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From: "Jane Lyons" <>
Subject: [WEX] Festivals 3
Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2000 20:04:38 -0000


The end of the piece on Festivals from : Folk Customs and Belief: Seán
Ó'Súilleabháin: Published
for the Cultural Relations Commitee, Dublin: 1967

The Feast of St. John (June 24th) seems to have been celebrated by the
church in an attempt to Christianise the old festival of midsummer, which
occurred about that time. The lighting of bonfires which is still carried
out in many areas in Ireland is a very ancient custom and was once found all
over the world. Village inhabitants often joined together in the lighting a
huge fire; but in scattered farms each owner lit his own bonfire and ended
by throwing some of the blazing bushes into his crops for luck. As at May
Eve, cattle were driven between two such fires to protect them from harm of
various kinds. Diseases were said to grow less as each ceann féile
approached; still people also tried to help themselves and improve their
health by bathing on midsummer eve and drinking the boiled juice of St. John
's weed. The reaping hook was symbolically placed among the unripe corn on
that evening too. As on May Eve, fairies and spirits were active then also.

Bonfires again blazed on the Feast of SS. Peter and Paul (June 29th ) and
people looked forward to the day being fine as an augury of a good harvest:
Lá 'le Póil ma fhónann grian go geal,
Beidb grán go leor, 's gach sórt sa bhliain go maitb.
(If the sun shines brightly on St. Paul's Day, plenty, of grain and all
good things are assured for the year). St. Swithin's Day in July was said to
commemorate the day on which the Deluge began, and rain on that day was a
bad omen for the ensuing forty days.

The Feast of Lughnasa was celebrated either at the end of July or early in
August. As Máire Mac Neill has shown in her monumental study of this ancient
Celtic festival, it was celebrated to welcome in the first fruits of the
harvest. It was popularly known by scores of local names, ranging from
Domhnacb Chrom Dubh (Crom Dubh's Sunday), Donagh Sunday, Bilberry Sunday,
Fraughan Sunday, Garland (Garlic) Sunday, Mountain (Rock) Sunday, Domhnach
ba bhFear (The Mens Sunday) and many others to the Sunday ofthe New
Potatoes. The feast was celebrated on the last Sunday in July or the first
Sunday in August, whichever fell closest to the first of August. It is now
best known as the Sunday on which the annual pilgrimage is made to Croagh
Patrick in Co. Mayo, but scores at least of local pilgrimages, of a social
rather than a religious character, were made formerly on that day to hills
throughout the country where the day was spent in sports, picking
whortle-berries, and other amusements. The first fruits of the harvest, in
the form of wild berries, were eaten on that day, as later were the first
new potatoes of that year's crop. People also assembled at certain lakes and
rivers on that festival, and horses and cattle were set to swim in the
water. Many wells were also meeting, places for the people on that day, and
fairs (such as Puck Fair in Killorglin, in Kerry, and many others) were also
associated with the festival of Lughnasa.

People tried to have their harvest of grain crops secured by the time the
Feast of St. Bartholomew (August 24th ) came around. Flails for threshing
were then got ready. High winds were also expected at that time, which were
jocosely explained as being caused by the saint wielding his own own flail.

. St. Michael (the Archangel) was commemorated by the feast of Michaelmas in
September. "Summer is Summer until Michaelmas" was a common saying. Sickness
was expected to grow less at the approach of the festival. An animal (sheep)
or bird (goose) was ceremonially killed and eaten in the saint's honour; in
many districts some of the blood was rubbed to the doors. As well as this
kind of sacrificial slaying, this was the period of the year when most
farmers killed a beef for winter food, and the slaying also served to lessen
the number of livestock they would have to feed during the winter. As on
some other festivals, fishermen would not go to sea on the eve of the Feast.

Halloween piece posted to Ireland, Clare, Laopis, & Limerick on 30th Nov
2000

As Hallowe'en corresponds with an ancient Feast of the Dead, it was to be
expected that much of its lore would be concerned with the dead, the fairies
and spirits in general. All " fairy forts " were said to be open on the eve
of the festival, and their occupants were believed to change their residence
from one centre to another on that night; it was a dangerous night for
people to be out of doors, it was said, for fear of "fairy stroke" or
abduction. Houses were got ready for any deceased relatives who might visit
the old home during the night and food was laid out for them. Candles were
lighted in windows too. Colcannon was a popular dish as the evening meal as
were nuts, and many games were played and divinatory acts performed
afterwards. The food supply for the winter being very important, hunger and
famine were symbolically banished by throwing a cake of bread against the
door. As the weather was expected to deteriorate from that date on ("when
the cold stone was put into the water"), sheep were brought to the lowlands
from the higher grazing grounds, and other farm livestock were housed for
the winter. This was the time too, for the payment of "gales" or
"half-gales" of rent to the landlord, and the servants who had been hired
for the summer and harvest were allowed to go.

"Naoi n-oíche agus oíche gan áireamh
Ó oiche Shamhna go hOíche 'l Mártain"
(Nine nights and a night uncounted from Hallow'een to the Eve of the Feast
of St. Martin). The Irish commemeration of the saint (who was not an
Irishman) was on November 11th, and it seems it was meant to christianise an
ancient prechristian festival. As on the feast of saint Brigid, no action
should be performed on St. Martin's day which involved twisting or turning:
no spinning, no use of wheels, no fishing 9which involved the turning of
boats),and, above all, no grinding of corn in mills or quern stones. St.
Martin is said to have been ground to death in a mill - hence the
prohibition against milling on his feast day. There is no record of any
saint named Martin having had this fate and this tradition is believed to
come from some earlier pre Christian story. St. Martin replacing some
Christian deity. In any case, as in the earlier Feast of Michaelmas, a bird
or animal was sacrificed on the eve of the feast of St. Martin with much
traditional ritual, and some of the blood was placed on the foreheads of
members of the family and on the doors 9possibly as in the case of the Holy
Innocents, to signify that the sacrifice had been carried out). The flesh
was eaten at a ceremonial feast the next day. Like some of the other chief
festivals, the customs and beliefs in this case have roots which go down
inot prehistory and the early beliefs of our ancestors. In Ireland, this
sacrificial shedding of blood was practically unknown in the south-west and
north-east.

Christmas like Hallow'een, was also an ancient time for commemorating the
dead and approximated to the winter solstice. The Christmas tree came from
Europe. One of the most beautiful of our old Irish customs is that of
lighting one large candle in the kitchen window on Christmas Eve, as well as
a smaller one in each of the other windows of the house This was said to be
in honour of the Holy Family who sought shelter on that night long ago, and
the lights also served as a beacon for lonely and homeless wayfarers. The
placing of a large log (bloc na Nollag) at the side of the open hearth in
Irish homes for the Tweleve Days of Christmas had a possible counterpart in
the tinte éigin ("need fires") custom in Gealic Scotland.

There is no tradition in relation to St. Stephen being the patron of horses
in Ireland. Instead, St. Stephen's day was popularly observed by
"wren-boys", a group of boys or young men who went from door to door
carrying a holly bush, on which was either a dead wren or something to
represent the bird.
The sang a song which began
"The wren, the wren, the king of all birds,
St. Stephen's Day was caught on the furze;
Although he is little, his family is great,
So rise up, landlady, and give us a treat;
Bottles of whiskey and bottles of beer,
And I wish you all a happy New Year."

When the song had ended (often in the grey dawn, as rival groups tried to be
the first to visit each house), thehy would be given some money. All wore
masks or some other facial and bodily disguise, in the traditional manner of
carnival singing the world over. This custom still exists in some areas but
has died out in mosr. People used to abstain from meat on St. Stephen's
Day; the reason popularly given for this was that when plague threatened a
parish in olden times the people prayed to St. Stephen to save them - which
he did - and ever since they have thanked him in this way.

Lá na Leanbh (Children's Day: Feast of the Holy Innocents) fell on December
28th and for some unknown reason was also known as Lá Crosta Bliana ("The
Cross Day of the Year"). The word "cross" (crosadh) here signifies
prohibition: people would not begin any kind of work on that day, or dig a
grave or get married.

New Year's Eve, the last night of the Old year, was known as Oíche Chinn
bhliana (Year's End night) and Oíche na Coda Móire (The Night of the Great
Feast). Candles were again lighted in the windows and special food was
eaten. It was a night which was associated with the dead too and both they
and absent members of families were remembered in the family rosary. As the
New Year, with its many uncertainties, was near at hand, a cake of bread was
again dashed at the door to banish the danger of hunger, and the rise or
fall of rivers was observed to foretell whether prices would correspond
during the ensuing year. There was no general custom of bidding goodbye to
the old year and welcoming in the new one.

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