MYSTERIES OF KING CANUTE

Dominion, Volume 19, Issue 44, 16 November 1925, Page 10

MYSTERIES OF KING CANUTE

SEARCH FOR SITE OF THE TIDE COMEDY. '

Where did King Canute command the tide to recede? . The scene of this supposedly historic incident has become a matter of dispute since the Mayor of Southend, Air. it. Tweedy-Smith, claimed, when conducting a z trip on to the “Essex Broads,” that it was on the River Crouch, near Burnbain. Several correspondents write to the “Westminster Gazette” contradicting the Mayor’s claim. A Winchester reader, who bases his statement on local traditions, says that the scene of the King’s adventure was on the western shore at Southampton. An equally strong case, however, is made out by a Chichester correspondent, who says that King Canute was sitting on the sea front at Bosham, on Chichester Harbour, when he demonstrated the folly of his counsellors, Who thought that' even the waves must obey a King. A claim is also set up for ah unnamed place on the Norfolk Broads, where a reader who has just returned from a holiday there says he jyas shown the actual place where King Canute was seated. Works of reference are silent on the point, while historians refuse to commit themselves by giving any geographical position.—“ Westminster Gazette.”