Sunday, June 13, 2010

Knocking on Devil's Door

This beautiful aged church has a feature I had never seen, and have since found out is indigenous to the UK. It is called the "Devil's Door", built into the north face of some medieval and earlier churches. Here it can be seen under the third window, and is perhaps too small for a human to enter. Its purpose is to provide an escape hatch for the Devil as he carries the soul of an unbaptized child to an unpleasant place. I wonder if this practice is a crossover from pagan beliefs.

Unfortunately, I have no idea of the name of this church as I took this picture from the second storey of a tour bus, the use of which fitted our need for low impact sightseeing whilst I was suffering a coughy illness.

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