Pagan religions from the early days of the Great Britain are a treasure trove of strange, strange belief systems. The Wicker Man (the original with Christopher Lee cross-dressing, that is, not the one where Nicolas Cage puts on a bear costume to punch a woman) is just the tip of the iceberg, and isn't a million miles from what some believed in back in the day. Possibly the absolute most bizarre deity discovered throughout these fair isles are the Sheela-na-gigs, carvings of women that have been found engraved into churches, castles, and other buildings; apparently there's something like 101 of them in Ireland and 45 examples in Britain. And they're all of a naked woman spreading her vagina. It's assumed that the figures were gods that kept evil spirits away, which is why they're most often found over doors or windows. Others think the pagan goddess might have been a warning against sexual promiscuity, or even that their form of flashing is something called anasyrma, where genitals scare off crop-ruining bugs and bad weather.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
