Stone Tongued

"We counted all the none-witches. The waterlogged women
parcelled in their tiny, tidy, Christian graves."

Witches are woven throughout the book, alongside warriors, rebels, sex workers, goddesses, and everyday individuals. The phrase 'Stone Tongued' emerges in the first poem, where accused witches are declared innocent and tucked away in graves paid for by the Crown.

Sulis reads through curse tablets in her temple, Johanna Ferrour remembers the Peasants' Revolt from her kitchen, and Mary Jones throws her dinner in the face of the workhouse headmaster when he tries to silence her. Brought together to create a coven of powerful and sometimes violent women, these poems show that power might be hidden, but not forgotten.

"We arrived in this world screaming for revenge."

These voices are not new. They are simply tired of being spoken over.

Stored in the depths of the Shrewsbury Museum, is a metal contraption designed to silence. There are records of the people it was used on, including the women who were subjected to it purely for opening their mouths to speak. Mary Jones is forgotten almost entirely from history, but we find her among those punished for the crime of speaking during meals at the Oswestry House of Industry. The headmaster punished her with the scold's bridle, and she responded by throwing her food at him.

All we know of Aspasia is what is written on her gravestone, uncovered from the Roman ruins in Shropshire. Queen Amanirenas who was Queen of Kush during the early years of the Roman Empire fought back, led armies, lost an eye, a husband, and a son, yet is mysteriously absent from articles on the Meroë Head. A head she brought back to Meroë, and buried beneath the temple in an act of defiance.

Cartiumandua reigned in her own right, Julie d'Aubigny infiltrated a nunnery to rescue her lover, Grace Clifford painted a masterpiece on the wall of her prison cell.

Other woman sank quietly as the air left their lungs, accusations of witchcraft dragging them into the water.

Stone Tongued holds the voices of a few who were forgotten, overlooked, or written out of history. It is both remembrance and protest.