{"id":13928,"date":"2025-02-14T17:40:01","date_gmt":"2025-02-15T00:40:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=13928"},"modified":"2025-02-14T17:40:01","modified_gmt":"2025-02-15T00:40:01","slug":"wassailing-the-apple-trees-revived-in-the-west-of-england","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=13928","title":{"rendered":"Wassailing the Apple Trees Revived in the West of England"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Em Sibley, the \u201cwassail queen,” after successfully completing the ceremony at Sheppy\u2019s farm in Bradford-on-Tone, England (New York TImes).<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

From the New York TImes (February 13, 2025) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A jet of steam rises with a hiss as a red hot poker plunges into a bowl of cider. A garlanded woman spears a piece of toast with a long fork and lodges the offering among the branches of a tree. Then, amid shouts from the watching crowd, the torch-lit ceremony ends with gunfire ringing out beneath the clear night winter sky.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For most of the year, Sheppy\u2019s farm at Bradford-on-Tone in the west of England uses state of the art machinery to tend its 22,000 apple trees and produce more than half a million gallons of cider annually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read the whole thing.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Em Sibley, the \u201cwassail queen,” after successfully completing the ceremony at Sheppy\u2019s farm in Bradford-on-Tone, England (New York TImes). From the New York TImes (February 13, 2025) A jet of steam rises with a hiss as a red hot poker plunges into a bowl of cider. A garlanded woman spears a piece of toast with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[21,37,244],"class_list":["post-13928","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-england","tag-folklore","tag-spring"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-3CE","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":13362,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=13362","url_meta":{"origin":13928,"position":0},"title":"Yet It’s Not October: Paganism in the News (Part 1)","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"May 5, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"I have been seeing a flush of Pagan-related articles in Anglosphere news media lately, so many that it feels like October, which is usually the only time we are noticed.((Possibly with a smaller peak around Yule.)) One reason may be upcoming coronation of King Charles III.((I might as well say\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Britain\"","block_context":{"text":"Britain","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=britain"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/critic-cover.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1204,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1204","url_meta":{"origin":13928,"position":1},"title":"Paganism is Fa-abulous","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 6, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"So says the News of the World, so consider the source. Both Emma and Amie are in the throes of planning their weddings for next year - or hand-fastings, as they're called in pagan circles, because the couple's hands are tied together during the ceremony. Both are planning outdoor ceremonies\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"culture\"","block_context":{"text":"culture","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=culture"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8830,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8830","url_meta":{"origin":13928,"position":2},"title":"Mystery Deity in Hitler Hex","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 27, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Today the Internet served me \"Putting a Hex on Hitler: LIFE Goes to a 'Black Magic' Party.\" For background, you have to know that the pictorial weekly news magazine Life had a regular feature called \"Life Goes to a Party\" \u2014 and many of these parties featured big-name musicians \u2014\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"England\"","block_context":{"text":"England","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=england"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/incantation-in-progress.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4551,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=4551","url_meta":{"origin":13928,"position":3},"title":"Stone Circles: Not Just for Neolithic People","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 27, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"\"Andy Burnham, who runs the Megalithic Portal Web site and society in Surrey, England, has recorded 253 monolithic circles built in recent decades. And 'there must be many more in private gardens that we don\u2019t know about,' he wrote in an e-mail.\" The New York Times profiles a Vermont man\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Druids\"","block_context":{"text":"Druids","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=druids"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7304,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=7304","url_meta":{"origin":13928,"position":4},"title":"New Excavation at Marden Henge","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"June 28, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"A major archaeological effort beginning this summer will explore Marden Henge, a Neolithic monument that rivaled Avebury and Stonehenge but is less well known. Excavation within the Henge will focus on the surface of what is\u00a0thought to be one of the oldest houses in Britain,\u00a0a Neolithic building revealed during earlier\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/cdn.images.express.co.uk\/img\/dynamic\/1\/590x\/secondary\/Aerial-view-of-the-dig-site-306010.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/cdn.images.express.co.uk\/img\/dynamic\/1\/590x\/secondary\/Aerial-view-of-the-dig-site-306010.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/cdn.images.express.co.uk\/img\/dynamic\/1\/590x\/secondary\/Aerial-view-of-the-dig-site-306010.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":251,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=251","url_meta":{"origin":13928,"position":5},"title":"Almost pagan Thanks to Nick\u2026","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 25, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Almost pagan Thanks to Nick Freeman, whose paper, \"The Shrineless God: Paganism, Literature, and Art in Forties England,\" will appear in the next issue of The Pomegranate, I have been watching and reading some classics of literary, if not self-consciously religious, small-p paganism. One was the film A Canterbury Tale,\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13928","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13928"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13928\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13936,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13928\/revisions\/13936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13928"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13928"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13928"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}