Thus it is recorded that 'at Pentecost blood was
observed gushing from the earth at a certain town of Berkshire,
even as many asserted who declared that they had seen it. And
after this, on the morning after Lammas Day, King William was
shot.' Now, it is just possible that the birth of the Biddenden
Maids may have occurred later, but have been antedated by the
popular tradition to the year above mentioned. For such a birth
would, in the opinion of the times, be regarded undoubtedly as a
most evident prodigy or omen of evil. Still, even admitting that
the date 1100 must be allowed to stand, its remoteness from the
present time is not a convincing argument against a belief in the
real occurrence of the phenomenon; for of the dicephalic Scottish
brothers, who lived in 1490, we have credible historic evidence.
Further, Lycosthenes, in his "Chronicon Prodigiorum atque
Ostentorum", published in 1557, states, upon what authority I
know not, that in the year 1112 joined twins resembling the
Biddenden phenomenon in all points save in sex were born in
England. The passage is as follows: 'In Anglia natus est puer
geminus a clune ad superiores partes ita divisus, ut duo haberet
capita, duo corpora integra ad renes cum suis brachiis, qui
baptizatus triduo supervixit.
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