Girdles : their origin and development, particularly with regard to their use as charms in medicine, and midwifery / by Walter J. Dilling, M.B., Ch. B., lecturer in pharmacology, Aberdeen University.

  • Dilling, Walter James, 1886-1950
Date:
1914
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: Girdles : their origin and development, particularly with regard to their use as charms in medicine, and midwifery / by Walter J. Dilling, M.B., Ch. B., lecturer in pharmacology, Aberdeen University. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    our own country, but our ancestors were undoubtedly “let loose by the self-same zone. In the “ Privy Purse Expenses of Elizabeth of \ork in December, 1502, there is the entryPo a monke that brought our Lady gyrdelle to the Quene in reward, vjs. viijd;” and the commentator notes on this statement “ Probably one of the numerous relicks with which the monasteries and abbeys then abounded, and which might have been brought to the Queen for her to put on when in labour, as it was a common practice for women, in this situation, to wear blessed girdles.” It would appear also that lying-in women were accustomed to wrap round them a long scroll having the “Magnificat” written upon it, and in a letter to Lord Cromwell from Dr. Leighton about 1537, the passage occurs, “I send you also our Lady’s Girdle of Bruton red silke, a solemn relike, sent to women in travail.”1 Further, we read that on the dissolution of the monasteries at Leicester, a multitude of false miracles and superstitious relics were discovered. Amongst others our Lady’s girdle was shown in eleven several places, and her milk in eight; together with the penknife of St. Thomas of Canterbury and a piece of his shirt “ much reverenced by big-bellied women.”2 J & Other charms of a like nature to those cited were bound to the thigh , of these, two examples must suffice. Lemnius states that a jewel, named Aetites, found in the eagle’s nest, that rings with little stones within it, applied to the thigh of one in labour, eases and quickens delivery. The following charade, oi charm, used in the same way, is so interesting that I give the full inscription2 3:— “For Woman that travelyth of Chylcle bynd thys Wryt to her Thye. J “In Nomine Patris + et Filii + et Spiritus Sancti + Amen. + Per Virtutem Domini sint Medicina mei pia Crux et Passio Christi+ Vulnera quinque Domini sint Medicina mei. + Sancta Maria peperit Christum. + San eta Anna peperit Mariam. + Sancta Elizabet peperit Johannem. + Sancta Cecilia peperit Bemigium. + Arepo tenet opera rotas. -f- Christus vincit. + Christus regnat. + Christus dixit Lazare vem foras. + Christus imperat. + Christus te vocat. + Mundus te gaudet. + Lex te desiderat. + Deus ultionum Dominus. + Deus preliorum Dominus libera famulam tuam N. + Dextra Domini fecit virtutem. a. g. 1. a. + Alpha. + et Q. + Anna peperit Mariam, + Elizabet 2 tVoC' Hflzlitt’ “Dict- of Faiths and Folklore,” 1905, vol. ii, p. 378. , d . brand, “ Popular Antiquities,” Loudon, 1900, p. 333. 3 Ibid., p. 331-2.