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Irish Druids And Old Irish Religions

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Author Topic: Irish Druids And Old Irish Religions  (Read 6982 times)
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Crissy Herrell
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« Reply #210 on: February 22, 2009, 12:41:02 am »

mystical fishes. An old writer says, "They do call the said fishes Easa Seant, that is to say, holie fishes." In the charming poem of Diarmuid, there is an account of the Knight of the Fountain, and the sacred silver cup from which the pilgrim drank.

Giraldus, the Welsh Seer, beheld a man washing part of his head in the pool at the top of Slieve Gullion, in Ireland, when the part immediately turned grey, the hair having, been black before. The opposite effect would be a virtue.

Prof. Robertson Smith, while admitting Well-worship as occurring with the most primitive of peoples, finds it connected with agriculture, when the aborigines had no better, knowledge of a God. The source of a spring, said he, "is honoured as a Divine Being, I had almost said a divine animal." "Such springs," remarks Rhys, "have in later times been treated as Holy Wells."

River-worship, as is well known, has been nearly universal among rude peoples, and human sacrifices not uncommonly followed. The river god of Esthonia some times appeared to the villagers as a little man with blue and-white stockings. Streams, like wells, are under care of local deities. Even our river Severn was ado in the time of the Roman occupation, as we know by Latin inscriptions.

Wells varied in curative powers. St. Tegla's was good for epilepsy. Rickety children benefit from a thrice dipping. Some, by the motion of the waters when something is thrown in, will indicate the coming direction wind. Some will cure blindness, like that at Rathlogan while others will cause it, except to some favoured mortals.

Offerings must be made to the spirit in charge of well, and to the priestess acting as guardian. If in any, way connected with the person, so much the better. A piece of a garment, money touched by the hand, or even

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