Nod Beuno calves on Trinity Sunday at Clynnog

Trinity Sunday · Clynnog Fawr, Caernarfonshire

No longer kept

Calves and lambs born with the Nod Beuno, a natural mark in the ear, belonged to St Beuno and were brought to his church at Clynnog on Trinity Sunday, the saint’s anniversary. The churchwardens sold them and put the money in Cyff Beuno, a great chest cut from one piece of oak and fastened with three locks. Pennant found the offerings not quite given up, and the chest gave the Welsh a proverb for any hopeless task: you may as well try to break open St Beuno’s chest.

The offerings of calves and lambs, which happen to be born with the Nôd Beuno, or mark of St. Beuno, a certain natural mark in the ear, have not entirely ceased.

From Pennant's Tours, A Tour in Wales, vol. 2, p. 210. Read the original

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Folklore from the old calendars

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Nod Beuno calves on Trinity Sunday at Clynnog

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