Judgement Day

This is a modern copy of a carving to be found at the 12th century Abbaye de Ste-Foy in the French village of Conques. The west door of the Abbaye is surmounted by a richly carved tympanum, carved in 1135, which depicts the Last Judgment. Besides the joys awaiting the righteous in heaven, details of the hell that awaits the wicked are shown in terrifying detail; tongues being torn out, people being roasted on spits and so on.

The original of the carving in my photograph shows one of the curious onlookers at the top of the tympanum peeking over the scene from behind a cloth.

This is really just an excuse to recount to you a Scottish tale as told by Norman Harper and Robbie Shepherd in their book Anither dash O'Doric:

The story comes from the files of Professor Donald Francis Tovey, of Edinburgh. In the 1930s, the professor told often of an old minister on the Banffshire coast who would thunder and roar at his flock that every one of them would be sure to end in an eternal pit of damnation, a bottomless pit, where every last one of them would spend for ever weeping, wailing and gnashing their teeth.

Then he would pause, look around his congregation, see that most were elderly people and add:

'And for those of you without teeth, teeth will be provided.'