Septimus Keen

about

There is a small, almost forgotten village in the county of Lancashire, not far from the shadow of Pendle Hill, which bears the unusual name of Septimus Keen. This village was purchased back in 1887 by well-known philanthropist and local eccentric Mr Septimus Keen. He then proceeded to invite many of the day’s great minds and great artists to join him in setting up a very secretive and very unusual artist community/psychological experiment in the village. Not only did he rename the village after himself, he also insisted that absolutely everyone who came to live in the village would also be required to change their name – to Septimus Keen. His dream was that a community would grow where all sense of class or hierarchy would be rendered unnecessary because every man, woman or child would be made equal by their shared name. Without a name to identify someone when they weren’t present he believed would lead to gossip and criticism becoming a redundant concept. This theory did seem to work for a while until the issue of naming babies born to community members became a reality and people started to leave in protest. The small group who remained (a mere 14 people compared to the original 103) carried on this eccentric way of life for a further 16 years after their founder’s death in 1906. The most interesting paradox created by this experiment relates to this last remaining commune of believers. Because the name `Septimus Keen’ no longer referred to an specific individual in any wa

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