There’s a lot of history in this West Country town – much of it about long-dead cheating scumbagsWhat’s going for it? There is a stern tale told on the Market Cross in Devizes of one Ruth Pierce. She was at the market one day hunting for a bargain sack of wheat with friends. They decided to pool their money,but when it was time to pay they found they were short. Ruth swore on her life she’d paid up. “She rashly repeated this abominable wish, intones the Cross, and “when to the consternation and terrorism of the surrounding multitude,she instantly fell down and expired, having the money concealed in her hand.” Devizes forgets nothing – either long-dead fibbers like Pierce, or the drip,drip, drip of history. You can see it in its streets. Caught between the ancient earthworks of the Wiltshire Downs and the guns of Salisbury Plain, and Devizes has seen it all; it has grown slowly over the centuries,and is now crammed with listed buildings like the Market Cross, each with their own tales to tell of errant citizens. Don’t be a cheating scumbag in Devizes, or they’ll carve your misdeeds in stone.The case against This is no Frome or Totnes,those cool West Country towns full of downshifting cyberpunks. It could carry out with a bit of their mojo. You find the sense olives are still regarded as exotic.
Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com