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"Meeting Nicola"

Damien said:
I have no idea what was in control, he just remembers the green eyes were a fixture from what he as told me.
Click to expand...

If he didn't notice her jubblies he was clearly enchanted, I shall don my cloak and broad brimmed hat and hunt for witches.
 
Ogdred Weary said:
If he didn't notice her jubblies he was clearly enchanted, I shall don my cloak and broad brimmed hat and hunt for witches.
Click to expand...
You will do NO such thing!!! leave cloak and brimmed hat in your own hearth, if it's tits you want there's top shelf periodicals to acquire. :p
 
To diverge from Nicola's secondary sexual characteristics for just a moment...

Here is the area that @Damien has pinpointed as the locus of Frank's experience:

Walton-Bridge-Fortean-Google-earth.jpg


I went to my trusty source of reference material, the National Library of Scotland's peerless map collection, and looked at a few hoping, as always, to discover that the incident took place at "Drowned Lass Wharf", or "Water Nymph Pool": as usual, no such luck. Here are maps from the Ordnance Survey:

Walton-Bridge-Nicola-Fortean-1865.jpg


1864-1870

Walton-Bridge-Nicola-Fortean-1934.jpg


1934

Walton-Bridge-Nicola-Fortean-1938.jpg


1938

The only thing that I could see that was out of the ordinary was the feature at lower left: "Coway Stakes". Intrigued, I consulted Google, where I found a reference to this book:

Old England: A Pictorial Museum of Regal, Ecclesiastical, Municipal, Baronial and Popular Antiquities
by Charles Knight, London, 1845

Knight has this to say, quoting the English topographer Camden:

"In noticing the two descents of Cæsar upon Britain (page 26) we said, “From the nature of his inroad into the country, no monuments exist, or could have existed, to attest his progress.” But there is a monument, if so it may be called, still existing, which furnishes evidence of the systematic resistance which was made to his progress. Bede, writing at the beginning of the eighth century, after describing with his wonted brevity the battle in which Cæsar in his second invasion put the Britons to flight, says, “Thence he proceeded to the river Thames, which is said to be fordable only in one place. An immense multitude of the enemy had posted themselves on the farthest side of the river, under the conduct of Cassibelan, and fenced the bank of the river and almost all the ford under water with sharp stakes, the remains of which stakes are to be there seen to this day, and they appear to the beholders to be about the thickness of a man’s thigh, and being cased with lead, remain immoveable, fixed in the bottom of the river.”

OK: Bede the Venerable mentions these stakes (Ecclesiastical History of England, Chapter II, page 10) in the eighth century. How about Caesar himself?

"XVIII.—Caesar, discovering their design, leads his army into the territories of Cassivellaunus to the river Thames; which river can be forded in one place only, and that with difficulty. When he had arrived there, he perceives that numerous forces of the enemy were marshalled on the other bank of the river; the bank also was defended by sharp stakes fixed in front, and stakes of the same kind fixed under the water were covered by the river. These things being discovered from [some] prisoners and deserters, Caesar, sending forward the cavalry, ordered the legions to follow them immediately. But the soldiers advanced with such speed and such ardour, though they stood above the water by their heads only, that the enemy could not sustain the attack of the legions and of the horse, and quitted the banks, and committed themselves to flight."

Julius Caesar, De Bello Gallico, Bk.V, Ch.xviii

So: Caesar describes stakes, Bede quotes Caesar, Camden mentions them in Elizabeth's reign and Knight confirms that Coway Stakes is the very place mentioned by Camden here:

"Caesar then marched with is army to the river Thames, and so to the confines of Cassivelaunus. Upon the further banke of this river, yea and under the water, they had covertly stucke sharpe stakes, and embatteled themselves with a great power. But the Romanes went and waded over which such violence, notwithstanding they had but their heads cleere above the water, that the enemy was not able to endure the charge, but left the bank, and betoke themselves to flight..."

Camden, Romans in Britaine 1, Ch.v

Let's get woo: this sighting was of a water spirit, still seething from Caesar's defeat of her people at Coway Stakes, and condemned to haunt the site until...

...she can beguile, entrap and do away with someone from Caesar's land as revenge. Where is Frank's ancestral home? Sicily.

Mic drop.

maximus otter
 
Last edited:
maximus otter said:
To diverge from Nicola's secondary sexual characteristics for just a moment...

Here is the area that @Damien has pinpointed as the locus of Frank's experience:

Walton-Bridge-Fortean-Google-earth.jpg


I went to my trusty source of reference material, the National Library of Scotland's peerless map collection, and looked at a few hoping, as always, to discover that the incident took place at "Drowned Lass Wharf", or "Water Nymph Pool": as usual, no such luck. Here are maps from the Ordnance Survey:

Walton-Bridge-Nicola-Fortean-1865.jpg


1864-1870

Walton-Bridge-Nicola-Fortean-1934.jpg


1934

Walton-Bridge-Nicola-Fortean-1938.jpg


1938

The only thing that I could see that was out of the ordinary was the feature at lower left: "Coway Stakes". Intrigued, I consulted Google, where I found a reference to this book:

Old England: A Pictorial Museum of Regal, Ecclesiastical, Municipal, Baronial and Popular Antiquities
by Charles Knight, London, 1845

Knight has this to say, quoting the English topographer Camden:

"In noticing the two descents of Cæsar upon Britain (page 26) we said, “From the nature of his inroad into the country, no monuments exist, or could have existed, to attest his progress.” But there is a monument, if so it may be called, still existing, which furnishes evidence of the systematic resistance which was made to his progress. Bede, writing at the beginning of the eighth century, after describing with his wonted brevity the battle in which Cæsar in his second invasion put the Britons to flight, says, “Thence he proceeded to the river Thames, which is said to be fordable only in one place. An immense multitude of the enemy had posted themselves on the farthest side of the river, under the conduct of Cassibelan, and fenced the bank of the river and almost all the ford under water with sharp stakes, the remains of which stakes are to be there seen to this day, and they appear to the beholders to be about the thickness of a man’s thigh, and being cased with lead, remain immoveable, fixed in the bottom of the river.”

OK: Bede the Venerable mentions these stakes (Ecclesiastical History of England, Chapter II, page 10) in the eighth century. How about Caesar himself?

"XVIII.—Caesar, discovering their design, leads his army into the territories of Cassivellaunus to the river Thames; which river can be forded in one place only, and that with difficulty. When he had arrived there, he perceives that numerous forces of the enemy were marshalled on the other bank of the river; the bank also was defended by sharp stakes fixed in front, and stakes of the same kind fixed under the water were covered by the river. These things being discovered from [some] prisoners and deserters, Caesar, sending forward the cavalry, ordered the legions to follow them immediately. But the soldiers advanced with such speed and such ardour, though they stood above the water by their heads only, that the enemy could not sustain the attack of the legions and of the horse, and quitted the banks, and committed themselves to flight."

Julius Caesar, De Bello Gallico, Bk.V, Ch.xviii

So: Caesar describes stakes, Bede quotes Caesar, Camden mentions them in Elizabeth's reign and Knight confirms that Coway Stakes is the very place mentioned by Camden here:

"Caesar then marched with is army to the river Thames, and so to the confines of Cassivelaunus. Upon the further banke of this river, yea and under the water, they had covertly stucke sharpe stakes, and embatteled themselves with a great power. But the Romanes went and waded over which such violence, notwithstanding they had but their heads cleere above the water, that the enemy was not able to endure the charge, but left the bank, and betoke themselves to flight..."

Camden, Romans in Britaine 1, Ch.v

Let's get woo: this sighting was of a water spirit, still seething from Caesar's defeat of her people at Coway Stakes and condemned to haunt the site until...

...she can beguile, entrap and do away with someone from Caesar's land as revenge. Where is Frank's ancestral home? Sicily.

Mic drop.

maximus otter
Click to expand...
Nice bit of research there (old maps and all) didn't know it was the site of an ancient battle, that's cool. Frank was born in the UK, his parents are from Mussomeli Sicily. I haven't come across any local legends regarding ancient vengeful spirits in the area yet ;)
 
WeirdExeter said:
Excellent work maximus otter

A Scicilian has a paranormal encounter at the site of a major engagement with Caesar‘s invading Roman legions? Didn’t see that coming but it’s made my day :)
Click to expand...
Welcome aboard.
It’s not proven there was a paranormal encounter.
 
Leaving aside the reality or not of the encounter, I was immediately struck by its mythological subtext... Starts with a river (boundary between life/death or "real world"/otherworld), the girl appearing as archetypal water spirit standing on the shingle (just stepped across the boundary from the "other"), the black dog in the water - black dogs being psychopomps, wandering a deserted lane towards a lake where who knows what watery fate awaited, the mention of the summer solstice banishing the dark-haired emissary of aquatic doom and her companion i.e. triumph of life over death, in this instance anyway.
 
SimonBurchell said:
Leaving aside the reality or not of the encounter, I was immediately struck by its mythological subtext... Starts with a river (boundary between life/death or "real world"/otherworld), the girl appearing as archetypal water spirit standing on the shingle (just stepped across the boundary from the "other"), the black dog in the water - black dogs being psychopomps, wandering a deserted lane towards a lake where who knows what watery fate awaited, the mention of the summer solstice banishing the dark-haired emissary of aquatic doom and her companion i.e. triumph of life over death, in this instance anyway.
Click to expand...
Good post there Simon.
 
SimonBurchell said:
Leaving aside the reality or not of the encounter, I was immediately struck by its mythological subtext... Starts with a river (boundary between life/death or "real world"/otherworld), the girl appearing as archetypal water spirit standing on the shingle (just stepped across the boundary from the "other"), the black dog in the water - black dogs being psychopomps, wandering a deserted lane towards a lake where who knows what watery fate awaited, the mention of the summer solstice banishing the dark-haired emissary of aquatic doom and her companion i.e. triumph of life over death, in this instance anyway.
Click to expand...


Someone way back in the first couple of pages of this thread posited the idea that Nicola was some kine of otherworldly entity and that the black dog/biker was a familiar or guardian. I don't know why but I just love that idea
 
Mouldy13 said:
Someone way back in the first couple of pages of this thread posited the idea that Nicola was some kine of otherworldly entity and that the black dog/biker was a familiar or guardian. I don't know why but I just love that idea
Click to expand...
Yes I remeber reading that, I have heard of Familiars before, but what are Guardians? and even if a shape-shifter is in your belief system, where does a dog get a motor bike from?
 
Mouldy13 said:
Someone way back in the first couple of pages of this thread posited the idea that Nicola was some kine of otherworldly entity and that the black dog/biker was a familiar or guardian. I don't know why but I just love that idea
Click to expand...

Hey!! Mouldy! (that's all I have to say really, I like it when Mouldy13 posts). :)
 
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