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Walstan750Bawburgh pilgrims to wear costume for Walstan 

A reconstruction of a medieval pilgrimage in full pageant is coming to Bawburgh to mark St Walstan's Day and the final journey of the saint.

Colin Rymill explains that the event will re-enact the procession in 1016 which accompanied St Walstan’s corpse to his final resting place in Bawburgh: “The Norwich and Norfolk Medieval Association (NANMA) will recreate the original event. The pilgrimage along the route of the oxen-drawn hearse from Taverham to Bawburgh via Costessey has become an annual pilgrimage undertaken by hundreds. This year it will be followed by members of the NANMA pilgrims in medieval clothes.”
 
St Walstan was born, some claim, in Bawburgh, a prince of the royal house of East Anglia; as a young man he renounced all possessions and worked on a farm in central Norfolk. Legend records he received a message from an angel that he was to die in three days. He put down his scythe and sought out a priest in Taverham to receive the Last Rites. A spring issued forth to provide water where there had been none. The hearse stopped to rest the oxen in Costessey and a second spring appeared. At its destination near the church in Bawburgh a third, and the largest, spring burst forth and the site is now marked by St Walstan’s Well. An annual church service is held at the Well on the Sunday closest to St Walstan’s Day, 30 May.
 
The NANMA pilgrims plan to join the 11am service in Bawburgh Church that will be led by the Rt Revd Dr Jane Steen, Bishop of Lynn, on Sunday May 29. The congregation will process to St Walstan’s Well, about 100 metres north of St Mary’s and St Walstan’s Church, for prayers to close the service. The well may be accessed on foot via Church Street, Bawburgh. 
 
“Although the route is not as internationally famous as the Camino de Santiago’s 780 km pilgrimage route,” writes Colin, “the warmth of welcome in Bawburgh by Bishop Jane and others will be as sincere as that given to pilgrims arriving at the tomb of St James (Santiago in Spanish) in Santiago de Compostela cathedral. Interestingly, both the cathedral and Bawburgh church structures date to a similar period in the 13th Century.”
 
Pictured above is a detail of an icon of St Walstan by Anna Dimascio.
 
 

Eldred Willey, 23/05/2022

Eldred Willey
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