Saturday Scenes

On the 22nd of August, in the year 565, Columba reported seeing the Loch Ness monster.

Loch Ness Monster on Wikipedia

The earliest report of a monster associated with the vicinity of Loch Ness appears in the Life of St. Columba by Adomnán, written sometime during the 7th century. According to Adomnán, writing about a century after the events he described, the Irish monk Saint Columba was staying in the land of the Picts with his companions when he came across the locals burying a man by the River Ness. They explained that the man had been swimming the river when he was attacked by a “water beast” that had mauled him and dragged him under. They tried to rescue him in a boat, but were able only to drag up his corpse. Hearing this, Columba stunned the Picts by sending his follower Luigne moccu Min to swim across the river. The beast came after him, but Columba made the sign of the cross and commanded: “Go no further. Do not touch the man. Go back at once.” The beast immediately halted as if it had been “pulled back with ropes” and fled in terror, and both Columba’s men and the pagan Picts praised God for the miracle.Believers in the Loch Ness Monster often point to this story, which notably takes place on the River Ness rather than the loch itself, as evidence for the creature’s existence as early as the 6th century. However, sceptics question the narrative’s reliability, noting that water-beast stories were extremely common in medieval saints’ Lives; as such, Adomnán’s tale is likely a recycling of a common motif attached to a local landmark.

On 22nd August, 2009, we have this set of Saturday Scenes. We have a lot of water scenes although I noticed no one went swimming in any rivers . Probably safest that way.

Take a look:

• redalexred
• capo42
• wolfgang
• deinos
• akaSylvia
• mousewords
• Vaxanta
• StacyJMT
• pixelfreund
• colinbrooks
• CliffStanford
• drewbenn

It’s easy to take part!

1. Take a photo on a Saturday and upload it to the photo site of your choice.
2. Twitter the url for your photograph to @SatScenes.
3. Watch for the next episode of Saturday Scene to see your photo here!

The photo should be taken on a Saturday but you don’t need to let me know until Tuesday (although as soon as possible is always nice) when I collate them all. It’s a bit quiet at the moment, a perfect time to join in!

Did you know that there is not one, not two but three unrelated films named after our Saturday Scenes date this week? 15 Août and August 15th and August 15th are fairly recent films named after the 227th day of the year.

15 Août is a French film about “several middle aged men who have a crisis on their hands when their wives depart leaving them to look after the boisterous kids.”

August 15th is a short film based on the harrowing true story of a woman who was raped on a hijacked bus while the other passengers looked on.

And then, there is also a 15 minute Italian horror film, also called August 15th and available to watch online with subtitles if you are into that sort of thing (very violent and fairly plotless).

Something clearly is inspiring about the date. Maybe Saturday Scenes should start including video!

Here’s our 15th of August set:

Please pop by and look at the streams of our wonderful contributors:

• jmorby
• wolfgang
• sparc
• adhon
• carocat
• pewari
• akrabat
• ingridf
• capo42
• pixelfreund
• stacyJMT
• Vaxanta
• redalexred
• mousewords
• ColinBrooks
• drewbenn
• akaSylvia
• elibrody
• LannaGirl

Why don’t you take part this Saturday? We want to see your Saturday Scenes, where ever in the world you might be. All you have to do is:

1. Take a photograph on a Saturday
2. Upload the photograph
3. Send a tweet to @SatScenes with the url

Some dates involve long searches to find something of interest that I can tell you about.

This week, I typed “8 August” into my Google search bar and it immediately prompted me with 1918. Well, that was easy.

Funnily enough, just today my son was talking about what he’d learned at school about the First World War. I told him to try to remember that these are not just dates to be memorised. The dusty stories in his history books happened to real people, with real stories and real families and hopes and dreams and fears. I chose this site as my link of the day because of the personal touch:

8th August, 1918

In the early hours of the morning of the 8th of August 1918 a blanket of fog around the river Somme concealed a massive military force which was about to be unleashed. As aircraft flew overhead tens of thousands of troops were on the march and four hundred tanks rumbled forward to the start line with engines throttled low to minimise noise. Two thousand British, Australian, Canadian and French cannon were deployed in a line stretching south-west from Hamel and north to and beyond the Somme.

To the north of the river were two divisions of the British Third Corps to the south four Australian Divisions, two Canadian and on the far right two French Corps. Their task was to drive the German army back from Amiens and to inflict a defeat which would further undermine Germany’s flagging will to continue the war.

In the line of artillery not far from Hamel were the twelve 18 pounders of the 38th and 39th batteries of the 10th Field Artillery Brigade of the Australian Imperial Force.

Amongst the crews of the 38th was my great-uncle George William Jessop who was then 21 years old. From Launceston Tasmania, George was a talented watercolour painter and sketcher who had been apprentice to a professional artist for four years.Away from home for nearly three years by August 1918, he had followed his older brother Alf into the Australian artillery having served as a cadet before the war. And it had been nearly a year since Alf had died of wounds received in fighting around Ypres. George had, no doubt often thought of him and of his family on the other side of the world. But as the seconds ticked down to Zero hour everyone’s mind must have been on the job that had to be done.

91 years later, we’re living easier times and I am grateful that our photographs show scenes of peacefulness and friendship.

Here are the Saturday Scenes from 8 August, 2009:

Say hello to our wonderful contributors:

• redalexred
• jmorby
• Pewari
• PCurd
• carocat
• akrabat
• adhon
• ElshaHawk
• StacyJMT
• mousewords
• elibrody
• tradingnothing
• vitalybe
• ColinBrooks
• capo42
• vaxanta
• pixelfreund
• akaSylvia
• ingridf

Shouldn’t you save a photograph of your day-to-day life for posterity? It’s easy!

1. Take a photograph on a Saturday
2. Upload the photograph
3. Send a tweet to @SatScenes with the url and the location
4. Bookmark http://twitter.blog.me.uk/ for future descendants to find

I’m looking forward to seeing your photograph in the next edition!

I learn so much from Saturday Scenes! As soon as I twittered that it was Saturday, I got a message telling me that it was the Swiss national holiday. So I wandered off to look it up and sure enough, it’s true!

In 1291, the cantons of Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden conspired against the Habsburgs. Their union, the nucleus of the Old Swiss Confederacy, is recorded in the Federal Charter, a document probably written after the fact, in the 14th century. At the battles of Morgarten in 1315 and Sempach 1386, the Swiss defeated the Habsburg army, allowing the confederacy to continue within the Holy Roman Empire.

Officially, the 1st of August 1291 is recognised as the date that the Swiss Confederation was formed, also known by its latin name: Confoederatio Helvetica. Now I finally understand why the Swiss country code is CH!

On the 1st of August 2009, there were lots of great photos taken in Switzerland and some of them have even been sent to @Satscenes for us all to delight in. And of course, we have additional photographs from the rest of the world, including England, the US, Egypt, Spain and Italy.

Take a look:

These photographs were brought to you by these Summer-loving submitters:

• adhon
• PCurd
• tradingnothing
• redalexred
• tartanink
• drewbenn
• embee
• akaSylvia
• ElshaHawk
• michrueg
• vaxanta
• ColinBrooks
• pixelfreund
• elibrody
• unexpectedtiger

Wouldn’t you like your photograph included in our Saturday Scenes post?
It’s easy to take part!

1) Take a photo on a Saturday and upload it

2) Send a reply to @Satscenes with the url for your photograph

3) Watch for the next episode of Saturday Scenes to see your photo here.

Although the photo should be taken on a Saturday, you don’t have to let me know the same day (although as soon as possible would be useful)!