The Strange History of Mother Shipton

• 22/06/2021
• 18:00-19:30
• Online talk

Wikimedia Commons

Prof. Richard Jenkins (University of Sheffield) asks ‘Who was Mother Shipton? Was she a real person? How did she end up as the theme of a visitor attraction in Knaresborough, Yorkshire?’

This talk will trace the development of ‘Mother Shipton’ as a legendary figure: from the prophetess of seventeenth-century Civil War pamphlets, to the presiding spirit of a twenty-first-century visitor attraction in Knaresborough, Yorkshire, by way of a lively incarnation on the stage in the eighteenth century and a doomsday prophecy in the nineteenth. It will address the issue of whether she actually existed, and look at the social and cultural processes that have enabled her remarkable longevity.

Book via Eventbrite: tickets £5.00 non-members, £3.00 FLS members with Promo Code