The subject of fairs and markets has claimed so much attention that churchyard sports must be treated rather summarily. So early as A.D. 1225 a provincial synod in Scotland forbade wrestling matches and other sports in churchyards; and the Synod of Exeter, A.D. 1287, similarly prohibited combats, dances, and stage plays. But these isolated ordinances were repeatedly ignored. “Improper and prohibited sports,” such as wrestling, football, and handball, involved the transgressors in a penalty of twopence for each offence, at Salton, Yorkshire (A.D. 1472)[464]. The rule was infringed, for, nearly half a century later (A.D. 1519), the disobedient had to be threatened with excommunication[465]. So matters went on until the Reformation, and, indeed, down to a much more recent date. Writing in A.D. 1804, Malkin avers that, at feasts and revels, dancing and games at tennis and fives were “universal in [the churchyards of] Radnorshire, and very common in other parts of the Principality[466].” It should be noted, however, that these amusements were commonly permitted only on the North side of the burial-ground, where there were rarely any graves. (Cf. Chap. VIII.) At Stoke St Milborough, Shropshire (p. 95 _supra_), the games were not discontinued until the year 1820[467]. Though this recital of events may cause a shock to devout persons, the severity of the criticism will be relaxed when the conditions are duly appreciated. Once grasp the fact that social convenience reigned almost supreme, and the master key is found. Permeating the whole of the old social customs, though doubtless, to some extent, existing entirely apart from them, there were influences essentially religious and symbolical. On actual examination, however, it is often impossible to make a severance between the practical and the ideal. Take, for example, the widespread custom of preserving natural or semi-natural curiosities, such as fossils and aerolites, in churches. Was this practice based merely on superstition, or on the satisfaction of public curiosity? We are all conversant with the legends which are attached to some of our commoner fossils, and to “thunderbolts” of various kinds[468]. When the Breton peasant, finding a “_pierre de tonnerre_,” or “_pierre de foudre_”--really a Neolithic celt or axe of stone--builds it into his chimney to ward off lightning (cf. p. 80 _supra_), he is influenced partly by superstitious fear and partly by credulity. His very superstition is turned to useful account. Similarly, the meteoric stones, such as that which Ambrose Parey (Ambroise Paré) found suspended by an iron chain in the church of Sugolia, on the borders of Hungary, was probably believed to protect the building from the effect of thunderstorms[469]. Grimm tells us of a _donner-stral_ (= “a flash of lightning”; thence, evidently, “a thunder-stone,” i.e. either an aerolite or a stone celt) which was hung up in Enisheim church, in Alsace-Lorraine.