Feast of St. John the Baptist
Re-badging pagan places of worship as churches, as outlined in Gregory the Great's 7th C Letter to Mellitus , made a great deal of sense in the conversion of East Anglia. To what extent modern church dedications reflect the choice of a feast days to coincide with and replace pagan festivals is a moot point. The spandrels above the west door - a lamb and flag on one side and the eagle on the other - a and the two empty niches of St. John the Baptist, Coltishall reveal its original dual dedication. That would have been very handy if there was a pre-existing tradition of marking midwinter (St. John the Evangelist) and midsummer (St. John the Baptist). We cannot know, but we might guess, that the tradition of midsummer fires that continues in some parts of the U.K, was part of a wider (pre-Christian?) tradition marking all the solstices and equinoxes with fire. So one can imagine our yet to be converte...