Beltane
Beltane or Bealtaine is the Gaelic May Day festival, marking the beginning of summer. It is traditionally held on 1 May, or about midway between the spring equinox and summer solstice.
Historically, it was widely observed in Ireland, Scotland, and the Isle of Man. In Ireland, the name for the festival in both Irish and English is Lá Bealtaine. In Scottish Gaelic it is called Là Bealltainn, and in Manx Gaelic Boaltinn or Boaldyn. It is one of the four main Gaelic seasonal festivals—along with Samhain, Imbolc, and Lughnasadh—and is similar to the Welsh Calan Mai.
Beltane is mentioned in the earliest Irish literature and is associated with important events in Irish mythology. Also known as Cétshamhain, it marked the beginning of summer and was when cattle were driven out to the summer pastures. Rituals were performed to protect cattle, people and crops, and to encourage growth. Special bonfires were kindled, whose flames, smoke and ashes were believed to have protective powers. The people and their cattle would walk around or between bonfires and sometimes leap over the flames or embers. All household fires would be doused and then relit from the Beltane bonfire.
These gatherings were accompanied by a feast, and some of the food and drink would be offered to the aos sí. Doors, windows, byres and livestock would be decorated with yellow May flowers, perhaps because they evoked fire. In parts of Ireland, people made a May Bush: typically a thorn bush or branch decorated with flowers, ribbons, bright shells and rushlights. Holy wells were also visited, while Beltane dew was thought to bring beauty and maintain youthfulness. Many of these customs were part of May Day or Midsummer festivals in parts of Great Britain and Europe.
Public celebrations of Beltane fell out of popularity by the 20th century, though some customs continue to be revived as local cultural events. Since the late 20th century, Celtic neopagans and Wiccans have observed a festival based on Beltane as a religious holiday. Neopagans in the Southern Hemisphere may mark the festival on 1 November.
Name
In Old Irish, the name was usually Beltaine or Belltaine. In modern Irish, the festival is usually called Lá Bealtaine, while the month of May is Mí Bhealtaine. In Scottish Gaelic, the festival is Latha Bealltainn. Sometimes the older Scottish Gaelic spelling Bealltuinn is used. The term Latha Buidhe Bealltainn or Lá Buidhe Bealtaine, "the bright or yellow day of Beltane", means the first of May. In Ireland it is referred to in a common folk tale as Luan Lae Bealtaine; the first day of the week is added to highlight the first day of summer.The name is anglicised as Beltane, Beltain, Beltaine, Beltine and Beltany.
Another Old Irish name for the festival was Cétshamain or Cétamain, probably meaning 'first of summer'. Ó Duinnín's Irish dictionary gives this as Céadamhain or Céadamh in modern Irish. It survives in the Scottish Gaelic name for the month of May, An Cèitean, and matches the Welsh Cyntefin. These have all been derived from proto-Celtic *kentu-samonyos.
Etymology
Two modern etymologies have been proposed. The first reconstructs Beltaine as *beltiniā, deriving it from a stem *beltu associated with 'death', from an earlier *gʷel-tiō. On this view, Beltaine would be formally equivalent to the Lithuanian goddess of death Giltinė. The absence of expected syncope has been explained as the result of a popular reinterpretation of Beltaine as a compound containing Old Irish tene. However, Peter Schrijver has argued that this etymology is problematic, since associating the beginning of the fertile summer season with death appears semantically implausible, and does not accord well with Cormac's account of the kindling of apotropaic fires. According to an alternative etymology, Belaine is a compound formed from the Proto-Indo-European root *bʰel- and Old Irish tene. In this view, the fist element *bel- might be cognate with the English word bale.Toponymy
There are place names in Ireland containing the word Bealtaine, indicating places where Beltane festivities were once held. It is often anglicised as Beltany. There are three Beltanys in County Donegal, including the Beltany stone circle, and two in County Tyrone. In County Armagh there is a place called Tamnaghvelton/Tamhnach Bhealtaine. Lisbalting/Lios Bealtaine is in County Tipperary, while Glasheennabaultina/Glaisín na Bealtaine is the name of a stream joining the River Galey in County Limerick.Historical customs
Beltane was one of four Gaelic seasonal festivals: Samhain, Imbolc, Beltane, and Lughnasadh. Beltane marked the beginning of the pastoral summer season, when livestock were driven out to the summer pastures. Rituals were held at that time to protect them from harm, both natural and supernatural, and this mainly involved the "symbolic use of fire". There were also rituals to protect crops, dairy products and people, and to encourage growth. The aos sí were thought to be especially active at Beltane, and the goal of many Beltane rituals was to appease them. Most scholars see the aos sí as remnants of the pagan gods and nature spirits. Beltane was a "spring time festival of optimism" during which "fertility ritual again was important, perhaps connecting with the waxing power of the sun".Ancient and medieval
Beltane and Samhain are thought to have been the most important of the four Celtic festivals. Sir James George Frazer wrote in The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion that the times of Beltane and Samhain are of little importance to European crop-growers, but of great importance to herdsmen practising seasonal transhumance. Thus, he suggests that the festival has pastoral origins.The earliest mention of Beltane is in Old Irish literature from Gaelic Ireland. The early-10th century text Sanas Cormaic has an entry for "Belltaine" and derives it from bil-tene, "lucky fire". It says that to protect cattle from disease, the druids used to light two fires "with great incantations" and drive the cattle between them. In another entry, Sanas Cormaic says that Belltaine means "fire of Bel", explaining that Bel, Bil or Bial was a god and that "a fire was kindled in his name at the beginning of summer". Some scholars suggest that this might have been the Celtic healing god Belenos, although there is no other mention of Bel in Old Irish writings. Other scholars suggest that the writer was attempting to link the druidic fires with the Biblical god Baal.
The medieval tale Tochmarc Emire gives the same description of Beltaine. It says that it marks the beginning of summer, and calls Beltaine and Samhain the two main divisions of the year.
According to 17th-century historian Geoffrey Keating, there was a great gathering at the hill of Uisneach each Beltane in medieval Ireland, where a sacrifice was made to a god named Beil. Keating wrote that two bonfires would be lit in every district of Ireland, and cattle would be driven between them to protect them from disease. There is no reference to such a gathering in the annals, but the medieval Dindsenchas includes a tale of a hero lighting a holy fire on Uisneach that blazed for seven years. Ronald Hutton writes that this may "preserve a tradition of Beltane ceremonies there", but adds "Keating or his source may simply have conflated this legend with the information in Sanas Chormaic to produce a piece of pseudo-history". Nevertheless, excavations at Uisneach in the 20th century found evidence of large fires and charred bones, and showed it to have been a place of ritual since ancient times. Evidence suggests it was "a sanctuary-site, in which fire was kept burning perpetually, or kindled at frequent intervals", where animal sacrifices were offered.
Beltane is also mentioned in medieval Scottish literature. An early reference is found in the poem 'Peblis to the Play', contained in the Maitland Manuscripts of 15th- and 16th-century Scots poetry, which describes the celebration in the town of Peebles.
Modern era
From the late 18th century to the mid 20th century, many accounts of Beltane customs were recorded by folklorists and other writers. For example John Jamieson, in his Etymological Dictionary of the Scottish Language, describes some of the Beltane customs which persisted in the 18th and early 19th centuries in parts of Scotland, which he noted were beginning to die out.Bonfires
Bonfires continued to be a key part of the festival in the modern era. All hearth fires would be doused before the bonfire was lit, generally on a hill. Ronald Hutton writes that "To increase the potency of the holy flames, in Britain at least they were often kindled by the most primitive of all means, of friction between wood." This is known as a need-fire, or tein' èiginn in Gaelic. It was a sacred fire that could be kindled only with a wooden drill, by a group of certain people, after they had removed all metal and after all other fires in the area had been doused. Nineteenth-century writers record such fires being kindled at Beltane in the Scottish Highlands, and also in Wales. Its flames were believed to guard against sickness, supernatural harm and witchcraft.In the 19th century, cattle were still driven over flames or between two fires—as described in Sanas Cormaic almost 1000 years before—in parts of Ireland and Scotland. Sometimes the cattle would be driven around a bonfire or be made to leap over flames or embers. The people themselves did likewise for good luck and protection. On the Isle of Man, people ensured that the smoke blew over them and their cattle.
When the bonfire died down, people would daub themselves with its ashes and sprinkle it over their crops and livestock. Burning torches from the bonfire would be taken home, carried around the house or boundary of the farmstead, and used to re-light the hearth. From these rituals, it is clear that the fire was seen as having protective powers. Similar rituals were part of May Day or Midsummer customs in some other parts of the British Isles and mainland Europe. Frazer believed the fire rituals are a kind of imitative or sympathetic magic. He suggests they were meant to mimic the Sun and "ensure a needful supply of sunshine for men, animals, and plants", as well as to symbolically "burn up and destroy all harmful influences".
Food was also cooked at the bonfire and there were rituals involving it. In the Scottish Highlands, Alexander Carmichael recorded that there was a feast featuring lamb, and that formerly this lamb was sacrificed. In 1769, Thomas Pennant wrote of Beltane bonfires in Perthshire, where a caudle made from eggs, butter, oatmeal and milk was cooked. Some of the mixture was poured on the ground as a libation. Everyone would then take an oatmeal cake, called a bannoch Bealltainn or "Beltane bannock", which had nine knobs on it. Each person would face the fire, break off a knob one-by-one and throw it over their shoulder, offering them to the spirits to protect their livestock and to the predators that might harm their livestock. Afterwards, they would drink the caudle.
According to 18th-century writers, in parts of Scotland there was another ritual involving the Beltane bannock. The cake would be cut and one of the slices marked with charcoal. The slices would then be put in a bonnet and everyone would take one out while blindfolded. According to one writer, whoever got the marked piece had to leap through the fire three times. According to another, those present pretended to throw the person into the fire and, for some time afterwards, would speak of them as if they were dead. This "may embody a memory of actual human sacrifice", or it may have always been symbolic. There was an almost identical May Day tradition in parts of Wales, and mock-burnings were part of spring and summer bonfire festivals in other parts of Europe.