The Adoration of the Magi – Edward Burne-Jones (1894)

Dear Readers, a few years ago I was following the 72 seasons of the British year, as described in the wonderful book ‘Nature’s Calendar‘. so I thought I might have a bash at doing the same thing this year. Let’s see how we get on! It’s interesting to see how the book ties up with what I’m actually observing, and for the period 5th to 9th January the authors look at how the light is gradually, gently coming back.

However, the mornings seem every bit as dark as ever, even though sunset does seem a tad later every day. I’ve always found this very hard to get my head around. In her piece in the book, Lulah Ellender explains that this is because of the difference between Solar time and Clock time. Solar time is measured according to the Earth’s position relative to the sun, which is affected by the tilt of the axis, the fact that our orbit isn’t circular, and by the speed that the sun itself travels. Clock time takes a measurement of where the Earth would be in relation to the sun without these disparities. A Clock-time day is 24 hours long, and noon and midnight fall at set times. A Solar-time day runs from the highest point of the sun one day, to the highest point of the sun on the next day. In the northern hemisphere, the Earth tilts closest to the sun and is spinning faster than clock time. So, until 9th January our sunrises stay static – after this, we should notice a bit more light at both ends of the day.

Go figure! My head explodes with stuff like this. So much of what we live by is arbitrary – the date of New Year, the time when the sunrises and sets. I am reminded that not too long  ago, the UK had ‘local time’: for example. Bristol time was 11 minutes behind London time, and in Truro the time was 20 minutes later than here in good old East Finchley. In 1840 Greenwich Mean Time was adopted, mainly because the burgeoning railways demanded a standardised time across the country, but a study showed that actually some areas were very slow to adopt this, and there was something of a free-for-all until 1880. I imagine that only the rich had watches, and everybody else relied on the town hall clock.

Another thing that pops up in Ellender’s chapter in the book is that this very day (6th January) is Epiphany – for Christians, the day when the Three Wise Men finally reached Bethlehem. 7th January is Distaff Day, traditionally the day when women would get back to spinning and weaving after the Christmas break, while the first Monday after Epiphany is Plough Monday, when the chaps get back to the fields. There was often much jollity around these two days: on Distaff Day, the men would try to set fire to the womens’ distaffs (the rod where the wool or flax was kept) before the women could douse the distaffs (and hopefully also the men) with buckets of cold water. I imagine this was a whole lot of fun on a cold January evening.

Reine Berthe et les fileueses, 1888 by Albert Anker – Queen Bertha shows the young women of the court how to spin.

Those of you who studied English might also remember that James Joyce thought of the epiphany as a moment of revelation, one of those times when something quite ordinary somehow seems to be lit up with an inner light. This is the piece that I remember most: the bird-girl from A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Looking at it today it has resonances about the male gaze etc etc, but I still think it’s an extraordinary piece. See what you think.

A girl stood before him in midstream, alone and still, gazing out to sea. She seemed like one whom magic had changed into the likeness of a strange and beautiful seabird. Her long slender bare legs were delicate as a crane’s and pure save where an emerald trail of seaweed had fashioned itself as a sign upon the flesh. Her thighs, fuller and softhued as ivory, were bared almost to the hips, where the white fringes of her drawers were like feathering of soft white down. Her slateblue skirts were kilted boldly about her waist and dovetailed behind her. Her bosom was as a bird’s, soft and slight, slight and soft as the breast of some darkplumaged dove. But her long fair hair was girlish: and girlish, and touched with the wonder of mortal beauty, her face.

She was alone and still, gazing out to sea; and when she felt his presence and the worship of his eyes her eyes turned to him in quiet sufferance of his gaze, without shame or wantonness. Long, long she suffered his gaze and then quietly withdrew her eyes from his and bent them towards the stream, gently stirring the water with her foot hither and thither. The first faint noise of gently moving water broke the silence, low and faint and whispering, faint as the bells of sleep; hither and thither, hither and thither; and a faint flame trembled on her cheek.

—Heavenly God! cried Stephen’s soul, in an outburst of profane joy.

He turned away from her suddenly and set off across the strand. His cheeks were aflame; his body was aglow; his limbs were trembling. On and on and on and on he strode, far out over the sands, singing wildly to the sea, crying to greet the advent of the life that had cried to him.

And happy Epiphany! Make sure you lock up your distaffs for 7th January  too. You never know when someone will appear with a bucket of cold water.