Now, since the wicked fiend's at large,

Skippers, and housekeepers, I charge

You all to heed my warning.

Over your threshold, on your mast,

Be sure the horse-shoe's well nailed fast,

Protecting and adorning.

THE snow was melting rapidly and Five Hills Beck was running crystal clear with water that looked invigoratingly inviting.

It was the first walk of the New Year, out near Scotch Corner, and my three-year-old son was straining at the leash to be in there, sploshing merrily in his boots.

His mean parents held him back. No, no, no.

Then I spotted a horseshoe lying in the silt with the water noisily rippling around it. In I jumped. The horseshoe had to be retrieved - new year, new luck - and anyway, whatever age you are, jumping into water with your boots on is always good fun.

The little chap looked down from the beckside with undisguised incredulity as I paddled in the water, pulled out the horseshoe and passed it up to him.

My seven-year-old daughter immediately pronounced it Roman because she is studying the Romans at school at the moment and so is an acknowledged expert.

The Romans did, though, know the horseshoe which had been around since the Greeks invented it in the 4th century BC. Their horses needed shoeing because they originated in wetter, northern European climates where the soil was soft in comparison to sun-baked roads.

The Romans also had 'calks' or 'calkins' on their horseshoes, as the one from the stream has - protruding bits of metal at the heel which provided the horse with extra traction, rather like a footballer benefits from his studs.

So in triumph we - well, I - carried this rusty, muddy piece of mis-shapen metal home and I will well nail it fast above the back door.

But which way round? In this country, we believe the ends of the shoe should point upwards so that good luck collects in the cup. In other parts of Europe, the shoe is upside down so that its good luck can fall out onto the head of the person using the door.

Some say that the luck from a found shoe goes not to the finder but the original owner - so if someone in the Middleton Tyas area wins the Lottery, the millions are mine.

All the superstitions seem to trace back to St Dunstan, a blacksmith monk from Glastonbury who became a favourite of King Eadred. Eadred's dissolute son Eadwig succeeded in 955AD, and broke off his own coronation so that he could enjoy a romp with his foster-mother and her daughter.

The court was outraged, but only Dunstan was brave enough to confront the king. He found him with the harlots in the bedchamber, the new crown tossed casually aside.

The result was a civil war in which the Northumbrians sided with Dunstan. Dunstan won; King Eadward replaced the naughty Eadwig, and the saint retired to his blacksmith's shop.

There, one day, the Devil turned up. Dunstan grabbed his cloven hoof, took a red hot horseshoe from his fire and branded it onto the Devil's foot. The Devil screamed in anguish.

Brave Dunstan wasn't done. He drove nails into the quick of Satan's hoof. The wicked fiend begged Dunstan to remove the source of the pain and promised that he would never enter a house that was protected by the blacksmith's sign of the horseshoe.

I'll get the nails out this weekend.

Published: 07/01/2006