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This is said to be the bitterest curse in the Manx language:
“The stone of the church in the corner of thy house” (Clagh ny killagh ayns corneil dty hie).
The old houses usually contained one room, a corner was partitioned off by a choolley of straw, and in this the sick were kept. If a sick person was dying, the priest gave him the last sacrament: the vessels used were placed on the altar, or church-stone – a flat stone marked with a cross which he brought with him. So when a person said:
“Clagh ny killagh ayns corneil dty hie,”
he wished that the priest might soon be in a person’s house to administer Extreme Unction, the last rites.
(source: Wm. Cashen’s Folklore (1912); photo)
