It's emerged that kissing Ireland's world famous Blarney Stone may not bestow the gift of the gab upon you after all, as it might be the wrong stone entirely.

Meaning that the 300,000 visitors a year who patiently queue to snog the lucky stone may get nothing more for their trouble than a headrush and cold lips.

This got me thinking about other dubious superstitions or old wives' tales that, dare I say, are untrue or verging on the ridiculous.

The popular consensus is that most old wives' tales have some grain of truth to them but have merely been distorted over time. However, that theory is probably just an old wives' tale as well.

Locally, we have a rich history of these interesting and exaggerated legends, the most famous being the Cerne Abbas Giant. The chalk figure of a giant naked man bestriding a hillside near the village of Cerne Abbas has for hundreds of years been a magnet for folklore enthusiasts.

It was a local custom to put up a maypole upon the earthwork about which childless couples would dance to promote fertility. Even today childless couples are known to frequent the site in the hope that nine months later they might here the patter of tiny feet.

Another regional phenomenon is the act of wassailing that occurs in West Dorset. This involves gathering in apple orchards and performing ritual acts to ensure that there will be a good apple harvest the following year. Many wassail beverages (cider) are consumed and bonfires lit. In the orchards a noise is made to chase off evil spirits and pieces of toast soaked in wassail are placed in tree branches.

A close relation to wassailing is the Ashen Faggot, which is an old Christmas tradition celebrated in parts of Dorset, Devon and Somerset. The wassail party passes around a bundle of ash sticks, twigs or branches (the Ashen Faggot) bound with green ash withies, which is then placed onto the fire. As each binding bursts, the watchers toast it with a hearty drink. It's also believed that not burning the Ashen Faggot in your house brought bad luck or that having an Ashen Faggot in the house kept the Devil away.

Other bizarre local traditions of yesteryear include the practice of bricking up a live cat in the walls of your new house to bring good luck. Superstitious Victorians also adopted the tradition but instead buried a pair of shoes in the walls of their new homes.

Perhaps the strangest custom of all is placing a bull's heart filled with thorns in your chimney to stop witches coming down. But in hindsight just lighting the fire may have been a better preventative measure.

So is superstition a load of old blarney or have the old wives still tales to tell?

Well earlier this month, Barnsley football club manager Simon Davey took a direct hit from a seagull and attributed this as a good omen after his side knocked Liverpool out of the FA Cup.

l Next Friday is February 29. A date when tradition dictates that women may make a proposal of marriage to men with it being a leap year. Will you be one of those proposing, then why not let us know about it?