Hailing from Knaresborough in Yorkshire, Mother Shipton was a “witch” and prophetess said to have predicted major historical events like The Great Fire of London (1666), the death of Cardinal Wolsey (1530) and the British defeat of the Spanish Armada (1588).

Born to a single mother in 1488, Ursula Sontible (or Sontheil, or Southill, or Soothtell depending on the source you consult) never knew her father.

Which is probably for the best, as he was rumoured to be the devil.

Mother Shipton FAQs

A bit of a Jack-the-Lad was he?

No, I mean the actual devil.

Come again?

According to one account, 15 year old Agatha, was befriended, wined, dined and eventually seduced by the devil who appeared to the dirt-poor teenager as a man of wealth and taste. Sweeping her off her feet with his honeyed words, his lavish home and his dance moves. The couple spent 3 days together, after which Agatha was returned to her shack in Knaresborough where –

“In course of time was born, Mother Shipton, which proved the conclusion of her miserable life.” 

Anonymous, Prophecies of Robert Nixon, Mother Shipton, and Martha, the Gipsy, (1900?)

Later, Agatha moved into a convent leaving 2 year old Ursula in the care of a nurse.

With her mother already already labelled a “witch” (and the devil’s strumpet), baby Ursula was viewed with so much hostility and suspicion her looks were exaggerated to the point of parody.

As a baby, Ursula was a big-boned bub with –

“great goggling, sharp and fiery eyes, and unproportionable nose, full of crooks, turnings and red pimples, which gave such light that needed not a candle to dress her by”

Author unknown, The History of Mother Shipton from “Chapbooks of the Eighteenth Century”, 1882

And her looks didn’t improve with age.

Adult Ursula was described as having a huge hooked nose, a severely curved spine and crooked misshapen legs.

Although, like much of her life, her hideous appeareance was most likely exaggerated.

What is Mother Shipton’s threat level?

Infinitesimally small. (Although there were rumours that she caused her husband’s death.)

Mother Shipton predicted the untimely deaths of others, she didn’t cause them. And even those predictions are…questionable.

Because they’re vague?

And because they were published 80 years after she died.

In 1641, Ursula’s “words” were published in a 6 page booklet entitled The Prophesie of Mother Shipton in the Raigne of King Henry the Eighth. The handful of revelations contained within it would later be reworded and reprinted by anonymous authors in chapbooks and pamplets like: The History of Mother Shipton and Prophecies of Robert Nixon, Mother Shipton, and Martha, the Gipsy.

Because chapbooks were intended as inexpensive reading materal for the masses, the publishing houses that produced them weren’t too bothered with fact-checking or accuracy and many, such as those written about Mother Shipton, were written anonymously.

These cheaply produced publications helped to cultivate and develop the lore surrounding Mother Shipton. They told creative stories about her upbringing (such as her mother’s dalliance with the devil) and some even changed or omitted sections of the original 1641 prophecies.

For example, this is from the original 1641 booklet:

“a Ship come sayling up the Thames till it come against London, and the Master of the Ship shall weepe, and the Marriners shall aske him why hee weepeth, being he hath made so good a voyage, and he shall say; Ah what a goodly Citie this was, none in the world comparable to it, and now there is scarce left any house that can let us have drinke for our money.“

And this is from a chapbook and later a reference book published at least a 100 years later:

“A time shall come when a ship will come sailing up the Thames till it is opposite London, and the master of the ship asks the Captain of the ship why he weeps, since he has made so good a voyage; and he shall say, Ah! what a grand city was this? none in all the world comparable to it, and now there is scarce a house left.”

taken from, The History of Mother Shipton, found in John Ashton’s Chap-books of the Eighteenth Century, 1882

Although similar, the omission from the last line of the republished version turns a mention of there being no drinking houses (ie. pubs) left in London, into one where there are literally no houses at all. Implying that a catastrophe has befallen the city.

A catastrophe like the Great Fire of London which, at the time the second prophecy was published, had already happened.

In other words, the anonymous author of the chapbook appears to have altered the original “prophecy” so that it better suited the historical event it was claimed to have predicted.

Sneaky

And impossible to spot if you didn’t have the two versions side by side.

Meanwhile, there is little evidence that Mother Shipton ever spoke or wrote most of the words attributed to her. In fact, 1800s author and historian, John Ashton, states outright that:

“Many (predictions) are attributed to her … she probably never uttered…”

John Ashton, Chap-books of the Eighteenth Century, 1882

So what have we learnt?

Mother Shipton’s legend (like her life and the life of her mother, Agatha) was heavily influenced by rumour, innuendo and half-truths. Some sources say she was raised in a shack by a nurse, others say she grew up in a cave. Some authors say she attended school for 2 years, while others say she was a gifted child who taught herself to read and write.

Even her maiden name is in doubt.

To sum up, Ursula Shipton was most likely a real woman, possibly deformed, who might have eeked out a life for herself as a fortune teller after her husband’s untimely death. However, her alter ego, Mother Shipton, the famed soothsayer and witch, who predicted hugely important historical events, seems to have been the result of exaggeration, inventive storytelling, and the twisting of words that may not have even been hers.

Or, maybe I’m reading too much into it.

RESOURCES AND FURTHER READING

Anonymous, Prophecies of Robert Nixon, Mother Shipton and Martha, the Gipsy, (Publication date unknown), London (accessed on Project Gutenberg.org)

Anonymous, The History of Mother Shipton, reprinted in John Ashton’s Chap-books of the Eighteenth Century, 1882, London (accessed on Project Gutenberg. org)

Shipton, Ursula (Mother), The Prophecie of Mother Shipton, in the Raigne of King Henry the eighth, 1641, accessed on University of Michigan Online Library, https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo2/A93157.0001.001/1:2?rgn=div1;view=fulltext

Why not check out the Mother Shipton Tourist Attraction?
https://www.mothershipton.co.uk/