As has already been noted, there is a well-established agenda on the part of certain folk-lore researchers to interpret even the most innocuous of folk customs as being vestigial of some ancient prototype, invariably pagan / pre-Christian, and invariably 'stripped of its original meaning'. In this respect I'd have to say that Anne Ross is as guilty as the best of them, especially as she writes with such didactic certainty (as she does in Grotesques and Gargoyles, 1975) that: "One of the most pagan and archaic concepts in the imagery of the Christian Church must be that of the so-called Green Man or Jack o' the Green."

Admittedly 1975 is quite early for this sort of talk - in my experience books on Paganism, Folk-lore & Witchcraft are tellingly void of Green Men until around 1979. It is, for example, supremely significant that the Green Man is altogether absent from The Wicker Man (1973) - surely the cinematographic watershed of much of today's paganism (and 'Dark Folk').

Getting back to Ross, it's interesting to note how absolute such statements have already become even by 1975, leading to the situation we find today where such notions are trotted out in church and cathedral guide books as a matter of fact. Whilst in Sheffield on Monday I noted the comments in the Cathedral guide book concerning the impressive carvings to be found in the Shrewsbury Chapel where a glorious (and disputed!) Sheela-na-Gig is said to be the 'Mother Goddess' and the Green Man her 'consort'. For more on the Sheela-na-Gig, another famously paganised feature of Pre-Reformation church architecture, see the very excellent Sheela Na Gig Project .

I therefore applaud Gloucester Cathedral for producing their splendid pamphlet on the Green Man, which makes quite clear that all links to paganism are quite without foundation. Would that others did likewise, for it must be said that the worst offenders for promoting the 'paganism' of 'Green Men' are very often the Anglicans themselves, keen on turning a quick & cynical buck at the expense of this fascinating facet of the culture and theology of those who built the churches and cathedrals in the first place.

As for the queer notions of Clarke, Roberts, Ross et al - such thinking is, and can only ever be, a matter of pure speculation; and that would be fine were not for the sad fact that such wayward perspectives come seemingly ready-made for a market ravenous for such assuredly authentic cultural / spiritual provenance they find altogether lacking in the real world... Otherwise, a very good place to start would be Bob Pegg's 'Rites and Riots' (copies of which can be had for next to nothing via Amazon); and Bob Trubshaw's worth a look too!

Finally, I picked up a copy of 'Folk Leeds to Song & Custom #6' whilst visiting Hobgoblin in Leeds yesterday, thus seeing the bewildering (and entirely unauthorised) liberties the editors thereof have taken with my Devil in the Details article. But, overall, I'd have to say I was quite impressed with the results & applaud Sam & Ed (and Graham Miles?) for their work. In any case, it's a cracking little magazine - with a fine recipe for Stovies besides. Check out the site at Folk at the Grove.