Devil
Whirling Sunday
Bake on a holy day and the whirlwind takes you.
Stand where it happened
- What's there
- Village church with tall medieval spire
- Legend from
- Recorded 1899
- Best time
- Mid-Lent Sunday
- Tone
- Light-hearted
Leverington: one feast Sunday an old woman kept baking, and the Devil came in a whirlwind and swept her over the steeple.
In Leverington, near Wisbech, Mid-Lent Sunday was still called Whirling Sunday in 1899, according to the rector, and old people remembered a day of boxing matches, games and sports. A few families still baked small Whirling Cakes in memory of an old woman of the village. By tradition she was busy making cakes for visitors one feast Sunday when the Devil appeared in a whirlwind and carried her off over the church steeple. The tale seems to have been a warning against working on the Sabbath, and the cakes kept the memory alive.
One sourceOnly one written account of this legend has been found so far.