Today is Chimney Sweep’s Day. Here are ten things you might not know about chimney sweeps:
This date has no doubt been chosen as Chimney Sweep’s Day because in the times when children were sent up chimneys to clean them, May Day was the only day they had off. Which is also why celebrations for chimney sweeps often feature Jack-in-the-Green.
Chimney sweeps are generally thought to be lucky. It’s not clear why this should be but one theory is that a sweep once saved William the Conqueror in 1066 from a runaway Horse and carriage, and as a reward, the sweep was invited to a royal wedding. Since chimneys in houses weren’t even a thing until the 12th century I wonder about that one. Another theory is the story of a sweep who fell off a roof, and caught his foot on the gutter. A girl helped him climb through her window and the two ended up getting married.
Seeing a chimney sweep at your wedding is especially lucky and a sign that the marriage will be long and happy. Hence there’s a tradition of inviting a sweep to your wedding to make sure you see one.
Probably the most famous chimney sweep is the one in Mary Poppins, played by Dick van Dyke. In the song Chim Chim Cheree, he sings that shaking hands with, or blowing a Kiss to, a sweep is lucky.
In Poland and Croatia, people are considered lucky if they rub a Button on their clothing while passing a chimney sweep on the street.
There’s another tradition associated with New Year in which chimney sweeps would walk through the streets holding a Pig and villagers would pay a small amount of Money to make a wish while they pulled a hair from the pig. Depictions of chimney sweeps are a popular New Year's Day gift in Germany.
“Spazzacamini” is the Italian word for “chimney sweep.”
It’s well known that in Victorian times, small children were used to clean chimneys by climbing up them. They were usually boys, but it wasn’t unknown for girls to be used as well. The children were typically between the ages of 6 and 12 when they worked as “chimney sweeps' apprentices”, or in reality indentured servants to master chimney sweeps. Some of them were obtained from orphanages; others were sold to the chimney sweeps by their parents for prices ranging from 7 shillings to 4 guineas. Once his seven-year-long apprenticeship was completed he could become a journeyman sweep, and work for a master sweep of his choice. Aside from cleaning the chimneys their jobs might include roaming the streets calling out "Soot -Oh, Sweep" or another cry to let people know they were around.
Conditions were appalling. We already know they only got one day off per year. They were rarely allowed to bathe and often slept on sooty sacks and so many of them got cancer from exposure to soot. It wasn’t uncommon for a child to get stuck in the chimney and either suffocate or burn to death if the chimney was on fire. The master sweep might send another kid up to help but that child could easily end up suffering the same fate. If they were too slow, the master might light a Fire in the grate to speed them up which is where the expression “to light a fire under someone” came from.
Some sweeps used Geese rather than children, by tying a rope round the bird’s neck and forcing it to fly up the chimney. From about 1803, machines to sweep chimneys began to appear but sweeps and their clients preferred to abuse children than use one of the new-fangled contraptions. Eventually, Lord Shaftesbury spearheaded a campaign to stop children from being used this way and an act of Parliament put an end to it in 1875.
The six richest people in Britain decide to hold a contest to settle the question of which of them is most successful. It will be a gladiator style contest with each entrant fielding a team of ten super-powered combatants. Entrepreneur Llew Powell sets out to put together his team, which includes his former lover, an employee of his company with a fascinating hobby, two refugees from another dimension (a lonely giant and a drunken sailor), two sisters bound together by a promise, a diminutive doctor, a former Tibetan monk initiate and two androids with a history. As the team train together, alliances form, friendships and more develop, while others find the past is not easy to leave behind.
Meanwhile, a ruthless race of aliens has its eyes on the Earth. Already abducting and enslaving humans, they work towards the final invasion which would destroy life on Earth as we know it. Powell’s group, Combat Team Alpha, stumble upon one of the wormholes the aliens use to travel to Earth and witness for themselves the horrors in store if the aliens aren’t stopped. Barely escaping with their lives, they realise there are more important things to worry about than a fighting competition.
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