All Saints Church there before remembering what it was they were sent to Earth to do.

Bursting into Lincoln Cathedral, they assert dominance by beginning with knocking over the startled Dean, then go off like superpowered toddlers on a sugar high. All the lights got busted up, setting the ambiance for the rampage, then the imps got to work tearing up stonework to smash all the stained glass windows. This direct intervention did not go unnoticed by heaven. Mostly being a petty dick move, it didn't warrant an archangel smiting session, but it did get an exasperated regular angel sent down to tell the imps off.

One imp, arguably the smart one, hid beneath a table when it saw the angel coming to yell at them to get off of God's lawn. The other imp scampered up to a stone pillar overlooking the Angel Choir where it proceeded to tear up more stone and started pelting the angel with rocks, yelling “Stop me if you can!”. Now, it turned out the angel could, in fact, stop a lone hyper imp while stood in a holy power centre. As soon as it got sick of being target practice, probably once the first wild projectile actually hit it, the angel turned the imp to stone.

There, above the Angel Choir, to this very day the Lincoln Imp remains. A tiny detail among the rest of the gothic architecture, although proudly lit up by a spotlight so visitors can enjoy finding them. One story goes that the second imp continues to wait for its friend, when the wind blows extra strong across the city it's the frustrated imp angry that is left alone outside the Cathedral after the angel came down to clean up their mess.

Lincoln has wholeheartedly embraced its tale of their imps! Extra impish stone grotesques have sprung up all over the city (sidenote: this type of statue is not actually a gargoyle unless it has a spout for rainwater, the correct term is grotesque when it's a solid statue, if it isn't able to gargle it isn't a gargoyle). The local football team are even nicknamed “The Imps”, and a lot of tourist-y merchandise is all delightfully imp themed.

Lincoln is definitely going on the visit list!

SECTION BREAK – The Agnus Grave of Maryland

Druid Ridge Cemetery, already an utterly fantastic name, is a beautiful graveyard in Pikesville, Maryland just outside of Baltimore. Filled with the final resting place of many a famous historical figure, it's no stranger to statues as its 200 acres have multiple Hans Schuler sculptures decorating it and some random, yet brilliant, additions such as a statue of the Greek Fate Clotho.

But it has an impressively notorious stonework figure which stands out among the rest, for how haunted it was supposed to be.

The statue that became known as Black Aggie had an incredible reputation through the 1950s to the 1970s. It was an unauthorised replica of the “Grief” statue Henry Adams, grandson of President John Quincy Adams, commissioned after his wife committed suicide in 1891. The grey marble copy of the famous Adams Memorial was made for the grave of local publisher General Felix Agnus in 1926, and it almost immediately took on a fearsome reputation of its own.

Black Aggie was theoretically safe in the day time. An imposing figure upon its plinth, no grass would grow anywhere it cast a shadow. Speaking of that shadow, pregnant women were warned not to let it fall upon them, and to just plain avoid the statue of the robed melancholic woman, or else they were at risk of a miscarriage.

Night time was when Black Aggie really came to life. Perhaps even literally. Her eyes would turn red at night, and meeting her gaze could strike someone blind. Each year the ghosts of Druid Ridge Cemetery would all convene around her statue, and you could risk becoming haunted by some of these spirits if you were stupid enough to sit on her lap at night. There was even a local college fraternity hazing ritual that had pledges sit on the lap of the statue overnight from dusk until dawn, when the frat bros would come back to collect the initiate. Only the story goes that this practice ended quite suddenly when one student was found dead from fright in the arms of the statue the next morning. Supposedly if you spoke the name Black Aggie in front of a mirror in the vicinity of the Cemetery you would get a scratch for your troubles. The brave could risk placing coins in her hand for good luck, although there's one urban legend of some idiot who thought it would be funny to put out a lit cigarette in Black Aggie's hand and they would some years later come to a very bad end.

Above, I referred to how haunted it was supposed to be, past tense. That's because the infamous statue got removed! Black Aggie had become so infamous the statue was a target of constant vandalism, and it was eventually removed from Druid Ridge being donated to the Smithsonian in 1967. It's still possible to see Black Aggie, long cleaned up at this point, after spending some years in storage where she could get up to no further mischief she has now been moved to a courtyard behind the Dolley Madison House in Washington's Lafayette Square. If you're feeling brave, you can go meet the statue for yourself.

The empty pedestal she used to sit upon still remains in place at the south side of Druid Ridge Cemetery, should you want to make pilgrimage to the former paranormal hotspot. Double dare you to say “Black Aggie” into a mirror if you do go!

SECTION BREAK – A Very Cursed Stone

Cursed jewels and gemstones are surprisingly common throughout history, probably because they're worth money and as such are worth fighting over. There's only so much blood you can be bathed in before you at the very least pick up bad vibes, let alone curses or the odd restless spirit.

This is the storied history of The Hope Diamond. A brilliant blue gem, absolutely outstanding in beauty, it began its trail of tragedies as The Tavernier Blue. It was, initially, a gemstone set in a Hindu statue of worship as one of the eyes, but 17th Century French merchant Jean-Baptiste Tavernier spotted how impressive the blue diamond was and promptly Did A Colonialism to it, pocketing the 115.16-carat shiny thingie and returning to France to sell it. Carats are apparently a measure of a diamond's weight, something I had to look up because I kept seeing these ratings while not really knowing what they meant. One carat is equal to 0.2 grams, those of you with a head for numbers following along.

King Louis XIV bought it off Tavernier and had it recut to 69 carats in 1673. (Nice). In its new form it was known as “The Blue Diamond of the Crown” or the “French Blue”. King Louis XIV would promptly catch the gangrene that would go on to kill him after this. The French Blue would then be inherited by King Louis XVI and would be proudly worn by his wife Marie Antoinette. You may recognise these names... The good news is neither of them caught gangrene. The bad news is the French Revolution happened, and both of them got extreme haircuts with guillotines.

The diamond was stolen as a part of the revolutionary upheaval, although that's a strong term for something that was already stolen goods, and it would be cut down to its final 45-carat form as The Blue Hope Diamond. It didn't have the final name as yet, though. The Dutch jeweller who did the final work on the gem was murdered by his son who stole the cursed rock, who then later took his own life. It would turn up in an 1839 gem collection catalogue as owned by the Hope banking family in London, which is where it got its final name, and it would then go on from there into the 1900s to continue its kill streak.

1910, a man named Pierre Cartier buys it, then goes on to drive his car over a cliff. It ends up in the possession of rich heiress Evalyn Walsh MacLean, who appears to have made the diamond mad by affixing it to her dog's collar to show it off. Her mother-in-law dies. Her young son dies. Her husband leaves her for a younger women, then dies in a psychiatric hospital. Her daughter dies from an overdose, and Evalyn ends up in staggering debt so bad she has to sell her newspaper The Washington Post, then SHE dies still owing massive outstanding debts. The now reduced in number of surviving children sell The Hope Diamond on to help pay off these outstanding debts in 1949.

The Hope Diamond seems to need a nap after this level of curse related carnage, and behaves up until the jeweller who had it in his collection decides to donate it to the Smithsonian Institution, posting it to them for $2.44 plus $155 insurance. The Blue Murderstone doesn't appear to like the indignity of travelling via US Mail. The poor mailman who got the job got hit by a truck soon after, suffered a head injury in a separate accident after that, and then his house burned down. He did at least survive, although it seems the curse took a good run at him.

Having settled at the National Museum of Natural History as one of the most visited exhibitions of all Smithsonian pieces, and now valued at a flattering $150million, The Blue Hope Diamond appears to be behaving. Maybe don't handle it though, and certainly don't try to steal it. Believe in the curse or not, it's without question one of the most notorious diamonds in all of human history.

SECTION BREAK

Well, that's the first of this thematic trilogy of episodes. Early guesses as to what I'm up to are very welcome! The second episode should be with you sooner rather than later, but there's a special episode planned for mid August to tie into a movie I'm excited to see. Part three will then likely be after that one, and I will reveal what I have been up to for anyone who hasn't guessed the theme yet. I'm being a little daft with these, but I always keep myself amused if nothing else, and we're already unearthing some great stories. I'm looking forwards to where the theme takes me next.

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Goodbye for now.