Published in Issue 14 of Pagan Ireland (WInter 2024/25). Get a copy of this issue here: https://paganireland.com/buyissues What is the nature of the other-dimensional world of fairyland? Since ancient times, seers have described the parallel world of nature spirits and deities. Peeling away the biased accounts of medieval monks, one finds archaic fragments of mythos of the Other, also in children’s stories. The Other, the different dimensional worlds, are as real as the world of ordinary reality. In Ireland, where ‘the veils are thin’, we can potentially encounter spiritual beings at many special places around the magical island. The spiritual reality is timeless and the Otherworld are all around us, but in Ireland they seem to be very close indeed. However one’s culturally conditioned sense of the world may not accommodate the consciousness of nature and the spirits of place. We may filter out that which we are ignorant about or wilfully choose not to see something, if it clashes with

Published in Issue 13 of Pagan Ireland (Autumn 2024). Get a copy of this issue here: https://paganireland.com/buyissues Brigid has as many faces as she has names. Brigid is most probably best known as the triple goddess of healing, poetry and smithcraft as well as being the only pagan goddess carried over into Christianity in the form of Saint Brigid. Beneath her saintly magical cloak that swept across the Curragh plains to mark her site for her famous monastery, we catch glimpses of otherworldly undertones that without doubt, in my opinion anyway, give a cultural nod to ancient Gaelic Ireland and her pagan ways before the arrival of Christianity. If we look across the Atlantic Ocean, to New Orleans, Louisiana to be exact, and sharpen our gaze onto a figure called Maman Brigitte we can see undertones in this spirit that nod to both the goddess and the Saint Brigid. Maman Brigitte is a deity of the Vodou Pantheon. Birthed in Haiti during the slave trade she is arguably half Irish and ha

Part 1. Published in Issue 12 of Pagan Ireland (Summer 2024). Get a copy of this issue here: https://paganireland.com/buyissues Tamall an-fhada ó shin, or—a very, very long time ago, about 10,000 years give or take, agriculture developed; it took off as an idea, much like trends and inventions take hold and spread today. It moved from the fertile cresent in the Levant, to Anatolia, Greece, as well as the Danube Basin of the Balkans. How it spread resembled something similar to someone manifests an idea, another improves upon it, Joe shows it to Jill et voilà, “Bob’s yer uncle”—and before you know it, through trade, migration and marriage, every one is doing it. Today ideas spread much faster but it is likely there was rudimentary agriculture in the late upper paleolithic. As hunter- gatherers moved into the Danube Basin, they developed a semi-sedentary lifestyle in riverine valleys; the hunters knew it was much easier to find game when the herds came to drink at dusk and dawn in the he

Bealtaine is a tradition that goes back to pre-Christian times. Much of the traditions have continued into Christian times and the modern day. After all Bealtaine is the name of the 5th month (May) and Lá Bealtaine (May Day) is a day celebrated in Irish tradition along with Oíche Bhealtaine (May Eve). The Irish tradition has been adopted and mutated as the international celebration of Beltane, but Beltane is not Irish, it is all things to all people, although it might still have themes inspired by or linked to this ancient Irish fire festival. Uniquely Bealtaine has 2 fires not 1, unlike the 8 other major events in the Pagan calendar. Fires were lit at solstices and equinoxes and also at Imbolc (fire is linked with Brigid), Lughnasadh and Samhain. The tradition of the bonfire is still very much in existence in modern Ireland today. It is a time of purification, Aos Sí (the fairies) of marriages, of fertility, the arrival of summer and the blessing of animals and tools for work. In rece

Published in Issue 11 of Pagan Ireland (Spring 2024). Get a copy of this issue here: https://paganireland.com/buyissues Airmid, an Irish Goddess of healing, has become a Patroness of Herbalists. She is a member of the Tuatha Dé Danann, the Tribe of Danu, and the daughter of Dian Cécht, an Irish God of Medicine. Her brother is the healer Miach. She is mentioned in the Cath Maige Tuired (the Battle of Moytura) as one who assisted in healing during the battle. She was a skilled Druid for her tribe. Airmid and her brothers helped build the Well of Sláine (the Well of Health) which was created to bring warriors killed during battle back to life. A wounded warrior would be dipped into the well and be healed, making him fit for battle once more. During the second Battle of Moytura, the opposing side filled the well with stones to stop the Tuatha Dé Danann from healing their warriors. When King Nuada’s arm was severed from his body, he called upon his Druid physician Dían Cécht to heal him, be

Win not one, not two, but three fabulous prizes in our brand new competition. The competition is open until Bealtaine (1 May) - all you have to do is buy any item and you will be entered into the draw to win these. Competitions are now a regular feature through the year, some being just a draw and others with a question to answer. To enter all you have to do is buy something from the website. The winner will be announced when our next issue (Summer 2025) is published and then the book will be posted out. As buying the recycled paper magazine is relatively expensive for some, we now have a range of e-mag options available from €2.67 to €4 per copy.