Morgan Daimler's Blog, page 43

The Obligatory Pantheacon Post

 I attended my first Pantheacon this year, so here is the obligatory re-cap of my experience:
Day one - travel. Who'd have thought I actually enjoy airplanes? Airports however are a form of elaborate torture. I arrived in California and was hit with immediate culture shock - you can get alcohol everywhere and it feels like early summer, and this is so not Connecticut. It was great to travel with a good friend and reconnect with other friends I had made at the Morrigan Retreat last June. I also had fun setting up a communal altar in the hotel room I was sharing with these three friends.
    Horse omens started immediately. No really, in the airport and then everywhere afterwards, horses, horses, horses. I have witnesses! Also crows everywhere. I really should have understood where this would be going but I can be slow on the uptake.
  It was a great experience setting up the traveling altars in the hotel room with my roommates. Although I am very open minded about sharing space with people of other religious persuasions and approaches I must admit staying with other polytheists was nice because there was never any need to explain anything. We all understood that altars were needed, that offerings were required, and we all had the same basic respect for those spaces and things. The communal Morrigan altar was especially powerful as all four of us are devoted to her in different ways, and since there was another Odin's woman there as well he got his space and offerings without any issue as well. There were space for other Gods being honored as well, and several jokes about the number of altars and the amount of alcohol around the room but the overall feeling was friendly and pleasant. I also set up a small space for the land spirits and Fay, as it was important to me to try to connect to the local wights.
  Later on Thursday we went to the Doubletree, the hotel where the con actually takes place, and poked around a bit, met some people including a friend from an online group that I really enjoyed spending the weekend hanging out with (we dubbed her the unofficial mayor of P-con). And then jet-lag of doom set in. Later in the evening I met the Coru Cathobouda crew at their meet and greet event which I attended with the rest of the Tuatha De Morrigan contingent (my roommates at the hotel).Day two - registered for the con. And so it begins. Today's theme was horse skulls. Everywhere.    
    I taught a Morrigan workshop in the ADF suite and it went so well I was asked to go back Sunday and do another. Met Lora O'Brien who is really wonderful and reconnected with some of my favorite ADF people. I can safely say the ADF hospitality suite is entirely full of awesome.
 I also was able to meet several other people I had previously only known on facebook which was great. I love putting a FB name to an actual face. I must admit even though I had been warned about the size of Pantheacon I wasn't prepared for the sheer scale of it. It was larger than anything I had ever been to by orders of magnitude and because of that I didn't end up seeing or doing nearly as much as I wold have liked to, although what I did see and do was amazing.
   I attended a class by Orion Foxwood where he talked a little bit about his Faery Seership approach and also his theory of the four types of witchcraft. He is a very engaging speaker and puts on an entertaining workshop. Day three - the horse skulls continue. Those of you who know my old LJ/yahoo group name will get the entertainment value of my being stalked by the Lair Bhan (although it was being called the Mari Lwyd here). I'll probably do a future blog post just on that topic, but suffice to say it became something of a running joke with the group I was with.
  Very early in the morning I went to a smashing class on the Irish sidhe by Lora O'Brien - if any of you ever have a chance to go to any of her classes, DO IT!
   Later that day we wandered in to relax a bit in the Sisters of Avalon suite, admire their artwork and connect with some great people who are helping with the Morrigan sacred sites pilgrimage I'm involved in next year*. Later we hung out with some Faery Seers and learned a bit about their approach - not my cuppa but always good to learn other ways. The hospitality suites were an interesting experience in themselves, and I have to admit I thought it was really fascinating to look at the approach each one took.
      There were some spiritual shenanigans on Saturday including making offerings on a rock in a small island of trees in the parking lot. Part of my personal experience as a polytheist and Reconstructionist is that you end up making a lot of offerings, and I was lucky enough to be bunking with other people who felt similarly although the actual lead up to making the offerings should probably be categorized as a misadventure.Day four - very early Sunday morning I went to a class on working with skull spirits because at that point it felt like I needed to figure out what was going on with all the skulls I kept seeing. It was very interesting stuff (and the Mari Lwyd was discussed of course because at that point I was still being stalked by horse skulls). Went to a class about the Morrigan, Poetry, and Prophecy - interesting info on Irish poetics but there can't ever be enough rosc catha discussion for me.    smile emoticGot to have a good chat with Morpheus and Brennos Agrocunos over lunch with the Coru and Tuatha De Morrigan folks, sort of an east coast/west coast gnoshy thing.Went to Lora's Morrigan class which was amazing, even if there were a mad amount of people crammed into a little room for it (seriously should have been in a bigger room).    Lora O'Brien did a workshop on the Morrigan which was intriguing and had some great food for thought in it. Hearing her talk about her firsthand experiences with the Morrigan's sacred sites, especially Oweynagat, makes me even more eager to go visit them myself. She also had a guided meditation at the end of her workshop which I found very profound. 
 Later that day I taught my second workshop, "Morrigan 2.0" in the ADF suite - anyone else noticed a theme at P-con this year?  - and had a blast doing it. ADF Druids rock! The class went well and we ended up talking about a variety of things relating to Irish Gods and mythology with a bit of Boudicca thrown in. Afterwards I was as asked to invoke Macha at the ADF unity ritual Monday morning, as if I'd say no to that!  That night I was dragged up to a meet and greet in the Llewellyn suite. It was an interesting experience but by far the loudest hospitality suite which made conversation a bit difficult. I enjoyed meeting Jason and Ari Mankey though and seeing the new Llewellyn releases displayed around the room.Day five - Up very early Monday morning for the ADF unity ritual, which went really well, even if my brain ceased functioning at this point. I think I was suffering from convention burn out. And as I was standing there getting ready to thank Macha at the end of the ritual I had a strong feeling that Herself wanted the thank you in Irish. I have no idea where I pulled the words from if not Her, because by that point my mind was pretty mushy, but the words came.
    Afterwards down in the lobby I had an awesome chat over coffee with Vyviane Armstrong, Lora O'Brien, and Stephanie Woodfield about the sacred sites tour that's being planned for next year which may be one of my favorite parts of the whole con, although its hard to pick any one favorite thing.
And then - the vendor room. Wow. Please take my money awesome pagan vendors. (And I got to meet Jen Delyth and talk about, what else?, the Mari Lwyd).

The less fun part was the Epic Quest Homeward which involved two airplanes, an overnight layover in Salt Lake City airport, and New England welcoming us back to her frigid arms with a snow storm.That's the highlights anyway, I'm sure I'm leaving half of everything out. In short, met a ton of awesome people, the craic was mighty, and I had my priestess hat on, quite unexpectedly, the whole time. Because the Work never ends.
Since people seemed to really like it, here's the Macha invocation from the ADF ritual:
"Macha Mong-ruadh
Macha of the Red Hair
Great Queen, Mighty Lady,
Uniter of opposing forces
Who was queen by her own hand
and chose the king from the most deserving
You who brought unity
Where there had been opposition and strife
Be with us now."The "thank you" (and anyone who can correct my Irish feel free to jump in, it was a spontaneous thing) was:
"Macha Mong-ruadh
Mór Ríoghain, Bean uasal,
go raibh maith agat as do bheannachtaí
imeann i síocháin
gach croí, do bhaile"
(Macha of the Red hair
Great Queen, noble woman,
Thank you for your blessings
Go in peace
Every heart, your home)

Thoughts on The Morrigan, Service, and Diversity

    I read a blog the other day about the Morrigan and not proselytizing which I agree with, and there's really no need to re-hash here. But I mention it because a line in that blog stuck out to me: "spirituality is not a one size fits all concept."
  I think this is profoundly true and also something we all should give more thought to, not only in the general sense that each tradition won't be right for everyone - Gods know recon isn't everyone's cuppa - but also that even those who are dedicated to the same deity will find different expressions of that dedication. We each have our own niches within our service. Perhaps we can say that there are often themes within the things people who share a deity are drawn to, commonalities, but each of us finds our own expression. We are each filled with a different passion. Its easy to forget though that those who honor the same deity we honor do not necessarily share the calling that drives us.
   I have only rarely met other people dedicated to Macha, but I know many more generally dedicated to the Morrigan. I see the expression of the things that drive them and sometimes I nod in agreement and sometimes I shake my head or shrug. The things that they are so profoundly driven by may or may not be things that I understand or share. In the same way the things that drive me are not the things that drive them. I know many honorable Morrigan's peolpe who have taken up wonderful causes in Her name, including things like raising money to donate to charities like the Wounded Warrior Project. I admire that, but it is not my cause to carry forward.
     I have a deep concern for the welfare of children, especially infants and for the rights of mothers. I'm a pretty outspoken against circumcision and strongly advocate breastfeeding, for example. In fact the only social protest I've participated in was a "nurse-in" that came about after a woman was asked to stop nursing at a local restaurant. I have helped with fundraisers in my area to donate to the local women's shelter and to food pantries. I don't tie those things directly into my dedication to Macha, but I certainly have come to feel over the years that She is a deity who is very much about justice for women and children*. When I think of serving Macha I can't help but think as well of speaking up in defense of the helpless, especially children, and of defending mother's rights. I feel like that's part of my personal calling. But I have to remind myself that just because these things matter to me doesn't mean they matter to others, not even other people who serve Her. It would be unfair of me to judge others for not sharing in the drive I feel to fight for these things. Instead I try to see and appreciate the things they do want to fight for.
     Some of us are called to write and teach while others sing, or dance, or live quiet lives of devotion. Some of us feel very passionate about a cause, others don't. We are a diverse group, a wide array of people from different walks of life and places - in every sense - who all seek to honor the Morrigan. As tempting as it can be to want to measure everyone by our own standard, we need to let go of the idea of expecting everybody to be like us, to share our goals and ideals. Our service takes many different forms, and we should strive to appreciate the service offered by others, as much as we work at doing the best on our own path.


* This has grown out of my contemplation of her cursing the men of Ulster, although I do realize that story has a lot of other layers as well

Are the Irish Gods, Gods?

  Every cultural type of paganism has its own unique little issues, things that go around within that particular community. Usually these are not things based in facts, but are a kind of urban legend, a statement made at a some point that was then repeated and taken as fact and slowly takes on a life of its own until it gains a kind of truth of its own, no matter how disconnected it may be from the actual root culture, historic fact, or myth. In Heathenry you see this with the idea people constantly repeat that only those who die in battle go to Valhalla* or that Valhalla is a universal goal, a kind of heaven, while Hel is a terrible place to be avoided. In Celtic paganism, or I should say Irish paganism specifically, what I see going around fairly often is the assertion that the Irish Gods were not, in fact, Gods at all. 
   This argument is put forth on several assertions. Firstly it's claimed that we have nothing recorded or written by the pagan Irish themselves therefore we have no idea who or what they considered Gods. The second assertion is that none of the Tuatha Dé Danann are ever referred to as Gods in any of the existing material, and that this is because they were never seen as being Gods at all just fictional characters. Both of these arguments get tossed out, sometimes be people within the Celtic pagan community, for a variety of reasons. Sometimes, as with the "we know nothing about Druids" line its simply an excuse to justify someone tossing out the historical material and making up whatever they like. Sometimes its an attempt to disparage Irish paganism. The responses to being told the Irish Gods aren't Gods are often sincere but emotional, so lets try a different approach here. 
   To address the assertion that we have nothing from the pagan Irish Celts so therefore we don't know anything about their Gods, I honestly find that argument disingenuous. That statement is generally true of cultures like the Picts and neolithic Irish, but while we do not have any primary sources for the pagan Irish Celts we have an abundance of secondary sources. We have mythology preserved by early scribes during and immediately after the conversion period and we have later folklore which preserved the memory of deities in certain areas. These secondary sources can be cross checked in some cases against other Indo-European cultures, both other Celtic cultures and other closely related I-E ones because we know that I-E cultures had not only certain patterns of deities but also certain deities who can be found across cultures. Nuada is an excellent Irish example of that: a mythic figure, found among the Irish Tuatha Dé Danann who fits a wider pattern of the wounded king God seen in related cultures and who has clear cognates among the Welsh, British, and Gaulish. Archaeology is a significant tool as well, as studying  archaeological sites can tell us where ritual centers were and whether areas from myth and folklore did have ritual significance. We know from these sites that the Gods honored there were worshiped with offerings, and stories like "The Taking of the Sidhe" imply that such offerings were necessary for the people to receive blessing and abundance. We can also study place names and the way that folklore around specific deities focuses at a location. The different Tuatha De Danann had their own sacred places and real world sites that belonged to them. Like putting together pieces of a puzzle no single piece gives us an answer but when we put them all together we see the bigger picture. 
    Speaking of secondary sources, the second argument claims that nowhere are the Irish Gods, that is the Tuatha De Danann, called Gods. This is simply untrue. Some examples from the source material: 
    "ben in Dagda…día sóach" (Gwynn, 1906). the Dagda's wife…the shapeshifting goddess. 
   "‘H-i Ross Bodbo .i. na Morrighno, ar iss ed a ross-side Crich Roiss & iss i an bodb catha h-i & is fria id-beurur bee Neid .i. bandee in catæ, uair is inann be Neid & dia cathæ’."In the Wood of Badb, i.e. of the Morrigu, for that is her wood, viz. the land of Ross, and she is the Battle-Crow and is called the Wife of Neit, i.e. the Goddess of Battle, for Neit is the same as God of Battle.’" (Meyers, 1910)
 "Brigit .i. banfile.... bandea no adratis filid," (Sanas Cormac, n.d.) Brighid, that is a poetess...a Goddess poets used to worship" 
  "Manannan Mac Lir... inde Scoti et Britónes eum deum maris uocauerunt..." (Sanas Cormac, n.d.)  Manannan Mac Lir...the Irish and British called him the God of the sea 
  This is only a small sample but it makes it clear that while each and every one of the Tuatha De Danann may not have been called Gods explicitly several of them were. It would seem very illogical for the people recording this information to retroactively promote fictional characters to deities during a period that was still in transition from one religion to another, when the populace would still remember the older beliefs. When the different iterations of the myths are studied I believe a pattern can be seen wherein the Gods are slowly demoted over time, so that the Morrigan is clearly a goddess in the oldest versions of the material but by the later period has become a spectral figure. Similarly Aine is clearly originally a goddess who slowly devolves into a fairy woman and then mortal girl. This pattern would not seem to fit with the idea that the Gods were never divine, but only a Christian literary device. 
   Were the Irish Gods understood to be Gods historically? It seems clear that they were. They have sacred sites, they have myths and folklore, they have cognates and related deities in other Celtic cultures, they are called Gods in the older texts. 
 Are the Irish Gods, Gods? Yes.

References:
Gwynn, E., (1906). Metrical Dindshenchas
Meyer, K., (1910). The Wooing of Emer
Sanas Cormac (n.d.) http://www.asnc.cam.ac.uk/irishglossa...

* No, in fact this is not so. Read my blog here for an explanation of the complexities of Heathen afterlife beliefs http://lairbhan.blogspot.com/2013/09/...

Excerpt from "Celebrating Imbolc with the Family" in Air n-Aithesc volume 1 issue 1

   Of the four Irish fire festivals Imbolc is the most family oriented, although it does also have wider community aspects. Celebrating Imbolc as a modern Irish polytheist, or indeed any Celtic polytheist drawn to this holiday, is an opportunity to involve the entire family, especially children, in the traditions. While we don’t have any surviving information about the ancient ways that this day was celebrated we do have a plethora of native traditions to draw on, with the role of saint Brigit and the pagan Goddess Brighid often blurred and easily shifted fully into paganism. With some slight alteration all of these traditions can be celebrated by any pagan family to honor Imbolc and the holiday’s main deity, Brighid.A basic overview of the Irish traditions, most of which were actively practiced into the last century, is helpful in giving the reader both an understanding of the holiday and of ways that it can be adapted for modern family practice. There were often regional variations in practice and even in the tone of the celebrations, from solemn to comical, which created a wide array of different traditions associated with this holiday (Danaher, 1972). For the purposes of modern celebration by a pagan household it would be best to focus on specific traditions and choose one tone for the festival, rather than trying to include everything noted here.    Generally it was the daughters of the household who played the main roles, although the mother might also be called to do so if there were no daughters. This is in contrast to other traditions which place the father as the main actor in any rituals, divination, or prayers, and establish the more domestic tone of Imbolc. The prominence of women and daughters also demonstrates the importance placed on Brighid at this holiday, with the women and girls often being the main intercessors between Brighid and the family in the ritual enacted or playing the role of Brighid herself. Imbolc also places a strong emphasis on children’s participation that is lacking at other holidays which tend to have a more adult tone.    Weaving new Brighid’s crosses – symbols of protection, health, and blessing – was an important Imbolc tradition in many places. One ritual that was enacted in Connaught, Sligo, Leitrim, Mayo, Roscommon, and Ulster before the Brighid’s crosses were woven for the new year on the eve of the festival was for the eldest daughter to take the part of Brighid and wait outside carrying the material for the project (Danaher, 1972). She would then knock three times, proclaiming herself to be Brighid requesting entrance; she is warmly welcomed in and the family sits down to dinner with an elaborate blessing prayer (Danaher, 1972).  The meal often prominently featured dairy products, and if the family was wealthy might also include fresh mutton (Danaher, 1972). After eating the meal the family would sit and weave the new crosses, with the largest sprinkled with water and hung up on the wall until the next Imbolc (Danaher, 1972). In parts of Leitrim there was also a children’s practice to use a small rectangle of wood and with potato paste attach peeled rushes in shapes symbolizing the moon, sun, and stars which would be hung up alongside the woven crosses (Danaher, 1972).    Another tradition was to create an effigy or doll, called a brideog (little Brighid), representing Brighid. The Brideog might be made of straw from the last sheaf of the harvest, leftover rushes from weaving the crosses, a re-purposed child’s doll, or the dash from the butter churn. The effigy would be decorated with a white dress and mask or carved turnip, and might be comical, grotesque, or beautiful in appearance (Danaher, 1972). In some parts of Ireland the Brideog was carefully and elaborately decorated with shells, crystals, and other natural adornments (Carmichael, 1900). In some places, including Ulster, Connaught, Leinstir and Munster, the children would process from house to house carrying the brideog and pronouncing Brighid’s blessing on each home (Danaher, 1972). At each home the people give gifts to the effigy, and the mother of the household gives food to the children in the procession, usually cheese, butter, or bread; this food would later be used by the children for a feast of their own (Carmichael, 1900). In other areas including Cork, Clare, Galway, Mayo, and Kildare a brideog might not be used but rather the unmarried girls would form the procession with one of their number chosen to represent Brighid (Danaher, 1972). In Ulster it was said that the chosen girl wore a crown of rushes, called a crothán Brighite, and carried a shield (sgaith Bhrighite) on her arm; she carried Brighid’s crosses to hand out telling each household that it was the sword of Brighid (Danaher, 1972). In other areas the procession might collect food from each house, and in some cases might be comprised entirely of men or boys who would play music at each house (Danaher, 1972). In these cases the procession was often referred to as ‘Biddy Boys’ (EstynEvans, 1957).In those homes that used an effigy as a Brideog a small bed would be prepared, made of rushes or of birch twigs, on the eve of Imbolc (Estyn Evans, 1957). In some cases the older women in the home would prepare or shape a small cradle, the leaba Bride or bed of Brighid, for the effigy to sleep in (Carmichael, 1900). In this tradition the effigy is made with great care and a ritual is enacted, much like the one mentioned earlier with the reeds for the crosses, where the effigy is taken outside and invited in. In one tradition the women of the house prepare everything and then one goes and stands in the open door, bracing on the door jambs, and loudly invites Brighid in three times, telling her that her bed is ready (Carmichael, 1900). The brideog is placed in the bed with a small wand, the slat Brighid, which may be made of birch, hazel, willow or another white wood (Carmichael, 1900).       Read more in Issue one 2014 of Air n-Aithesc   

A Bit More Translation

"Fo-ceird Cú Chuluinn bedg ina charpat feissin íarum. Naicc ní i nneoch íarum in mnaí nach in carpat nach in n-ech nach in fer nach in mbuin ocus co n-faco-sium íarum ba hén-si dub forsin chroíb ina farrud.
‘Doltach ben atat-chomnaic’, ol Cú Chuluin n.
‘Is Dollud dono bias forsinn greallaig si co bráth’, ol in ben. Grellach Dolluid íarum a hainm ó hoin ille.‘Ochti ro-feisind bed tú ní samluid no-scarfamais’, ol Cú Chuluinn.
‘Cid donrignis’, olsí, ‘bieith olec de.’
‘Ni chumgai olc dam’, ol Cú Chuluinn.
‘Cumgaim écin’, olsin ven. ‘Is oc do ditin do báis-siu atáu-so ocus bia’, ollsí."

 Cuchulain sprang onto his own chariot after that. Then nothing was there of all of them not the woman, not the chariot, not the horse, not the man, not the cow and he saw that she was a black bird on a branch near him.
"A hurtful woman you are," said Cuchulain.
"It is Dollud then that will be the name of this bog until Judgement Day," said the woman. Bog of Distress was its name from that time afterwards.
 "If only I had known it was you," said Cuchulain, "not this way would we have parted."
 "Whatever you would have done," said she, "misfortune would result from it."
 "You cannot bring misfortune to me," said Cuchulain.
"I can indeed," said the woman; "It is at the final touch of your death I am and shall be," said she.

- Tain Bo Regamna

A Prayer to an Cailleach During Storms

Cailleach, Lady of Winter,
Winter of hard snow,
Snow driven by wind
Wind roaring, fierce,
Fierce Hag, I pray to you
You, who can be gentle
Be gentle to my home
My home and my family
My family and little children
Children who offer to you
You, Cailleach of Winter,
Winter hard and cold
Cold kept back by warmth
Warmth that we share
Share what we have with you
You, who can be gentle
Be gentle with those
Those who offer in your storm
May your storm pass us by
pass us by unharmed

The Morrigan and Plans for 2015

   I'm sure many of you would rather see more translation here, and don't worry I'll get some more done soon. I'm working on a new manuscript at the moment which is taking up some time, but hopefully next week I'll get to some of the other fun untranslated bits of the Cath Maige Tuired...
  I dreamed last night of the Morrigan, and this morning I was asked to do a workshop about her (them) next month so I thought it might be good to offer a short blog today just outlining some of this year's plans, where I'll be and what I'll be doing.
  I'm going to Pantheacon next month which is a very exciting first for me. I'll get to meet a lot of awesome people and spend time with some friends, including Stephanie Woodfield who is dragging me out there with her (I haven't been on a plane since I was 10 years old). It will be an adventure. While I'm at the con I'm going to be doing an informal workshop in the ADF hospitality suite, on Friday at 4, about the Morrigan in different myths. I'm really looking forward to it and think it will be a lot of fun, and I'm honored to have been asked to do it. So if you happen to be at Pantheacon and in the mood to hang with some Druids and talk Morrigan, come check it out.
  In June I'll be at the second annual Morrigan's Call Retreat teaching a workshop or two and helping with rituals. Last year was amazing and I'm sure this year will be even better. We have Jhenah Telyndru from the sisterhood of Avalon as a speaker and Mama Gina as a musical guest, as well as the usual suspects and some new faces.
   At the end of October I'll be participating in Seeking the Great Queens: a Sacred Sites Tour in Ireland. It is a sacred sites tour focusing on sites associated with the Morrigan and her mythology and includes celebrating Samhain at Tlachtga. There will be workshops, discussions, and rituals, and I have no doubt it will be a once in a lifetime experience.
   It's going to be a busy year, and very Morrigan-focused, but I'm excited about it.

Verifying Practical UPG

  So a common question in relation to upg* is how to know if the gnosis you get is good or not. A basic rule of thumb is to take the information you get and double check it, whether that's checking it against mythology or other types of fact checking.
  I tend to do a lot of mystical activities that result in upg. Sometimes on purpose, sometimes not so much. The result is the same though, information that comes into my head from outside and then requires some sort of verification. I almost never utilize a upg without some kind of checking, and when it is checked I find that while some of it turns out to be contradicted (in other words just my head talking to myself) some of it turns out to be even more interesting than I realized at first.
  One example is the phrase "Mache mind" which I had stuck in my head for several days. I knew it was from the Tain Bo Cuiligne and thought that it meant "halidom of Macha"; I had a visionary experience where I saw a sword with those words engraved on it. I initially thought the message of the vision was that the sword was a sacred object of Macha's, which is one layer of meaning and is true, but after several days of this stuck in my head I finally double checked the word mind. It turns out mind in Old Irish also means "blade, weapon", so that Mache mind also means Macha's blade. As soon as I learned that it felt as if something clicked and the phrase stopped being stuck in my head. Part of the upg had to do with me understanding the vision and the phrase on the sword, and that meant getting out of my own assumption.
   I recently also had a upg experience involving herbal knowledge. Herbs are not my forte**. I was looking for an oil to use in a cleansing bath and was feeling like I needed something particular. I tried to open myself up to find out which one I needed. On the store display my eyes went to rosemary oil, but I dismissed it. I knew that rosemary was burned to cleanse sick rooms after illnesses but not much else about it and that wasn't the sort of thing I was looking for. Nonetheless I kept feeling that rosemary was what I needed and when I tried picking out a different bottle the next one I grabbed from a different area of the display was also rosemary, even though there shouldn't have been two bottles (according to the store owner). I gave in and went to look up the uses of rosemary to see if this little upg had anything to it, and it turned out that yes indeed rosemary is used in cleansing and purification according to two different books on magical uses of herbs.
   Both of these are just small things, but I hope they demonstrate the way that different types of upg can be researched and double checked. Instead of just trusting the random information we get in visions, dreams, and intuition we can take the time to see what deeper meanings might be behind them. Sometimes they may come to nothing. Other times they may prove out, and then you will know going forward how much depth your gnosis had.


*upg - unverified personal gnosis
** any herbal upgs should be double and triple checked in my opinion before you even think of using them in any way

Translating the Untranslated part 5 - The Morrigan's Prophecy part 2

Today I want to take a look at the second half of the Morrigan's prophecy after the battle of Moytirra, which Gray does offer a translation for, but with significant sections excluded:

Boí-si íarum oc taircetul deridh an betha ann beus ocus oc tairngire cech uilc nobíad ann, ocus cech teadma ocus gach díglau; conid ann rocachain an laíd-se sís:
"Ní accus bith nombeo baid: sam cin blatha, beit bai cin blichda, mna can feli, fir gan gail. Gabala can righ rinna ulcha ilmoigi beola bron, feda cin mes. Muir can toradh. Tuirb ainbthine immat moel rátha, fás a forgnam locha diersit- dinn atrifit- linn lines sechilar flaithie foailti fria holc, ilach imgnath gnuse ul-. Incrada docredb- gluind ili. imairecc catha, toebh fri ech delceta imda dala braith m-c flaithi forbuid bron sen saobretha. Brecfásach mbrithiom- braithiomh cech fer. Foglaid cech mac. Ragaid mac i lligie a athar. Ragaid athair a lligi a meic. Climain cach a brathar. Ní sia nech mnai assa tigh. Gignit- cenmair olc aimser immera mac a athair, imera ingen..." (Gray, 1983).

 She was afterwards among them prophecying the years at the end of existence,  and further promising each evil and lack in those years, and every plague and every vengence: so that there she chanted her poem:
 "Something seen is a world that shall not be pleasing: summer deprived of flowers,  cows deprived of milk; women deprived of modesty, men deprived of valor. Conquests without a king, pointed, bearded, mouths of many-oaths, sorrow, a lord without judgments*. Sea without profit. Multitude of storms, excessively tonsured, forts, barren of structures, hollow, a stronghold coming from mistakes a devastated time, many homeless, an excess of lords, joy in evil, a cry against traditions, bearded faces**. Equipment decaying, numerous exploits, finding battles, silent towards a spurred horse, numerous assemblies, treachery of lord's sons, covered in sorrow, crooked judgement of old men. False precedents of judges, a betrayer every man. A reaver every son. The son will go lay down instead of  his father. The father will go lay down instead of his son. In-law each to his own kinsman. A person will not seek women out of his house. A long enduring evil period of time will be generated, a son betrays his father, a daughter betrays [her mother***]"


Referene
Gray, E., (1983) Cath Maige Tuired

* "feda cin mes" can be translated as "a lord without judgments" or alternately "trees without acorns"; given the rest of the sentence is discussing the difficulties caused by lack of a king, the lord version seems more logical
** sometimes a reference to Vikings
*** the manuscript ends with "a daughter betrays" with the next page missing, however it is logical to assume the line should be "a daughter betrays her mother"

an Slua Sí

  Whenever the subject of the fairies comes up it is best to remember that they are not the twee little things of pop culture. Even among the diverse groups of fairies though some deserve more caution and respect than others. One group that was particularly feared is the slua sí, the fairy host. In Scotland the Sluagh are considered the most daunting of the fairies (Briggs, 1976).This fairy army would travel on the wind, especially the whirlwind, which was called the séideán sídhe, fairy blast, or sitheadh gaoithe, meaning thrust of wind, and often called by the similar sounding name of sí gaoithe, fairy wind (O hOgain, 1995; MacKillop, 1998). Although most often described as invisible to mortal eyes and traveling in the form of a wind, in Scotland the Slua is also said to appear in the form of clouds (Carmichael, 1900). The Slua traveled most often at night, but was especially active around midnight (Evans Wentz, 1911). Anyone who had reason to be out at night, and more so if they were out alone, needed to be careful to avoid the fairy host. This does not mean that the slua appears only at night though, and in fact the fairy host may appear anywhere at any time.
     In Ireland it was said that the slua sí  would often force a human to go along with them while they engaged in their malicious endeavors (O Suilleabhain, 1967). In tales these endeavors often included kidnapping brides, a common theme in many different types of fairy stories. A hapless traveler out alone at night or wandering where they shouldn't be might be taken up by the slua and find themselves with no choice but to go along where the fairies took them. People taken this way might be said to be "in the fairies" (O Suilleabhain, 1967). In folklore people taken by the slua sí may go as far afield as France or Spain and be left there to find their own way home, or else may be returned to the place where they were taken mostly unharmed. There are also tales of those, out traveling at night, who would see another person who had been or was being taken by the slua. To get the host to release anyone they may have taken one should throw the dust from the road, an iron knife, or your left shoe and say "This is yours; that is mine!" (McNeill, 1956).Those known to have been taken and released were gone to for advice relating to the fairies and seen as being quite knowledgeable about them (O Suilleabhain, 1967). 
    In Scotland some people believe that the Slua sí, the fairy host of the air, are spirits of the mortal dead*, specifically those who died with unforgiven sins (McNeill, 1956; Briggs, 1976). Alexander Carmichael described them as the ghosts of men who died full of sin and Evans Wentz related stories of the Slua as both the mortal dead and as fallen angels (Carmichael, 1900; Evans Wentz, 1911). In Irish folktales related by authors like Yeats and Hyde however the fairy host seem distinct from the human dead and appear to act like fairies in other tales, engaging in behavior such as stealing human brides. It's possible that no simple line can be drawn between the two groups, but rather that crossover existed which is reflected in the different folk beliefs. 
     The fairy host would appear in a sudden wind and the sound of voices, armor clinking, or people shouting (O Suilleabhain, 1967). Hyde describes it in the story "Guleesh Na Guss Dhu" this way: "he heard a great noise coming like the sound of many people running together, and talking, and laughing, and making sport, and the sound went by him like a whirl of wind..." (Hyde, 1890, p 76). Some say it appears as a dust devil which moves over roads and hedges as the Good Neighbors travel (JCHAS, 2010). When the whirlwind appeared people would avert their eyes, turn their backs, and pray, calling on saints or their guardian angels or else saying "Good luck to them, the ladies and gentlemen" (O hOgain, 1995, JCHAS, 2010, p. 319). This was done to avert any harm caused by the close proximity of the Host and to hopefully avoid drawing their attention. The sidhe gaoithe (fairy wind) which was a sign of the presence of the fairy host, could bring illness or cause injury as it passed by, contributing to its fearsome reputation (MacKillop, 1998). The Slua had a reputation for being mercurial and prone to malicious behavior and unlike more sedentary types of Fair Folk they are not easily appeased but most often must be warded off, usually with iron, driven away, or out-witted. 
   I've only encountered the Slua Si once and that is enough for me. Their reputation is what it is for a reason. 


References:

MacKillop, J., (1998) A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology McNeill, M (1956). The Silver Bough, volume 1
O Suilleabhain, S., (1967). Nosanna agus Piseoga na nGael
O hOgain, D., (1995) Irish Superstitions
Briggs, K., (1976). A Dictionary of Fairies
Carmichael, A., (1900) Carmina Gadelica
Evans Wentz, W., (1911). The Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries
Hyde, D., (1890) Beside the Fire
JCHAS (2010) Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society

*This may tie into the idea seen on the continent of the Wild Hunt as spirits who travel the air and can take people.