Coifi and the Sparrow

	Coifi, the heathen priest, emphatically rejects his old gods

Demosthenes and Cicero were famous in their day for the brilliance of their speeches, but one of the greatest and most influential speeches ever made came from the mouth of an unknown, blunt-speaking Yorkshireman. With no high flights of rhetorical fancy, he drew a picture of a sparrow flitting through a hall while a winter storm raged outside - and the result of his speech is still to be seen today in the thousands of churches that dot Yorkshire's hills and dales.

Yet the story of how he came to make that speech is equally fascinating: murder, intrigue, fear, revenge, mysterious strangers appearing in the dead of night and the nick of time and, of course, like all good tales, a love interest: doughty Yorkshireman Edwin's love for Ethelburga, the fair maid of Kent.

I hope I have whetted your appetite enough. Now watch the film.