Irish Druids and old Irish religions / by James Bonwick.

James Bonwick

Date:: 1894

Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Irish Druids and old Irish religions / by James Bonwick. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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Among the names of Druids we have, in Cormacs Glossary, Serb, daughter of Scath, a Druid of the Connaught men ; Munnu, son of Taulchan the Druid ; and Druien, a Druid prophesying bird. D. O. Murrim belonged to Creag- a-Vanny hill; Aibhne, or Oibhne, to Londonderry. We read of Trosdan, Tages, Cadadius, Dader, Dill, Mogruth, Dubcomar, Firchisus, Ida, Ono, Fathan, Lomderg the bloody hand, and Bacrach, or Lagicinus Barchedius, Arch- druid to King Niall. Druidesses were not necessarily wives of Druids, but females possessed of Druidical powers, being often young and fair. Some names of Druidesses have been preserved j as Geal Chossach, or Cossa, xvhite-legged, of Inisoven, Donegal, where her grave is still pointed out to visitors. There was Milucradh, Hag of the Waters, reported to be still living, who turned King Fionn into an old man by water from Lake Sliabh Guilin. Eithne and Ban Draoi were famous sorcerers. Tradition talks of Women’s Isles of Ireland, as of Scotland, where Druidesses, at certain festivals, lived apart from their husbands, as did afterwards Culdee wives at church orders. On St. Michael, on Sena Isle of Brittany and elsewhere, such religious ladies were known. Scotch witches in their reputed powers of transformation were successors of Druidesses, Several ancient nunneries are conjectured to have been Druidesses’ retreats, or as being established at such hallowed sites. At Kildare, the retreat of St. Brigid and her nuns, having charge of the sacred fire, there used to be before her time a community of Irish Druidesses, virgins, who were called, from their office, Ingheaiv Andagha, Daiighters of Fire. The well-known Tuam, with its nine score nuns, may be an instance, since the word Cailtach means either nun or Druidess. On this, Hackett remarks, “ The