Halloween Divination in Ireland

Illustrated London News, 1871

In Ireland Hallowe’en is the most popular night of the year to practice divination, which provides much amusement and excitement. As summer turns to winter on this night, the boundaries between this world and the Otherworld are believed to be less pronounced, and so on Hallowe’en many games, rituals and rites were, and still are, performed partly in jest and partly in earnest, with the object of gaining insight into one’s fate.

One activity involved setting several objects out in saucers or plates, which were then laid on a table. The chosen objects varied from one region to another, and even between different households, but generally a few of the following were included; a ring, a piece of wood, clay, a bean, a coin, salt,  water, a button or a thimble. Once the saucers were set, a blindfolded person, seat before them would pick one, the item which the person touched was symbolically believed to indicate their future situation in life.  A ring meant the person would be married, a piece of wood or clay meant that they would die young, a bean or a rag meant that they would always be poor, while a coin indicated that they would be wealthy, salt was for luck, water meant that the person would emigrate or travel, while if one picked the saucer with a button or thimble it was believed they would die bachelor or a spinster.

In another divination game nuts were used to determine if two young people would be good together when married. Two nuts were named after a pair, usually both being present, and placed on the grate or on the turf ashes of the fire, to burn side by side. Chestnuts, wall-nuts and hazelnuts were traditionally the most popular for this activity, while grains of wheat were also sometimes used. If the nuts burned together it was taken as a sign that the young couple would end their days happily married to one and other, however, the pair would not marry if one hopped off, while if one burned fully and not the other, it was taken as a sign of unrequited love.

Other activities took place outside the house on Hallowe’en, for example, cabbages were picked by blindfolded young women*on that night, in the belief that the appearance of the cabbage would reflect the attributes of their future husbands. If a well grown cabbage was picked it indicated that the girl would have a handsome husband, while if the cabbage had a rotten or crooked stalk it was said to signify that the girl’s husband would be a “stingy old man”. A cabbage with two heads was said to protend that the girl would end a widow, while if the cabbage was hollow in the centre it foretold that the young woman would never marry and end her days as a spinster. Additionally, the number buds on the cabbage were believed to correspond the number of children the marriage would produce, and many accounts state that the cabbage must be stolen.

Illustrated London News, 1865, by  J.T. Lucas

While the above practices were generally carried out in company, other forms of divination were traditionally carried out a person alone. These practices often commenced at midnight, and were always performed in the name of the devil. One described by Lady Jane Wilde as “the most fearful of all” involved a girl uttering an incarnation before a looking-glass, in the expectation of catching a glimpse of her future husband, it happened sometimes that instead of seeing their future love, the looking-glass instead reflected an image “too terrible to describe”, and the girl from shock would either die or spend the rest of her days in a state of great distress.

Many of divination rites practiced on Hallowe’en were aimed at inducing a dream of one’s future lover. One method of achieving this was to eat a salted egg, a smoked herring, or some other food that would cause thirst  – in the hope that whilst asleep your future lover would come to your aid in a dream with a glass of water. Another rite, which was supposed to give you a glimpse future love while sleeping, involved gathering ten ivy or yarrow leaves – cut with a black handled knife, and without speaking a word. The tenth leaf was thrown away, while the remaining nine were sneaked into the house once everyone was asleep, and were then placed under a pillow in a sock or stocking, with only the following words uttered:-

“Nine ivy leaves I place under my head,

To dream of the living and not of the dead.

If ere I be married or wed unto thee,

To dream of her to-night, and her for to see,

The colour of her hair, and the clothes that she wears,

And the day that she’ll be wedded to me.”

* In some areas, including parts of County Mayo, both young women and men participated in this activity.

Sources

Donaldson, John. A Historical and Statistical Account of the Barony of Upper Fews in the County of Armagh, 1838.

McGlinchey, Charles, The Last of a Name

Wilde, Lady Jane. Ancient Cures, Charms and Usages in Ireland. 1890

Folklore, various articles, 1881-1916

Journal of the Kildare Historical and Archaeological Society, 1908

Irish Folklore for Ireland’s winter visitor the Barnacle Goose

George Marples, 1869-1939, Barnacle Geese

From as early as the middle of September each year flocks of barnacle geese, known in Irish as Gé ghiúrainn, make their winter homes on remote sea-cliffs and islands that surround Ireland’s northern and western coasts, where they stay until their eventual departure which commences as the weather starts to warm up, which usually occurs by the following April. We now know that barnacle geese migrate to Ireland, flying thousands of miles in their distinctive V-shaped formation from the sea-cliffs of Greenland where they spend the summer months, mate, nest, and rear their young goslings. Prior to the development of scientific explanations on the migratory habits of birds the mysterious appearance and disappearance of barnacle geese in Ireland, coupled with the absence of evidence of their reproduction, led many to take special notice of the arrival of these winter visitors in Ireland, and to ascribe legendary explanations for the origin and reproduction of barnacle geese.

As winter visitors the date of arrival of barnacle geese on Irish shores is traditionally believed to provide insight into the weather of the coming season. As noted in a number of accounts provided by the Irish Folklore Commission’s Schools’ Collection, which collected folklore from Irish Schoolchildren in the late 1930s, the early arrival of these geese, between late September and early October was believed to be a harbinger of a ‘hard’ or ‘severe winter.’ The early arrival of barnacle geese, however, was not always believed to impact the weather of the whole season; Mary Agnes Bonner of Ardmalin, County Donegal, provided a local belief that gave the premature arrival of the barnacle goose a shorter period of influence over Ireland’s winter weather noting that the geese’s arrival ‘is a sure sign of a month’s bad weather.’

Barnacle Tree, 1597

The mysterious appearance and disappearance of barnacle geese, who neither nest nor rear their young goslings on Irish shores, led to a number of variants of legends that attempted to explain the obscure origin and reproduction of these distinctive winter visitors.  The earliest documented account describing the origin of barnacle geese is recorded in the twelfth century text The History and Topography of Ireland by Giraldus Cambrensis [Gerald of Wales], who claimed to have witnessed the conception of these geese himself, noting that ‘first they appear as excrescences on fir-logs carried down upon the waters. Then they hang by their beaks from what seems like sea-weed clinging to the log, while their bodies, to allow for their more unimpeded development, are enclosed in shells. And so in the course of time, having put on a stout covering of feathers, they either slip into the water, or take themselves in flight to the freedom of the air.’ Similar variants to Cambrensis’ account of the reproduction of barnacle geese were still well remembered in more recent centuries. The Belfast born ornithologist, Edward A. Armstrong noted in his 1940 book Birds of the Grey Wind  the widespread familiarity of the belief ‘that barnacle geese are generated from the shell-fish of the same name.’* Armstrong also noted that in his 1882 hunting manual The Fowler in Ireland Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey asserted that around the coast of Ireland ‘men were to be found who professed to have seen the transmogrification taking place. Writing for the Schools’ Collection, in the late nineteen thirties, Mick Campbell of Speenoge in County Donegal recalled hearing the old people ‘say that the gosling of the barnacle goose falls from a barnacle that grows on a certain tree, on a certain shore on one particular island of the Orkney- and nowhere else.’

The accepted and widespread conclusion that barnacle geese were not born of flesh had a significant impact on the consumption of food on Ireland’s many and various fast days throughout the year, which included Fridays, Holy Days and Lent. In the twelfth century Giraldus Cambrensis noted that ‘in some parts of Ireland bishops and religious men eat them [barnacle goose] without sin during a fasting time, regarding them not to be flesh, since they were not born of flesh.’ In 1215, just thirty years after Cambrensis’ visit to Ireland, Pope Innocent III saw that it was fit and necessary to specifically forbid the eating of barnacle goose on fast days. Despite Pope Innocent III’s edict, the consumption of barnacle goose by fasting Irish Catholics continued well into the twentieth century. Kevin Danaher in his 1972 seminal work The Year in Ireland confirmed that the tradition of Irish people, including members of the Catholic clergy, eating barnacle goose on fast days, in the belief that the geese were of the sea rather than of flesh, continued until relatively recent times in areas along the west coast of Ireland, including parts of Donegal and Kerry, and that a well-known hotel in Tralee served ‘brent goose# during Lent, mainly for the benefit of the clergy.’

*Edward A. Armstrong thought it probable that the word barnacle was attached to these geese through the similarities between the Latin word for shell-fish – bernaculae, and the Latin word for referring to birds – Hibernicae or Hiberniculae.

      # Brent geese were, and to some extent still are, often confused with barnacle geese. At one time they were they were thought to be of the same species.

Sources

Armstrong, Edward Allworthy. Birds of the Grey Wind. Oxford, 1950.

Cambrensis, Giraldus. The History and Topology of Ireland. Translated by John O’Meara. Harmondsworth, 1982.

Danaher, Kevin. The Year in Ireland. Dublin, 1972.

http://www.birdwatchireland.ie

www.duchas.ie

Christmas day, Gifts, Feasting and the Mummers

Fermanagh –

Lombe Atthil writing about the Christmas of his youth,  in Fermanagh, in the 1830s;

‘Christmas seemed a glorious time, but what my grandchildren would think of the Christmas-boxes with which I was content, I can well imagine, for the nearest shop at which presents could be bought was fourteen miles off, and even then the choice was of the poorest kind. But then there was a splendid plum pudding as big as a small haycock; this would be carried in all aflame. There were mince pies, too, home-made cakes, etc., and for us youngsters a bottle of home-made gooseberry wine.

Then I have vivid recollections of bands of boys being admitted to the kitchen at Christmas time, dressed up fantastically to the best of their ability, and called “mummers”; and of the excitement of us children, when the servant would, some evening between Christmas and Twelfth Night, enter the drawing-room and utter the almost magic words, “the mummers have come.” Down we would rush to find the kitchen cleared, the servants ranged around the wall, and the table brought to one end for us to stand on.

These mummers were boys farmers’ and labourers’ sons residing in the district, and were of course poorly clad, but decorated with scraps of coloured calico and ribbon sewed on here and there, and I think they wore paper caps of various shapes. They came into the kitchen one by one, each reciting some scrap of doggerel verse, and when the whole band had come in they danced in some fantastic way on the flagged kitchen floor. Then, a little money being given them, they went their way to some farmer’s house, at which they might hope to receive a trifle. One of the rhymes has fixed itself in my memory, probably because it frightened me. A boy about thirteen, farther better got-up than the others, with a frying-pan in his hand, on one occasion entered, strutted into the centre of the floor, and turning to face us, Said,-

“Here come I little devil doubt;

Under my arm I carry a clout;

In my hand a dripping-pan;

Money I want and money I crave,

If you don’t give me money,

I’ll sweep all to grave.”’

Recollections of an Irish doctor, 1907

 

Halloween Divination in Ireland

Illustrated London News, 1871

In Ireland Hallowe’en is the most popular night of the year to practice divination, which provides much amusement and excitement. As summer turns to winter on this night, the boundaries between this world and the Otherworld are believed to be less pronounced, and so on Hallowe’en many games, rituals and rites were, and still are, performed partly in jest and partly in earnest, with the object of gaining insight into one’s fate.

One activity involved setting several objects out in saucers or plates, which were then laid on a table. The chosen objects varied from one region to another, and even between different households, but generally a few of the following were included; a ring, a piece of wood, clay, a bean, a coin, salt,  water, a button or a thimble. Once the saucers were set, a blindfolded person, seat before them would pick one, the item which the person touched was symbolically believed to indicate their future situation in life.  A ring meant the person would be married, a piece of wood or clay meant that they would die young, a bean or a rag meant that they would always be poor, while a coin indicated that they would be wealthy, salt was for luck, water meant that the person would emigrate or travel, while if one picked the saucer with a button or thimble it was believed they would die bachelor or a spinster.

In another divination game nuts were used to determine if two young people would be good together when married. Two nuts were named after a pair, usually both being present, and placed on the grate or on the turf ashes of the fire, to burn side by side. Chestnuts, wall-nuts and hazelnuts were traditionally the most popular for this activity, while grains of wheat were also sometimes used. If the nuts burned together it was taken as a sign that the young couple would end their days happily married to one and other, however, the pair would not marry if one hopped off, while if one burned fully and not the other, it was taken as a sign of unrequited love.

Other activities took place outside the house on Hallowe’en, for example, cabbages were picked by blindfolded young women*on that night, in the belief that the appearance of the cabbage would reflect the attributes of their future husbands. If a well grown cabbage was picked it indicated that the girl would have a handsome husband, while if the cabbage had a rotten or crooked stalk it was said to signify that the girl’s husband would be a “stingy old man”. A cabbage with two heads was said to protend that the girl would end a widow, while if the cabbage was hollow in the centre it foretold that the young woman would never marry and end her days as a spinster. Additionally, the number buds on the cabbage were believed to correspond the number of children the marriage would produce, and many accounts state that the cabbage must be stolen.

Illustrated London News, 1865, by  J.T. Lucas

While the above practices were generally carried out in company, other forms of divination were traditionally carried out a person alone. These practices often commenced at midnight, and were always performed in the name of the devil. One described by Lady Jane Wilde as “the most fearful of all” involved a girl uttering an incarnation before a looking-glass, in the expectation of catching a glimpse of her future husband, it happened sometimes that instead of seeing their future love, the looking-glass instead reflected an image “too terrible to describe”, and the girl from shock would either die or spend the rest of her days in a state of great distress.

Many of divination rites practiced on Hallowe’en were aimed at inducing a dream of one’s future lover. One method of achieving this was to eat a salted egg, a smoked herring, or some other food that would cause thirst  – in the hope that whilst asleep your future lover would come to your aid in a dream with a glass of water. Another rite, which was supposed to give you a glimpse future love while sleeping, involved gathering ten ivy or yarrow leaves – cut with a black handled knife, and without speaking a word. The tenth leaf was thrown away, while the remaining nine were sneaked into the house once everyone was asleep, and were then placed under a pillow in a sock or stocking, with only the following words uttered:-

“Nine ivy leaves I place under my head,

To dream of the living and not of the dead.

If ere I be married or wed unto thee,

To dream of her to-night, and her for to see,

The colour of her hair, and the clothes that she wears,

And the day that she’ll be wedded to me.”

* In some areas, including parts of County Mayo, both young women and men participated in this activity.

Sources

Donaldson, John. A Historical and Statistical Account of the Barony of Upper Fews in the County of Armagh, 1838.

McGlinchey, Charles, The Last of a Name

Wilde, Lady Jane. Ancient Cures, Charms and Usages in Ireland. 1890

Folklore, various articles, 1881-1916

Journal of the Kildare Historical and Archaeological Society, 1908

Irish Folklore for Ireland’s winter visitor the Barnacle Goose

George Marples, 1869-1939, Barnacle Geese

From as early as the middle of September each year flocks of barnacle geese, known in Irish as Gé ghiúrainn, make their winter homes on remote sea-cliffs and islands that surround Ireland’s northern and western coasts, where they stay until their eventual departure which commences as the weather starts to warm up, which usually occurs by the following April. We now know that barnacle geese migrate to Ireland, flying thousands of miles in their distinctive V-shaped formation from the sea-cliffs of Greenland where they spend the summer months, mate, nest, and rear their young goslings. Prior to the development of scientific explanations on the migratory habits of birds the mysterious appearance and disappearance of barnacle geese in Ireland, coupled with the absence of evidence of their reproduction, led many to take special notice of the arrival of these winter visitors in Ireland, and to ascribe legendary explanations for the origin and reproduction of barnacle geese.

As winter visitors the date of arrival of barnacle geese on Irish shores is traditionally believed to provide insight into the weather of the coming season. As noted in a number of accounts provided by the Irish Folklore Commission’s Schools’ Collection, which collected folklore from Irish Schoolchildren in the late 1930s, the early arrival of these geese, between late September and early October was believed to be a harbinger of a ‘hard’ or ‘severe winter.’ The early arrival of barnacle geese, however, was not always believed to impact the weather of the whole season; Mary Agnes Bonner of Ardmalin, County Donegal, provided a local belief that gave the premature arrival of the barnacle goose a shorter period of influence over Ireland’s winter weather noting that the geese’s arrival ‘is a sure sign of a month’s bad weather.’

Barnacle Tree, 1597

The mysterious appearance and disappearance of barnacle geese, who neither nest nor rear their young goslings on Irish shores, led to a number of variants of legends that attempted to explain the obscure origin and reproduction of these distinctive winter visitors.  The earliest documented account describing the origin of barnacle geese is recorded in the twelfth century text The History and Topography of Ireland by Giraldus Cambrensis [Gerald of Wales], who claimed to have witnessed the conception of these geese himself, noting that ‘first they appear as excrescences on fir-logs carried down upon the waters. Then they hang by their beaks from what seems like sea-weed clinging to the log, while their bodies, to allow for their more unimpeded development, are enclosed in shells. And so in the course of time, having put on a stout covering of feathers, they either slip into the water, or take themselves in flight to the freedom of the air.’ Similar variants to Cambrensis’ account of the reproduction of barnacle geese were still well remembered in more recent centuries. The Belfast born ornithologist, Edward A. Armstrong noted in his 1940 book Birds of the Grey Wind  the widespread familiarity of the belief ‘that barnacle geese are generated from the shell-fish of the same name.’* Armstrong also noted that in his 1882 hunting manual The Fowler in Ireland Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey asserted that around the coast of Ireland ‘men were to be found who professed to have seen the transmogrification taking place. Writing for the Schools’ Collection, in the late nineteen thirties, Mick Campbell of Speenoge in County Donegal recalled hearing the old people ‘say that the gosling of the barnacle goose falls from a barnacle that grows on a certain tree, on a certain shore on one particular island of the Orkney- and nowhere else.’

The accepted and widespread conclusion that barnacle geese were not born of flesh had a significant impact on the consumption of food on Ireland’s many and various fast days throughout the year, which included Fridays, Holy Days and Lent. In the twelfth century Giraldus Cambrensis noted that ‘in some parts of Ireland bishops and religious men eat them [barnacle goose] without sin during a fasting time, regarding them not to be flesh, since they were not born of flesh.’ In 1215, just thirty years after Cambrensis’ visit to Ireland, Pope Innocent III saw that it was fit and necessary to specifically forbid the eating of barnacle goose on fast days. Despite Pope Innocent III’s edict, the consumption of barnacle goose by fasting Irish Catholics continued well into the twentieth century. Kevin Danaher in his 1972 seminal work The Year in Ireland confirmed that the tradition of Irish people, including members of the Catholic clergy, eating barnacle goose on fast days, in the belief that the geese were of the sea rather than of flesh, continued until relatively recent times in areas along the west coast of Ireland, including parts of Donegal and Kerry, and that a well-known hotel in Tralee served ‘brent goose# during Lent, mainly for the benefit of the clergy.’

*Edward A. Armstrong thought it probable that the word barnacle was attached to these geese through the similarities between the Latin word for shell-fish – bernaculae, and the Latin word for referring to birds – Hibernicae or Hiberniculae.

      # Brent geese were, and to some extent still are, often confused with barnacle geese. At one time they were they were thought to be of the same species.

Sources

Armstrong, Edward Allworthy. Birds of the Grey Wind. Oxford, 1950.

Cambrensis, Giraldus. The History and Topology of Ireland. Translated by John O’Meara. Harmondsworth, 1982.

Danaher, Kevin. The Year in Ireland. Dublin, 1972.

http://www.birdwatchireland.ie

www.duchas.ie

Halloween Divination in Ireland

Illustrated London News, 1871

In Ireland Hallowe’en is the most popular night of the year to practice divination, which provides much amusement and excitement. As summer turns to winter on this night, the boundaries between this world and the Otherworld are believed to be less pronounced, and so on Hallowe’en many games, rituals and rites were, and still are, performed partly in jest and partly in earnest, with the object of gaining insight into one’s fate.

One activity involved setting several objects out in saucers or plates, which were then laid on a table. The chosen objects varied from one region to another, and even between different households, but generally a few of the following were included; a ring, a piece of wood, clay, a bean, a coin, salt,  water, a button or a thimble. Once the saucers were set, a blindfolded person, seat before them would pick one, the item which the person touched was symbolically believed to indicate their future situation in life.  A ring meant the person would be married, a piece of wood or clay meant that they would die young, a bean or a rag meant that they would always be poor, while a coin indicated that they would be wealthy, salt was for luck, water meant that the person would emigrate or travel, while if one picked the saucer with a button or thimble it was believed they would die bachelor or a spinster.

In another divination game nuts were used to determine if two young people would be good together when married. Two nuts were named after a pair, usually both being present, and placed on the grate or on the turf ashes of the fire, to burn side by side. Chestnuts, wall-nuts and hazelnuts were traditionally the most popular for this activity, while grains of wheat were also sometimes used. If the nuts burned together it was taken as a sign that the young couple would end their days happily married to one and other, however, the pair would not marry if one hopped off, while if one burned fully and not the other, it was taken as a sign of unrequited love.

Other activities took place outside the house on Hallowe’en, for example, cabbages were picked by blindfolded young women*on that night, in the belief that the appearance of the cabbage would reflect the attributes of their future husbands. If a well grown cabbage was picked it indicated that the girl would have a handsome husband, while if the cabbage had a rotten or crooked stalk it was said to signify that the girl’s husband would be a “stingy old man”. A cabbage with two heads was said to protend that the girl would end a widow, while if the cabbage was hollow in the centre it foretold that the young woman would never marry and end her days as a spinster. Additionally, the number buds on the cabbage were believed to correspond the number of children the marriage would produce, and many accounts state that the cabbage must be stolen.

Illustrated London News, 1865, by  J.T. Lucas

While the above practices were generally carried out in company, other forms of divination were traditionally carried out a person alone. These practices often commenced at midnight, and were always performed in the name of the devil. One described by Lady Jane Wilde as “the most fearful of all” involved a girl uttering an incarnation before a looking-glass, in the expectation of catching a glimpse of her future husband, it happened sometimes that instead of seeing their future love, the looking-glass instead reflected an image “too terrible to describe”, and the girl from shock would either die or spend the rest of her days in a state of great distress.

Many of divination rites practiced on Hallowe’en were aimed at inducing a dream of one’s future lover. One method of achieving this was to eat a salted egg, a smoked herring, or some other food that would cause thirst  – in the hope that whilst asleep your future lover would come to your aid in a dream with a glass of water. Another rite, which was supposed to give you a glimpse future love while sleeping, involved gathering ten ivy or yarrow leaves – cut with a black handled knife, and without speaking a word. The tenth leaf was thrown away, while the remaining nine were sneaked into the house once everyone was asleep, and were then placed under a pillow in a sock or stocking, with only the following words uttered:-

“Nine ivy leaves I place under my head,

To dream of the living and not of the dead.

If ere I be married or wed unto thee,

To dream of her to-night, and her for to see,

The colour of her hair, and the clothes that she wears,

And the day that she’ll be wedded to me.”

* In some areas, including parts of County Mayo, both young women and men participated in this activity.

Sources

Donaldson, John. A Historical and Statistical Account of the Barony of Upper Fews in the County of Armagh, 1838.

McGlinchey, Charles, The Last of a Name

Wilde, Lady Jane. Ancient Cures, Charms and Usages in Ireland. 1890

Folklore, various articles, 1881-1916

Journal of the Kildare Historical and Archaeological Society, 1908

Irish Folklore for Ireland’s winter visitor the Barnacle Goose

George Marples, 1869-1939, Barnacle Geese

From as early as the middle of September each year flocks of barnacle geese, known in Irish as Gé ghiúrainn, make their winter homes on remote sea-cliffs and islands that surround Ireland’s northern and western coasts, where they stay until their eventual departure which commences as the weather starts to warm up, which usually occurs by the following April. We now know that barnacle geese migrate to Ireland, flying thousands of miles in their distinctive V-shaped formation from the sea-cliffs of Greenland where they spend the summer months, mate, nest, and rear their young goslings. Prior to the development of scientific explanations on the migratory habits of birds the mysterious appearance and disappearance of barnacle geese in Ireland, coupled with the absence of evidence of their reproduction, led many to take special notice of the arrival of these winter visitors in Ireland, and to ascribe legendary explanations for the origin and reproduction of barnacle geese.

As winter visitors the date of arrival of barnacle geese on Irish shores is traditionally believed to provide insight into the weather of the coming season. As noted in a number of accounts provided by the Irish Folklore Commission’s Schools’ Collection, which collected folklore from Irish Schoolchildren in the late 1930s, the early arrival of these geese, between late September and early October was believed to be a harbinger of a ‘hard’ or ‘severe winter.’ The early arrival of barnacle geese, however, was not always believed to impact the weather of the whole season; Mary Agnes Bonner of Ardmalin, County Donegal, provided a local belief that gave the premature arrival of the barnacle goose a shorter period of influence over Ireland’s winter weather noting that the geese’s arrival ‘is a sure sign of a month’s bad weather.’

Barnacle Tree, 1597

The mysterious appearance and disappearance of barnacle geese, who neither nest nor rear their young goslings on Irish shores, led to a number of variants of legends that attempted to explain the obscure origin and reproduction of these distinctive winter visitors.  The earliest documented account describing the origin of barnacle geese is recorded in the twelfth century text The History and Topography of Ireland by Giraldus Cambrensis [Gerald of Wales], who claimed to have witnessed the conception of these geese himself, noting that ‘first they appear as excrescences on fir-logs carried down upon the waters. Then they hang by their beaks from what seems like sea-weed clinging to the log, while their bodies, to allow for their more unimpeded development, are enclosed in shells. And so in the course of time, having put on a stout covering of feathers, they either slip into the water, or take themselves in flight to the freedom of the air.’ Similar variants to Cambrensis’ account of the reproduction of barnacle geese were still well remembered in more recent centuries. The Belfast born ornithologist, Edward A. Armstrong noted in his 1940 book Birds of the Grey Wind  the widespread familiarity of the belief ‘that barnacle geese are generated from the shell-fish of the same name.’* Armstrong also noted that in his 1882 hunting manual The Fowler in Ireland Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey asserted that around the coast of Ireland ‘men were to be found who professed to have seen the transmogrification taking place. Writing for the Schools’ Collection, in the late nineteen thirties, Mick Campbell of Speenoge in County Donegal recalled hearing the old people ‘say that the gosling of the barnacle goose falls from a barnacle that grows on a certain tree, on a certain shore on one particular island of the Orkney- and nowhere else.’

The accepted and widespread conclusion that barnacle geese were not born of flesh had a significant impact on the consumption of food on Ireland’s many and various fast days throughout the year, which included Fridays, Holy Days and Lent. In the twelfth century Giraldus Cambrensis noted that ‘in some parts of Ireland bishops and religious men eat them [barnacle goose] without sin during a fasting time, regarding them not to be flesh, since they were not born of flesh.’ In 1215, just thirty years after Cambrensis’ visit to Ireland, Pope Innocent III saw that it was fit and necessary to specifically forbid the eating of barnacle goose on fast days. Despite Pope Innocent III’s edict, the consumption of barnacle goose by fasting Irish Catholics continued well into the twentieth century. Kevin Danaher in his 1972 seminal work The Year in Ireland confirmed that the tradition of Irish people, including members of the Catholic clergy, eating barnacle goose on fast days, in the belief that the geese were of the sea rather than of flesh, continued until relatively recent times in areas along the west coast of Ireland, including parts of Donegal and Kerry, and that a well-known hotel in Tralee served ‘brent goose# during Lent, mainly for the benefit of the clergy.’

*Edward A. Armstrong thought it probable that the word barnacle was attached to these geese through the similarities between the Latin word for shell-fish – bernaculae, and the Latin word for referring to birds – Hibernicae or Hiberniculae.

      # Brent geese were, and to some extent still are, often confused with barnacle geese. At one time they were they were thought to be of the same species.

Sources

Armstrong, Edward Allworthy. Birds of the Grey Wind. Oxford, 1950.

Cambrensis, Giraldus. The History and Topology of Ireland. Translated by John O’Meara. Harmondsworth, 1982.

Danaher, Kevin. The Year in Ireland. Dublin, 1972.

http://www.birdwatchireland.ie

www.duchas.ie

Reek Sunday & other Irish Traditions for the Last Sunday of July

Croagh Patrick & Rosbeg – Westport (Postcard)

Reek Sunday, the last Sunday in July, is traditionally known for the great pilgrimage to Croagh Patrick, a mountain in County Mayo. Croagh Patrick, or Cruach Phádraig as it is known in Irish, literally means Patrick’s Stack, the site, according to hagiography, was where Saint Patrick fasted for 40 days. For over four thousand years Patrick’s Stack has has attracted pilgrimages, with the site originally hosting pagan gatherings which were gradually to become more Christianised from the time of Saint Patrick. The popular nineteenth century British writer William Thackeray recorded the following details regarding the Croagh Patrick Pilgrimage which he witnessed in 1842;

‘The first station consists of one heap of stones, round which they must walk seven times, casting a stone on the heap each time, and before and after every stone’s throw saying a prayer.

The second station is on the top of the mountain. Here there is a great alter – a shapeless heap of stones. The poor wretches crawl on their knees into this place, say fifteen prayers, and after going around the whole top of the mountain fifteen times, saying fifteen prayers again.

The third station is near the bottom of the mountain at the further side of Westport. It consists of three heaps. The penitents must go several times round these collectively, and several times round each individually, saying a prayer before and after each progress.

The pleasures of the poor people – for after the business on the mountain came the dancing and love-making at its foot – was woefully spoiled by the rain, which rendered dancing on the grass impossible, nor were the tents big enough for that exercise. Indeed, the whole site was as dismal and half-savage a one as I have seen.’

Although the pilgrimage to Croagh Patrick is both traditionally and presently the most popular and infamous custom associated with the last Sunday of July,  other traditions with different names exist throughout the country, some still surviving to this day and observed on the last day of July, where people from near and far gather on mountains, hills and strands in many parts of Ireland to mark the end of summer, and welcomed in the harvest.

Activities to mark the start of harvest have traditionally differed from region to region, in Lahinch in County Clare, for example, the Rev James Kenny, in 1814, recorded that the last Sunday in July was known as Garlic Sunday, and was a patron day, but also included activities participated in  included  the less devotional activities of  horse-racing on the strand, and dancing.  From Ballyliffen in County Donegal, Charles McGlinchey remembered that in his youth, 1860s-1870s, the last Sunday in July was known as Heather-Berry Sunday, and was marked by the younger people who went up into the hills to gather hill-berries and heather-berries, while in Leitrim, the last Sunday of July was known as Garland Sunday, in reference to the custom of the younger people, in parts of the county, adorning the holy wells with Garlands of flowers on that day.

Sources

Duncan, Leland  L. ‘Folklore Gleamings from County Leitrim’ in  Folklore 1893.

Kenny, Rev James.’Union of Kilmanaheen’, in A Statistical Account or Parochial Survey of Ireland, edited by  William Shaw Mason. Dublin, London and Edinburg, 1814.

Mc Glinchey, Charles. The Last of the Name. Edited by Brian Friel. Belfast, 1986.

Thackeray, William Makepeace. The Irish Sketch Book. London. 1842.

Saint John’s Day, “Tell it in Toberona”

Louth-

Saint John’s Well, Toberona -Photograph by John P. Swift

John Swift, Toberona;

‘Up to the early part of the nineteenth century a pattern or fair annually celebrated St John’s Day, 24th June, when well known bards and other artists from Louth and the surrounding counties would gather in the vicinity of Toberona bridge, to show their talents. It is recorded that over-indulgence in alcohol and rowdying brought an end to these patterns…..

But legend had it Toberona did not require either brewed or distilled liquor to engender anything like transports of inebriation. Toberona had its well of spring water, named after Saint John, and those quaffing of its draughts, if endowed to even the slightest extent with poetic or rhetorical talent, would be inspired to speech worthy of the most gifted orator or author. They had a saying in the Temple tavern (in Dundalk): Tell it in Toberona.’

Told in Toberona, 2008

John Swift 1896-1990 spent the formative years of his life in Dundalk, County Louth, before moving to Dublin in 1912.

 

Midsummer’s Eve in Ireland

Midsummer’s Eve-

21 June;

A hundred years ago, and for many centuries before, Midsummer’s Eve was celebrated throughout Ireland on the 23 June, that is, on Saint John’s Eve.

The bonfire was central to the activities of Midsummer’s Eve, and those who witnessed the flames more than a lifetime ago noted that the landscape was filled with hundreds of bonfires, creating a beautiful aspect by illuminating the country as far as the eye could see. These fires were lit on elevated sites including mountain tops and hills, but also in fields, at crossroads and on the streets and in squares of towns and villages throughout the country. In Dublin bonfires were outlawed by the Lord Mayor in the 1700’s, and as a substitute, the towns’ people attached candles to trees and bushes to maintain the tradition in some form. Gradually, during the nineteenth century, coercion bills were brought in an attempt to eliminate bonfires from many towns and villages across Ireland, but these bills, while having limited in their success, failed to end the popular tradition of lighting bonfires on Saint John’s Eve. While the tradition of lighting bonfires on Saint John’s Eve has declined substantially over the past century the tradition is still observed in certain parts of the country up to the present day.

Bonfires in previous centuries were fed on materials that were readily available and  easily obtained; in some areas straw, reeds and wood were collected throughout the whole six months leading up to Midsummer’s Eve, while in other areas the bonfire was principally made of turf, with every inhabitant of the village donating their own share to feed the bonfire.  Well into the last century the ancient Irish tradition of burning animal bones continued, some believe in imitation of ancient sacrifices, in certain parts of Munster and Connaught, the addition of which created crackling noises, bright stray sparks, while, at the same time, providing the origin of their very name “bone-fire”, now generally spelled and often pronounced as bonfire.

The Midsummer’s bonfire are traditionally thought to increase fertility and produce luck, while passing through the flames of the fire was also thought to  provide protection from both the fairies and the evil eye. Many accounts relate how cattle were driven through the flames between two persons who each held lighted sheaf of straw or reeds, known as a “cleer”. Members of the household also jumped through the fire, as did lovers who held hands in the hope of encouraging their own fertility.  In County Cavan, a century ago, it was still believed that if you ate your supper by the fire on Midsummer’s Eve you would be protected from hunger throughout the coming year, while farmers often spread a sod of turf, coal, ashes, or even holy water on their crops as a method of protection from diseases including blight on Midsummer Eve.

Games and amusements were performed by many who attended, caps were often grabbed from unsuspecting heads and thrown or, at least, pretended to be thrown in the flames by the more boisterous members of the community. Spectators at the bonfires also fashioned bundles of reeds or straw which, when lit, were waved through the air, and in some places including Belmullet in County Mayo sods of lighted turf were thrown to the sky in the belief that the air would be purified through the motion of these smouldering sods. Additionally, a lighted piece of turf or a coal was often taken from the bonfire and carried home to relight the hearth in the household, which according to many accounts, was annually quenched on Midsummer’s Eve.*

 

*It is worth mentioning that quenching the fire on Midsummer’s Eve  was only observed in some localities, as there was a strong tradition in many parts of Ireland of keeping the hearth fire burning continuously for years, or even decades, on end.

 

Sources

Mac Lir, Mananaan. ‘The Folklore of Months’. Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society, Second series II (1896), 157, 316, 365.

Mahon, Rev. Michael P. Ireland’s Fairy Lore, Boston, 1919.

Mason, William Shaw. A Statistical Account or Parochial Survey of Ireland. Dublin, London and Edinburg, 1814-19.

O’Hanlon, Rev. John (Lageniensis). Irish Folk Lore: Traditions and Superstitions of the Country; with Humorous Tales. London, 1870.

Ó Súilleabháin, Amhlaoibh. The Diary of an Irish Countryman 1827 – 1835. Translated from the Irish by Tomás de Bhaldraithe. Cork/Dublin 1970/1979.

Piers, Sir Henry, A Chorographical Description of the County of West-Meath,  A.D. 1682

Synge, J. M. In Connemara. Dublin, 1979.

Warburton, John & others. History of the City of Dublin. Dublin, 1818.

 

Various articles from the Folklore Journal 1881 – 1916