please empty your brain below |
Burying Gladstone in 1881 would have been a good way to silence him, given he didn't die till 1898. Do you mean Disraeli who did die in that year?
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Imperial graduate here. I’ve never heard anyone at the technical college on Exhibition Road using the terms Michaelmas or St Michael’s Lawn.
Curious. |
I thought the English quarter days were
- Lady Day (25 March) - Midsummer Day (24 June) - Michaelmas (29 September) - Christmas (25 December) Lady Day being particularly important because it’s when all taxes were due. The reason it’s now 6th April is due to the switch to the Gregorian calendar, which jumped 11 days. |
Errr. Tomorrow, 29th, is the feast of Michaelmas.
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I am one of the Volunteer Guides at St Paul’s Cathedral and the correct title is the Order of St Michael and St George. The Order is the sixth most senior in the British honours system and is used to honour individuals who have rendered important services in relation to Commonwealth or foreign nations.
The original home of the Order was the Palace of St Michael and St George in Corfu but since 1906 the Order's chapel has been at St Paul’s Cathedral. The Order was founded in 1818 to commemorate the British protectorate over the Ionian islands and Malta which came under British rule in 1814. Other distinguished people appointed to the order are Tim Peake, Michael Palin and in fiction, James Bond in 1953 in the novel From Russia With Love. |
I’m not getting a duck in any of the 32 boroughs today, I fear.
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Would I lie to you?
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A fascinating read, as usual.
It’s Disraeli who’s buried at Hughenden, not Gladstone; he lived next door in his later years. Queen Victoria didn’t attend his funeral: she sent primroses instead, as you told us in a previous post (about Primrose Day, I think). |
First link doesn't work. Schoolboy spelling error.
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Michaelmas Daisies used to be called Aster Novi-Belgii but were recently renamed Symphyotrichum Novi-Belgii. Not cornflowers.
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I think he's playing with us. There are too many discrepencies between what he says and the facts given by the links when you click on them (Michaelmas Duck/Michaelmas Goose, Quarter days, number and names of the terms of the legal year, etc.).
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April fool and a half?
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Your bid to appear on The Unbelievable Truth?
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You had me at petal primes - now I'm lost in Fibonacci numbers. Meanwhile, it seems ancient tradition remains alive, perhaps via some atavistic corporate memory: My local Tesco last week stocked its freezer section with goose.
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28th September, henceforth known as Spooflemas.
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You had me. I'm furious with myself that I didn't realise sooner.
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Knowing the Quarter Days and where M&S started made me suspicious early on.
I do hope there will be a corrected version of this or quizzes the world over might forever be contaminated by incorrect information accidentally ingested from here! |
Leeds, not Manchester for M&S. And not the reason for the St. Michael brand.
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That wasn't just any old post, that was an M&S post.
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Tripping over brambles, with their long shoots spreading across paths is an occupational hazard for anyone walking in the countryside, so Satan has my sympathies.
I generally just swear loudly afterwards, but each to their own. |
If we're spotting things, it was spit, not urine
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The first Marks and Spencer stall was in Leeds market, not Manchester, as Clive has already noted.
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Hmm, misinformation day it is!
The false date given for the annuciation (should be 25 March) tipped me off, but this is clearly not the only bit of dubiously sourced material here. Sad! |
I think you may be providing fodder for the various 'information' suppliers who routinely scavenge their content from others, rather than do their own research. Well done!
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Had me going.
You’re generally rather punctilious in your research and spelling. The giveaway being right at the beginning - Michaelmas, when it should be Michealmas! Can I now believe anything written in this post - or a mish-mash of fact and fiction! We're being put to a test! |
Also with regards to 'nature doesn't shift', I'm not sure about blackberries but this report shows apple and pear harvest dates moving forwards between 0.1 and 0.4 days per year due to climate change.
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For 10 years I've been comparing the Michaelmas daisies in my shaded garden with other gardens around me and mine generally start flowering in mid-Sept while others in sunnier spots, in August.
This year they all (including mine) have been a good 3-4 weeks earlier! Saying that, you got me too as there was enough 'truth' among the mis-information. I'd heard that Satan urinated on blackberries, and knew Michaelmas Day to be a quarter day etc. The fact that you didn't jump in to fix the 'mistakes' straight away is also a big clue! Either way, a good post full of useful (if slightly wrong) information to store up for future reference - you've convinced me about the M&S branding regardless of its accuracy! |
Can't help thinking a post of real facts would have been more interesting. Was obviously wrong from the Quarter Days onwards. Waste of time.
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An excellent lesson in never taking anything at face value, however (usually) credible the source, methinks.
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Ha ha! But you're not completely wrong about quarterdays. Those listed are the half quarterdays.
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My wife berated me this morning for getting today wrong, when it should be tomorrow (showing me our Saints' Calendar to further prove the point).
I have now clicked on the 'Michealmas' (Wiki link) so I guess today is one of your rare experiments to see what type of reaction you will achieve. Please add me to the list of pedants if I am not already near the top of it. |
AD 666 piqued my interest (and it turns out that Benedict II was pope for less than a year, but not until in 684-5) but I started looking for falsehoods at the peculiar quarter days.
Your list looks superficially plausible but you moved Lady Day, and where was Christmas? Not least, they need to be three months apart, so early August to late September (less than 2 months), and late September to early February (more than 4 months) would not work. And the legal year has four terms, and ... well. |
A trivial correction to add to the others. The Lord Mayor of London is elected on Michaelmas Day (ie tomorrow) not by the City Sheriffs and Aldermen but by the Liverymen of the City Livery Companies who meet for the purpose at the Guildhall. The election is not by way of secret ballot but by a show of hands. Once in a blue moon there is actually a genuine contest which serves to delay the Liverymen's arrival at the main business of the day, namely lunch.
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It’s certainly prompted a lot of comments.
I enjoyed reading it, true or false. |
Heh heh. Had me for a good way through.
I guess some of these factoids will become transmitted into facts now. You are testing something, someone, maybe. |
I hope you'll publish a fully correct version tomorrow.
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Obviously some sort of Wagatha Christie sting to see who trots out the ( false) content as if it's their own !
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Well, some of us were brought up believing Satan widdled on the blackberries. No spitting for us.
(I read up on this and it seemed a belief most prevalent in Kent. So it's odd that we followed it: we were in Cumbria.) |
By complete coincidence I happen to be eating duck right now, in a honey sauce too
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Really hope one of those London news sites copies this article
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I was going to comment about Gladstone/Disraeli but having read the ohter comments decided not to. I went to Hughenden many years ago and saw the special chair for Queen Victoria.
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Obviously incorrect is the statement 'Chief among these [churches dedicated to St Michael] is St Michael and All Angels in Chiswick'.
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I don't think anyone else has pointed out that Barbara Pym's Quartet in Autumn is not a trilogy. It's a single novel.
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I've got a feeling nature has shifted, actually, and by quite some distance - but that is another story.
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There is also a "country pursuits" tradition of chasing after geese on Michaelmas, the person catching the geese gets to eat it.
Similar in concept to climbing a greasy pole to claim a flitch of bacon. |
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