A band of princesses, knights, morticians and rappers journeyed on a pilgrimage through downtown Ironton Wednesday, spreading the Canterbury Tales.

However, these Canterbury Tales had a modern twist.

"We were rappers," 17-year-old Ironton High School senior A.J. McKnight said.

While wearing a bandage on his face that parodied "Hot In Herre" rapper Nelly, McKnight and his partner, J.T. Holt, rapped a tale which had a "be yourself" moral through the streets of Ironton. They were joined by their classmates in Linda Ross's senior English class.

The Canterbury Tales, written by Geoffrey Chaucer, features several people on a pilgrimage to the shrine of Thomas a Becket. To pass the time on their journey, the pilgrims tell stories. Ross's students wrote their own tales in the style of Chaucer, in iambic pentameter and with every two lines rhyming.

Ross said her decision to let the students make a pilgrimage on South Sixth Street to Park Avenue and to C.R. Thomas's Old Place was part of her desire to "get involved."

A tale written by Andrew Cronacher and Hillary Porter was declared the winner.

In this tale, Cronacher's character, a mortician named "Fitz D. Dead," is visited by Porter's "Judy Powdersalot," a Mary Kay saleswoman. As the two converse, Dead tells Powdersalot about his fiancee who was a beautiful woman that made herself unattractive. Dead's fiancee, he tells Powdersalot, kills herself afterward.

"The moral of the story is love your heart before loving your skin," Cronacher said.

Porter, carrying a case of cosmetics, said drivers were staying at stoplights even after they would turn green.

Teresa Skelly, 17, and her tale-writing partner, Amy Cartmell, 18, garnered stares while venturing through the IHS hallways and on the streets. They dressed like princesses.

"When we were walking through the hallway, people were looking at us," Cartmell said. "Then, we walked by someone's house where people were working in the yard. They were laughing."

"It was fun, and it was a great experience," Skelly said. "We lived the Canterbury Tales in our own modern way."

Andy Vulhop, 18, dressed as a knight, and Matthew Norris, 17, dressed as a squire also garnered stares from drivers and passerbys.

"This guy driving by in a Porsche just stared as he drove by," Vulhop laughed.

Norris said there was no disagreement between himself and Vulhop as to who would be the knight and the squire. They had already bought necessary items from a Renaissance festival, and Norris did not want to wear armor made of tinfoil like Vulhop did.