[384]
[Beltane fires in Ireland.]
The Beltane fires appear to have been kindled also in Ireland, for
Cormac, "or somebody in his name, says that _belltaine_, May-day, was so
called from the 'lucky fire,' or the 'two fires,' which the druids of
Erin used to make on that day with great incantations; and cattle, he
adds, used to be brought to those fires, or to be driven between them,
as a safeguard against the diseases of the year."[385] Again, a very
ancient Irish poem, enumerating the May Day celebrations, mentions among
them a bonfire on a hill (_tendal ar cnuc_); and another old authority
says that these fires were kindled in the name of the idol-god Bel.[386]
From an old life of St. Patrick we learn that on a day in spring the
heathen of Ireland were wont to extinguish all their fires until a new
fire was kindled with solemn ceremony in the king's house at Tara. In
the year in which St. Patrick landed in Ireland it chanced that the
night of the extinguished fires coincided with the Eve of Easter; and
the saint, ignorant of this pagan superstition, resolved to celebrate
his first Easter in Ireland after the true Christian fashion by lighting
the holy Paschal fire on the hill of Slane, which rises high above the
left bank of the Boyne, about twelve miles from the mouth of the river.
So that night, looking from his palace at Tara across the darkened
landscape, the king of Tara saw the solitary fire flaring on the top of
the hill of Slane, and in consternation he asked his wise men what that
light meant.
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