Houses by the water's edge, small boats and lighthouse on a jetty
Squares,  Themed galleries

Gallery: seven times seven

September 24, 2024 / 52 Comments

As I was going to St Ives,

I met a man with seven wives,

Each wife had seven sacks,

Each sack had seven cats,

Each cat had seven kits:

Kits, cats, sacks, and wives,

How many were there going to St Ives?

Traditional English riddle

The rhyme above is usually regarded as a trick question. When you read it, did you start to calculate the sum of all those wives, cats etc.? If so, you fell for the trick, as the answer is probably one, just the narrator. It seems likely that only he was going TO St Ives, the others were coming FROM it. Of course it is feasible that he fell into step alongside them, all going in the same direction, but that would spoil the fun of the joke!

The other thing we can’t be certain of is which St Ives it refers to, as there are two in England. One in Cornwall, the other in Cambridgeshire. But as I have no photos of the latter and the Cornwall town is generally thought the most likely, I’ve featured it above.

The discipline of selecting just seven images for my various #SevenforSeptember Squares posts has been good for me, as I know I sometimes go over the top and present more shots than is really necessary! However, that restriction to seven shots has been the only acknowledgement of the ‘sevens’ theme – until now! For this final contribution to the challenge before I go away for the rest of the month (and half of October!) I have hunted out some images that each contain seven of something.

This is my last post before heading to California for a three week long road trip. I’ll try to send some virtual ‘Postcards from the Road‘ while away but apart from that you won’t see so much of me. I’ll drop in on friends’ posts when I can although less often than I usually do.

Dark speckled birds on a wire

Seven starlings on a wire at Seaton Sluice, Northumberland

The Seven Sisters, white chalk cliffs in East Sussex, England

Series of white cliffs with a footpath in the foreground
Colonnade with arches decorated with delicate lattice work

Seven arches in a courtyard of the Palais de la Bahia in Marrakesh

Seven moai at Anakena on Rapa Nui (Easter Island), some in better condition than others

Seven large worn stone figures in a row
Long-legged birds feeding in a reflective lake

Seven flamingos feeding at the Salar de Atacama, Chile

Seven Bake-Jizō in Kanmangafuchi Abyss, Nikko

Jizō is a Buddhist divinity, the guardian of children, and in particular, children who die before their parents

Seated mossy statues with red caps and bibs
Poster with images of glasses of beer and Oriental labelling

Seven beers for sale in a bar in Pyongyang, North Korea

The percentages show the balance between wheat and rice, with beer #5 being 100% rice

52 Comments

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