Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names
Kay Muhr Ulster Place-Name Society
The term Bealtaine (older spelling Beltine), attested from the Early Irish period, appears in a small number of Irish and Scottish place-names. In Ireland there are possibly ten, most of which are names of townlands in the north (of which two are now obsolete); in the south, there is a townland in Co. Tipperary and one in Co. Cork. In Scotland, Tullybelton PER is the earliest attested of all such names. Bealtaine is used as the name of a time of year, May Day or the month of May. This day was significant both as a quarter day beginning the summer, when young animals increased in value and were taken to their summer grazing, and for the lighting of ceremonial bonfires, the ritual also known as Bealtaine.1 The term Bealtaine was common to the Gaelic-speaking area, including Man,2 while the fire ritual has parallels throughout Europe.3 This paper will study some accounts of what happened during the season of Bealtaine in Ireland and Scotland, and consider the various attempts to explain the origin of the term. This is followed by the history and topography of the place-names containing Bealtaine, in order to compare what is known of the traditions and their development with the origin of the place-names themselves.
Bealtaine in the Gaelic year The Early Irish year was divided into four seasons, apparently beginning, not at the equinox or solstice, but between them. All four quarter days, counted from the night before, are mentioned in the Early Irish story of Cú Chulainn’s wooing of his wife Emer. First of all, Samhain (October 31st or Hallowe’en) and Bealtaine are explained: is dé roinn nobid foran mpliadain and .i. in samrad o beltine co samfuin 7 in gemred o samfuin co beltine. ‘there used to be two divisions of the year then, summer from May Day to Hallowe’en and winter from Hallowe’en to May Day.’4
1 Kelly 1997, 59, 534 §3. 2 Modern Irish Bealtaine and Manx Boaldyn refer to ‘the month of May’, while in Scottish Gaelic Bealltainn is ‘May Day’ while the month is now An Cèitean. 3 Studied with a huge collection of evidence by J. G. Frazer 1913, in Pt 7, Vol. 1 of the Golden Bough. 4 Tochmarc Emire (Van Hamel 1956, 32, 43); translation mine.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 90 Kay Muhr The other two quarter days follow: Imbolc, February 1st, and Lugnasad, August 1st.5 The significance of Bealtaine as the beginning of (the summer part of) the year was long remembered. Much closer to the present, James McGann of Ballymoney, Co. Antrim, gave an account in 1835 of the ‘May Eve Customs’ attributed to many of the elderly females of the parish, who, as he notes, were not all Roman Catholic. Along with protective twigs of rowan over kitchens, byres and cattle, They will not mix the milk which they may have on May eve with the milk of the following day. As they say, ‘It is unlucky to mix the milk of two years together’ (OSM xvi, 19).6 Further on, Tochmarc Emire (‘The Wooing of Emer’) mentions the Bealtaine fire custom: Co Beltine .i. bil-tine .i. tene soinmech .i. dá tenid dognitis druídh co tincet- laib moraib 7 doléictis na cethrae etarro ar tedmannaib cacha blíadnae. Nó co bel-dine .i. Bel dano ainm dé ídail; is and doaiselbthea díne cacha cethrae fo selb Beil. ‘Till Bealtaine, that is a goodly fire, i.e. an auspicious fire, that is two fires which the druids used to make with great incantations, and they used to send the cattle between them against the diseases of each year. Or till Beldine, that is, Bel moreover is the name of a heathen god, and then the herds of every cattle used to be assigned to the possession of Bel.’7 The first part is paralleled in the Irish glossaries (see below), but without reference to the second part where the animal herds are directly associated with the ‘idol god’. Much later, the early seventeenth-century Irish historian Geoffrey Keating provides further evidence by describing an assembly of chieftains during Bealtaine at Uisnech8 in the centre of Ireland in honour of Béil – ‘the god that they adored’ – and also ritual fires lit for the Christian festival of Ss Philip and James, i.e. May 1st or May Day. His words echo the earlier glossary texts, but state
5 Lugnasad: MacNeill 1962/84; Kelly 1997, 460–61. Imbolc: Williams 2005. Also, see A. Minard in Koch 2006: Beltaine i, 201–03, Samain iv, 1556–58, Imbolc iii, 958-9, Lugnasad iii, 1201–02. 6 See also the origin-legends recounted by Ó Crualaoich 2003, 100–02, Ross 2000, 113–14, and Minard’s thoughts on the bi-partite Celtic year in Koch 2006 iv, 1556, 1558. 7 Van Hamel 1956, 43; translation mine. 8 Binchy (1958, 114; followed by Hutton 1996, 219) dismisses an Irish triad and Keating’s ‘assembly’ at Uisnech, while accepting the possibility of a ‘fire-cult’ there. The modern townland is Ushnagh Hill/Cnoc Uisnigh, Conry parish, Westmeath.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 91 that the custom was followed throughout Ireland: ‘It was their wont to light two fires in honour of Béil in every district in Ireland, and to drive the weak (deibhleán) of each species of cattle that were in the district between the two fires as a preservative to shield them from all diseases during that year; and it is from that fire that was made in honour of Béil that the noble festival on which falls the day of the two apostles, namely Philip and James, is called Bealltaine that is Béilteine, or the fire of Béil’ (... ón teinidh sin do-níthi i nonóir do Bhéil ghairmthear Bealltaine don fhéil uasal… .i. teine Bhéil.)9 In Scotland, Martin Martin, born in Skye, and encouraged by the antiquarian Sir Robert Sibbald, gave an account of fire customs he observed when visiting the Western Isles in the later 17th century (article published in 1697; book in 1703). He mentions Taranis as a god worshipped by the druids in Britain, according to Caesar, and continues with an attempt at interpreting the May Day rites: Another God of the Britons was Belus or Belinus, which seems to have been the Assyrian God Bel or Belus; and probably from this pagan deity comes the Scots term of Beltin, the [first] day of May, having its first rise from the custom practised by the Druids in the isles, of extinguishing all the fires in the parish until the tythes were paid; and upon payment of them the fires were kindled in each family, and never till then. In those days malefactors were burnt between two fires; hence when they would express a man to be in a great strait, they say, ‘He is between two fires of Bel,’ which in their language they express thus, Edir da din Veaul or Bel (Martin, 2nd edn, 1716, 105). The Gaelic saying was still known 200 years later, although druids, tythes and malefactors appear to have been added by Martin.10
The fire custom in Europe, Ireland and Scotland As part of his early 20th-century study The Golden Bough, Sir J. G. Frazer found a similar fire custom, held at various times during the growing season, alive in popular tradition across Europe to north Africa. According to the basic rite, a
9 Keating in Dinneen, ed., ii, 246–49. Quoted in Frazer 1913, 158–59. See further, Lyle 2003. 10 Carmichael heard it used for a hard task ‘by an old man in Lewis in 1873: … bu dora dhomhsa sin a dheanamh dhuit na dhol eadar dha theine mhoir Bheaill … ‘it were worse for me to do that for thee than to pass between the two great fires of Beall’ (i, 183). For Ireland, see Binchy 1958, 129: ‘the well-known metaphor still used by native speakers: idir dhá theine lá Bealtaine’.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 92 Kay Muhr bonfire was kindled, sometimes from friction, and the assembled people and their cattle passed between fires or over the embers, after which the people took bits of wood or ashes from the fire to bless their fields. This agrees with practice in Ireland and Scotland, as described further below. Frazer treated these performances at various dates, which ranged from Lent to Midsummer, as manifestations of the one custom (Frazer 1913, 259). In his earlier volumes, Frazer had interpreted the fires as pagan sun-worship, but by 1913 as a rite of purification and renewal, taking seriously the explanation regularly given by those taking part in the fire custom (Frazer 1913, 341). He was sufficiently convinced of its antiquity to suggest that, in Ireland, this was the rite celebrated by druids for the king of Tara which was challenged or pre- empted in the story of St Patrick lighting his new fire for Easter at Slane (Frazer 1913, 158; Bieler 1979, 84–87, note p. 203; Muirchú §§15 (14)). Although dismissed for discrepancies of date and location by John O’Donovan (1847, li) and Daniel Binchy (1958, 129), Muirchú’s legend remains a possible early witness to new fires being lit at both Bealtaine and Easter. Frazer then notes that the most common date for the fire festivals in Europe was the summer solstice, when the sun has reached its height: A faint tinge of Christianity has been given to them by naming Midsummer Day after St. John the Baptist, but we cannot doubt that the celebration dates from a time long before the beginning of our era. … Whatever their origin, they have prevailed all over this quarter of the globe, from Ireland on the west to Russia on the east, and from Norway and Sweden on the north to Spain and Greece on the south. (Frazer 1913, 160–61) After Keating, the next author to bear witness to the custom in Ireland was the early 18th-century Irish philosopher John Toland, a native of Inishowen, Donegal. Toland, who had read and thought highly of Martin Martin, wrote an antiquarian study of the druids as the pre-Christian Celtic priesthood. Although archaeology has since shown the sites are much older, Toland believed that the druids held rites on hill-top cairns. In his carefully-researched book he also discusses Bealtaine fires and locations known to him: On May-eve the Druids made prodigious fires on those carns, … in honour of Beal or Bealan, latiniz’d by the Roman authors into Belenus, by which name the Gauls and their colonies understood the Sun: and, therefore, to this hour the first day of May is by the aboriginal Irish call’d La Bealteine, or the day of Belen’s fire. I remember one of those carns on Fawn-hill within some miles of Londonderry, known by no other name but that of Bealteine, facing another such carn on the top of Inch-hill:
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 93 and Gregory of Tours, in his book de Gloria Confessorum, mentions a hill of the same name between Artom and Riom in Auvergne in France. (Toland 1718, 115) This hill, quoted by Gregory of Tours in cacumen montis Belenatensis, appears to be named with reference to the god Belenus, rather than to god and fire as in Bealtaine. After identifying Belenus, and associating him with place-names, Toland continues with fires lit throughout the growing season: As to this fire-worship, which (by the way) prevail’d over all the world, the Celtic nations kindled other fires on midsummer eve, which are still continu’d by the Roman Catholics of Ireland; making them in all their grounds, and carrying flaming brands about their corn-fields. This they do likewise all over France, and in some of the Scottish iles. These mid- summer fires and sacrifices, were to obtain a blessing on the fruits of the earth, now becoming ready for gathering; as those of the first of May, that they might prosperously grow: and those of the last of October, were a thanksgiving for finishing their harvest. (Toland 1718, 120–21) In a later book, Toland (1726, 101, 107, 112) again associates a cairn at Fahan (‘Fawn-hill’) in Inishowen with the place-name Beltany and gives further description of the fire ceremony held there on Midsummer Eve. Although sceptical himself, he notes people’s faith in the tradition: I have seen the people running and leaping thro’ the St John’s fires in Ireland, and not only proud of passing unsing’d: but, as if it were some kind of lustration, thinking themselves in a special manner blest by this ceremony. Toland associated the druidic fires with both May Day and Midsummer and made clear that the blessing brought about by the ceremony extended to people and their cultivation of crops as well as cattle. Frazer found an account of the custom in Ireland in the later 18th century from another writer who witnessed the festival at Midsummer in 1782: At the house where I was entertained, it was told me, that we should see, at midnight, the most singular sight in Ireland, which was the lighting of fires in honour of the sun. Accordingly, exactly at midnight, the fires began to appear; and taking the advantage of going up to the leads [? heads] of the house, which had a widely extended view, I saw on a radius of thirty miles, all around, the fires burning on every eminence which the country afforded. I had a farther satisfaction in learning, from undoubted authority, that the people danced round the fires, and at the close went
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 94 Kay Muhr through these fires, and made their sons and daughters, together with their cattle, pass through the fire; and the whole was conducted with re- ligious solemnity.11 For a parallel practice held on May Day in late 18th-century Scotland, Frazer quotes John Ramsay: The most considerable of the Druidical festivals is that of Beltane, or May-day, which was lately observed in some parts of the Highlands with extraordinary ceremonies … But since the decline of superstition, it has been celebrated by the people of each hamlet on some hill or rising ground around which their cattle were pasturing. Thither the young folks repaired in the morning, and cut a trench, on the summit of which a seat of turf was formed for the company. And in the middle a pile of wood or other fuel was placed, which of old they kindled with tein-eigin—i.e., forced-fire or need-fire12… They esteemed it a preservative against witch- craft, and a sovereign remedy against malignant diseases, both in the hu- man species and in cattle; and by it the strongest poisons were supposed to have their nature changed. Martin Martin also describes teine éigin (as practised in Lewis or North Uist) separately from his Beltin rite. The new fire thus lit was used to cure disease in people and cattle: The inhabitants here did also make use of a fire called Tin-Egin, i.e., a forced fire, or fire of necessity, which they used as an antidote against the plague or murrain in cattel; and it was perform’d thus: all the fires in the parish were extinguish’d, and then eighty-one marry’d men, being thought the necessary number for effecting this design, took two great planks of wood, and nine of ‘em were employ’d by turns, who by their repeated efforts rubb’d one of the planks against the other until the heat thereof produced fire; and from this forced fire each family is supply’d with new fire, which is no sooner kindled than a pot full of water is quick- ly set on it, and afterwards sprinkled upon the people infected with the plague, or upon the cattle that have the murrain. And this they all say they find successful by experience. It was practis’d in the mainland, op- posite to the south of Skie, within these thirty years. (Martin, 2nd edn, 1716, 113)
11 Frazer 1913, 202, from The Gentleman’s Magazine lxv (London, 1795), 124 sq.; Frazer notes that the writer dates the festival to June 21st, probably a mistake for Old Midsummer, June 24th. 12 I.e. ‘fire by friction’; on teine-éigin, see the entry in Dwelly, p. 943.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 95 Some of the details, such as the 9 x 9 married men (clearly implying a large communal fire) and the blessing with hot water rather than embers, are unusual and not corroborated elsewhere. Ramsay’s late 18th-century Beltane description continues: After kindling the bonfire with the tein-eigin the company prepared their victuals. And as soon as they had finished their meal, they amused them- selves a while in singing and dancing round the fire. Towards the close of the entertainment, the person who officiated as master of the feast pro- duced a large cake baked with eggs and scalloped round the edge, called am bonnach beal-tine—i.e. the Beltane cake. It was divided into a number of pieces, and distributed in great form to the company. There was one particular piece which whoever got was called cailleach beal-tine - i.e., the Beltane carline, a term of great reproach. Upon his being known, part of the company laid hold of him and made a show of putting him into the fire; but the majority interposing, he was rescued. (Frazer 1913, 146–47) Ramsay’s description, supported by Martin Martin, provides two elements not explicit in the Irish accounts: the fire was originally new fire, produced by friction, and the sinister mock-sacrifice of one of those attending, marked out by a (blackened) piece of cake as the ‘hag of Bealtaine’. 13 John McCloskey’s Statistical Report on the parishes of Banagher, Bovevagh and Dungiven, County Londonderry in 1821 gives a thoughtful account of the Irish customs in that area: May Eve is a festive anniversary with the young peasantry, and never passes without their favourite amusement, a dance. On Midsummer Eve 3 or 4 bonfires are kindled in every townland, round which the youngsters dance with torches. By some antiquarians this has been pronounced a vestige of Phoenician rites, a festival in honour of Belus. Others again af- firm that it was instituted in honour of St John Baptist. A very probable opinion is that the ancient Irish celebrated this rite, as the Swedes do at present, on May Day (in Irish Bhealtinne ‘fires of Belus’) which is still called Beltane in the Scottish dialect, and that the Christian missionaries had the address to transfer it to the eve of St John’s festival. (OSM xxx, 11) The etymology seems to have become widespread. Another early 19th- century Irish scholar, the Right Rev. Dr O’Brien, Roman Catholic bishop of Cloyne, in his ‘Remarks on the letter A’ in Edward O’Reilly’s An Irish-English Dictionary, first published in 1817, claimed that Irish sun-worship was attested by:
13 For the blackened piece of cake, see also OSA (1794) for Callander PER, xi, 620.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 96 Kay Muhr those religious fires they lighted with great solemnity on May Day … that day which is still called and known by no other name than that of Lá Béal Tinne, i.e. the day of the fire of Bel.14 Further Ordnance Survey Memoir accounts show that the fire custom was continued widely in Ulster. Midsummer fires were lit in Donacavey in Tyrone, still using the older name: ‘The Beal[tinne] fire blazes on St John’s eve, but even this ancient custom is gradually dying away’.15 In his parish reports, McCloskey also notes that rituals at the holy well at Bovevagh were celebrated in May, as well as the eves of Midsummer and Lammas.16 Wells visited at the beginning of May in Scotland included St Fillan’s well in Comrie PER, St Bride’s well in Sanquhar DMF, and St Anthony’s spring at Maybole AYR (MacKinlay 1893, 295, 296, 302). Fires were lit in May in mid 19th-century Dublin, noted alongside those of St John’s Eve (Petrie 1845, 38; cf. O’Donovan 1847, li.). MacKinlay noted that celebratory fires might be lit outdoors on other special occasions, such as Hallowe’en (1893, 284). The distribution of Midsummer, and also May and Samhain Eve fires, in Ireland has been mapped by C. O’Danaher (Royal Irish Academy Atlas, ed. Haughton 1979, ‘Folk Tradition’, p. 90). Frazer collected evidence on the Irish midsummer fires throughout the nineteenth century, visible on hillsides in counties Kilkenny, Queen’s (Laois), Wexford, Kildare and Leitrim, where they were also lit on roadsides, as in Kerry: Small fires were made across the road, and to drive through them brought luck for the year. (Frazer 1913, 202–03) Seán Ó Conaill, who died in 1931 near Ballinskellig in Kerry, remembered bringing in green branches on May Day, and the St John’s fire being made at the crossroads near the settlement, with merriment and prayers and the blessing of cattle and houses with the embers (Ó Duilearga 1964, 361). In the mid-20th century, Seán Ó Súilleabháin’s Handbook of Irish Folklore suggested questioning informants about fires on May Day, but expected far more detail on the St John fires, asking if the site were a height or crossroads, and if the fire were communal – a few houses, the townland or village, the parish – or if each family lit their own (Ó Súilleabháin 1942, 336, 337, 339–40). This last is the current practice near Doochary, Co. Donegal, and Trillick, Co. Tyrone, where neighbours shout greetings to each other from fire to fire (local information, June 2016; flowers 14 O’Reilly, E., 1817. An Irish-English Dictionary (Dublin; new edition with supplement by John O’Donovan, 1864, p. 6). 15 OSM v, 72, statistical memoir by Lt Stotherd, 1835. See also OSM xviii, 18; xxi, 77, 84; xxiii, 17; xxvii, 99. 16 I.e. Lughnasadh; OSM xxx, 11. For other May wells, see OSM xxiii, 137; xxvii, 25.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 97 for May Day also being continued at Trillick). In 2006, an interested observer in Donegal counted 22 fires visible from Lough Swilly.17 It seems that over the years the Irish ceremonies became more circumscribed and private. In Scotland, Alexander Carmichael believed ‘the practice of producing the need-fire’ on May Day continued in the Highlands and Islands to the first quarter of the 19th century, although Hutton interprets Ramsay’s comment that the ‘young folks’ made the fire as evidence that the custom was ‘reduced and marginalized’ in the late 18th century (Carmichael i, 182–83; Hutton 1996, 220, 225).18 In Europe some public ceremonies remain: witness newspaper references to Walpurgisnacht (April 30th-May 1st) bonfires in Germany (Irish Times, 30 April 2016) and the custom at Midsummer 2015 as performed in Alcobendas near Madrid in Spain, with a photograph of a young man leaping the San Juan bonfire (Irish News, 25 June 2015). Thanks partly to its exciting appearance, we have detailed evidence for the ubiquity and drama of the fire custom from the 18th century onwards in Ireland and Scotland, together with the belief in blessing of cattle and people. In Ireland the term Bealtaine was frequently transferred along with the fires to St John’s Eve. The ceremonial fires thus seem the most likely cause for the appearance of the element Bealtaine in place-names.
The original meaning of Bealtaine From the earliest Irish records to the present, most commentators have agreed that the term Bealtaine appears to be a compound containing as its second element the word teine ‘fire’ (Wagner 1975, 16; Carey 1998, 40). Cormac’s Glossary (Stokes 1862, 8) gives etymological explanations for both the initial element (Bil) and the compound (Beltine). Bil o Bial .i. dia idal, unde beltine .i. tene Bil no Beil ‘Bil is from Bial, that is an idol god; whence Beltine, i.e. the fire of Bil or Bel ’. The Cormac’s Glossary entry on Bealtaine gives further information about the fire, in similar words to the quotation from Tochmarc Emire above (Van Hamel 1956, 43): Belltaine .i. beil-tine .i. tene bil .i. da tene soinmech dognitis na draithe co tincetlaib moraib foraib 7 doberdis na cetra etarro ar tedmanduib cecha bliadna.
17 Sean McCartan, Ulster Place-Name Society, pers. comm. 18 The OSA records celebration by ‘herds and young people’ in Loudoun AYR iii, 105 (1792), ‘cowherds’ in Logierait PER v, 84 (1793), and ‘boys’ in Callander PER xi, 620 (1794).
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 98 Kay Muhr ‘Belltaine i.e. beil-tine, that is a goodly fire, i.e. two auspicious fires which the druids used to make with great incantations, and they used to bring the cattle between them [as a preservative] against the diseases of each year.’19 Stokes notes that in the first part of the word Belltaine ‘some philologists have fancied the name of Belenos, the Gaulish Apollo’ (Stokes 1862, xxxv). Later he gives the derivation as belo-te[p]niâ, from belo-s ‘clear,’ ‘shining’, the root of the names Belenos and Belisama, and te[p]nos ‘fire.’ Thus the word would mean something like ‘bright fire’, perhaps the sun or the bonfire, or both (Stokes 1894, 125, 164; McCulloch 1911, 264n.) Éimear Williams has written in detail on the explanations of Beltaine and Imbolc in Cormac’s Glossary, criticising what she calls ‘the received assumptions’ that these festivals were ‘pagan Irish survivals’, a view which she believes arose from the ‘antiquarian bias of later compilers’ (Williams 2005, 133). She describes the definition of Bil as a typical glossary entry. Noting that Bealtaine is also explained in another entry, she considers that the earlier entry (Stokes 1862, 6–8) was in connection with the term bil, with beltine as an afterthought. Where John O’Donovan (OSL Derry 71) thought it unlikely that the articles on bil or beltene were making deliberate reference to the Biblical idol-god Baal, since the spelling differs from Baal as found in both Septuagint and Vulgate, Williams believes the author or compiler intended to derive Bil from Hebrew Baal, a name meaning ‘lord’. In the compound Beltine, bel or bil can be read as an adjective, and she notes that O’Davoren’s glossary gives the word bil two contradictory meanings, one after the other: ‘good, auspicious’ as well as ‘evil’: Bil .i. maith no soinmech ut est bit secht mba bili. ‘Bil, i.e. good or prosperous, ut est ‘there are seven good cows’ Bil .i. olc ut est atcota biltenga brath. ‘Bil, i.e. bad, ut est ‘an ill tongue gets judgement’.20 She continues that, since the glossaries contain contradictory meanings, both cannot be survivals from paganism (Williams 2005, 132). However, this uncertainty about the significance of bil may be more suggestive of early, rather than antiquarian, origin, comparable to the ambivalent attitude taken to the ‘peace’ of the áes síde, the pre-Christian ‘people of the Otherworld’, as Ireland accepted Christianity (Baumgarten 1975, 23; Muhr 2016, 592–94). A traditional 19 Stokes 1862, 6 (MS Y 122); translation adapted from that in Stokes’s Introduction, p. xxxv, which is not closely based on any one manuscript. 20 Stokes 1862, 56, cf. 57; also 1903 with translation: ACL II, pt 3, p. 230, cf. p. 232.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 99 pre-Christian rite believed to purify and bless cattle and fields might well be viewed ambivalently, although Keating and Toland later dated the fires to saints’ days. One could add that Williams’s suggested meaning of February Imbolc ‘purification’ – as if derived from the Christian feast – fits a theme also found in pagan religious tradition. Moreover, the fire custom is soundly attested, and the idea that Bil reflects a Celtic divine name needs to be taken seriously. Research has demonstrated the survival in Ireland of the late summer seasonal festival of Lugnasad, the name of which seems a compound of the divine name Lug and nasad meaning a ‘festival’ (MacNeill 1962/1982, 1–3; Carey 1998, 331), so that the early summer fire festival might also be named from a god. Classical sources attest Belenus ‘one of the oldest of the Celtic gods, traces of his cult being discernible from northern Italy, though Gaul and into the British Isles’ (Ross 1967, 376). Belenus had some 31 dedications in Europe (Ross 1967, 57n.). He was mentioned in Austria by Tertullian c. AD 200, as Toland notes, and his sanctuaries were still known to Ausonius in 4th-century Aquitaine.21 The name Belenus may be compared with that of the ancestor-figure Beli Mawr in the Welsh genealogies, king of Britain and father of Lludd and Llefelys in the tale Cyfranc Lludd y Llefelys (Roberts 1973, xii–xiii). In Irish literary tradition there is also Bile the father or colleague of Míl in the Irish synthetic legendary history Lebor Gabála. The form of his name has been assimilated to the word bile ‘sacred tree’, figuratively ‘chieftain’, and both Bile and Míl are called progenitors of the Gaels (O’Brien CGH 148b 29; Macalister LG v, 44 §403, 90 §453). Thus, as suggested by Tochmarc Emire, the name of Bil was still perpetuated in early Ireland, although he lacked the high profile of Lug in Irish tradition. The element bil occurs in Gaulish personal names such as Bilicatus ‘good fighter’ and Mandubili, possibly ‘good pony’ (Ellis Evans 1967, 149–151). Stokes’s etymology of bil, bel as ‘shining’ has been generally accepted (Ross 1967, 376; Green 1986/2011, 102, 142, 150, 152; in place-names Falileyev 2010, 72). In Welsh, the names ‘Cymbeline’ (*Cunobelinus, Schrijver 1999, 26; Ross 2000, 134) and Llewelyn (*Lugubelinos, Koch 2006 iii, 1203) have been explained as containing the name of the god. Peter Schrijver (1999, 28, 38) has proposed that, rather than the root for ‘shining’, place-names in Bil-, the name of the god Belenus, and Bealtaine derive from a word meaning ‘henbane’ (Welsh beleu), a drug once widely used medicinally, before others were discovered, as a narcotic and reliever of pain. Since henbane was added to midsummer fires in Germany, he thinks it an appropriate qualifier of ‘fire’ in Bealtaine (Schrijver 1999, 35). However, Germany is the only location given for this detail and, as with Williams’s study, the lack 21 Toland 1718, 115n.: Tertullian Apologeticum xxiv, 7; Green 1986/2011, 150, 152.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 100 Kay Muhr of early evidence has not been balanced by reference to the full context of the Europe-wide practice of the fires. In Cormac’s Glossary the festival is simply called after the name of a pagan god, and it appears that, in early Christian Ireland, the use of the same word or name as an adjective had both positive and pejorative connotations.
Place-names and Bealtaine Attitudes to the fire custom As pointed out by John O’Donovan (OSL Derry 71), the spelling difference makes it unlikely that Cormac’s Glossary or Tochmarc Emire were deliberately associating the Gaelic druids with the idol-god Baal in the Bible. Keating acknowledges general accommodation of the fire ceremony with the festival of two Christian apostles, and Toland, although associating the ceremony with the druids, is the earliest to attest the general Irish transfer of the custom to the day of St John the Baptist. However, the custom in Scotland held on May Day, which included belief in the need-fire ritual against witchcraft and the suggestion of sacrifice, remained closer to its origin. These aspects of the ceremony reminded scholars of Classical references to human sacrifices by the druids, especially the burning of victims in a human image made of wickerwork (Piggott 1968/1975, 110), and of Biblical condemnation of human sacrifice, by burning, to the Canaanite god Baal, whose name is similar to Bel or Bil.22 The Old English and later Scots term for a ceremonial bonfire or beacon-fire – balefire, baillfire, from Old English and Old Norse bale ‘fire’ – is also confusingly similar to the name Baal.23 Thus the fire custom might be viewed with great hostility; for example, a story from The Times newspaper, ‘of a date so recent as the 14th of February, 1835’, reads: A scene of the most ludicrous and gross superstition took place lately at Perth. A wealthy old farmer having lost several of his cattle by some disease very prevalent at present, and being able to account for it no way so rationally as by witchcraft, had recourse to the following remedy … A few stones were piled together in the barn-yard, and wood and coals having been laid thereon, the fuel was ignited by fire obtained by friction. The [308] neighbours having been called in to witness the solemnity, the cattle were made to pass through the flames in the order of their dignity
22 Heinrich Wagner would connect the names, since he considered that the divine Ba’al in Ugaritic mythology was clearly marked ‘as the god of the beginning of summer’ (1975, 16–17). 23 bale being cognate with the ‘shining’ god-name Belenus: DSL, OED; Black 2005, 592 n.129.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 101 and age commencing with the horses and ending with the swine. The cer- emony having been duly gone through, a neighbouring farmer observed to the enlightened owner of the herd that he along with his family ought to have followed the example of the cattle and the sacrifice to Baal would have been complete. (Rivington 1835, 307–08). F. X. McCorry (2000, 265) discovered that, in the late 18th century, Kingsmills Presbyterian church, Co. Armagh, had discouraged members from attending midsummer bonfires, though no reason was given. The Ordnance Survey Memoirs report gradual abandonment of St John’s Eve bonfires in the parishes of north-east Ulster, apparently caused by friction between native Irish and Scottish settlers in Rasharkin east of the Bann: The Roman Catholics burn fires, when the Protestants allow them, on St John’s Eve. Their reason for not permitting this is very absurd though be- lieved by both parties: the Protestants imagine that it is typical of them- selves being one day burned or rather, that the Catholics look forward to it. (OSM xxiii, 133). However, from the parish of Kilrea adjacent across the Bann, there is the unique record of another fire custom, undated but very likely referring to May Day:24 Tradition: Holy Turf and Straw Runners The bearers of the holy turf and straws came to the town [of Kilrea] from the direction of Maghera, that is from the south west. A man from the parish of Tamlaght O’Crilly was the first. He ran in before sunrise, and on that morning they had spread from the parish of Ballinascreen. Some of them were known to have run for a whole day before he could find a house not already served. The turf was regarded with such reverence that a girl in the county Antrim good naturedly ran westward and deposited one at the door of an old Protestant minister of hers in Rasharking, in order that he might escape the ‘curse’. (OSM xxvii, 119, J. Stokes May 1836).
In Catholic Ireland, it appears that a benign and indeed Christian perspective remained possible. One might compare a Donegal record from the 1950s, as in the Perthshire example located on one farm: We celebrated St John’s eve in 1957 with the usual bonfire and prayers. Before the fire burnt out, my father prayed silently in front of it. Then se- lecting a brand he carried it carefully aloft to the ‘dale’ where the potatoes 24 Distribution of new fire to local households is mentioned in late 17th-century Scotland by Martin Martin 1716, 113; 1793 in OSA v, Logierait, p. 85.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 102 Kay Muhr were growing. He prayed silently for a brief moment and then threw the brand between two ridges where it would safely burn itself out. He then went back to the bonfire and selected a second brand which he carried to the byre, where the cows were kept in the winter, and traced a cross in the air. He then returned this brand to the bonfire. I was not quite ten years old at the time. I was an adult before I recognised that my father had not only honoured the saint but an older tradition. Reverence for the earth was as instinctive to that generation of people from south west Donegal as was reverence for the Creator.25 Describing the May fires in the Hebrides, Carmichael like Martin recorded the proverb used of any ordeal – ‘worse than passing between the two fires of Beall’ (see above) – and also a Christian beannachadh Bealltain ‘Beltane blessing’ on family, ‘kine and crops, flocks and corn’ and all their doings (Carmichael i, 182–83; Ross 2000, 147–48). Strong negative attitudes could have adversely affected the survival, if not the coinage, of place-names referring to the custom.
Place-names reflecting seasonal land use The fire custom has been the most dramatic connotation of Bealtaine, but since the term is still also used for May Day or the month of May, another type of significance in place-names is possible. Place-names can be found with times of year as specifics, for example Drumcask in Cavan which Joyce explained as Druim-caisc ‘ridge of Easter’, i.e. ‘a place for Easter sports’ (Joyce 1913 iii, 319; cf. Drumgask, Seagoe, mentioned in McKay and Muhr 2007, 75). References to summer in Irish place-names are usually taken to refer to summer grazing, for example Annasamry townland, Loughgall, Co. Armagh: Eanach Samhraidh ‘summer marsh’; Lurgantamry, Donaghcloney, Co. Down: Lorgain an tSamhraidh ‘summer ridge’ (Joyce 1913 iii, 468-9; Ó Mainnín 1989–90, 204; Muhr 1996, 91); and in Scotland, for example, Ruisaurie by Beauly INV: Ruigh(e) Samhraidh ‘summer sheiling or hill-slope’ (NH 501464). A long-attested seasonal use of land in Irish and Scottish history has been the movement of cattle to summer hill-pastures, in the past accompanied by their people. In later practice, much of the information has had to come from oral tradition (for example, Ó hEochaidh 1943/44, 141f.). Some sources specify that the traditional date for beginning this booleying or transhumance was Bealtaine ‘May Day’ (Kelly 1997, 43–46; Doherty 2000, 59; in Scotland, Black 2005, 593 and references). Black thinks that the cattle returned after Lughnasadh, while Kelly believes it was at Samhain. Seán Ó Súilleabháin suggested that 20th- century folklore collectors should ask informants about temporary dwellings
25 Seán Mac Nialluis, Hexham, Northumberland, The Tablet, Letters, 11th July 2015.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 103 or booley huts, and mountain pastures, although he did not imply particular dates for their use (Ó Súilleabháin 1942, 15–16, 29). Avoiding the earlier names for seasons, Feehan dates summer grazing from early May to October (Feehan 2011, 397). In the wider European perspective, Hutton observes that while May was generally a time of setting livestock to new grass, ‘Ireland and western and northern Britain had a pastoral economy involving seasonal transhumance’ and were thus areas where the fire ritual to ward off dangers survived more strongly (Hutton 1996, 225). The particular word used for the transhumance summer settlement was earlier áirge, as still in Scotland (àirigh), but in Ireland later buaile ‘cowfold, milking place’, which appears in a considerable number of Irish place-names, usually anglicised as booley or boley (Kelly 1997, 43–44; Feehan 2003, 397–400). O’Connor (2001, 26–27) counts and maps 281 townland names containing buaile. However, when buaile appears in place-names, field research would be needed to identify those sites which were for seasonal use rather than those established beside a farmstead (Flanagan and Flanagan 1994, 35). O’Connor’s map shows that most of the buaile-place-names are in the southern half of Ireland, especially Munster, and he notes 12 examples concentrated on the ‘gritstone upland of west Clare’. O’Connor (2001, 26) also shows a buaile cluster in the Glens of Antrim. The distribution of buaile in place-names is the opposite of the Ulster, mainly western Ulster, distribution of Bealtaine. While the moving of people and cattle uphill to summer pasture still continued, the place-name element Bealtaine may have referred to this less spectacular custom (as suggested by Doherty 2000, 59). However, another place-name reference system to transhumance in the north appears in the lowland and upland pairs of townlands referred to as bun and barr, with barr ‘upper part’ names found in particularly Cos Fermanagh, Antrim and Donegal, and as far south as Sligo and Leitrim.26
Bealtaine place-name examples The use of the term Bealtaine in forming place-names is rare and mainly restricted to the north of Ireland. The ten examples in Ireland and one in Scotland will now be examined to assess typical topography and any particular aspects of the origin or survival of the name.
26 In Fermanagh, Muhr 2014, 43–44, cf. Muhr 2004, 593–94; in Antrim, Muhr DPF 2011, 65–67; in Donegal, Anderson 1995, 468 n.60. See further
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 104 Kay Muhr The distribution of Bealtaine place-names in Ulster
A section of Provinces and Counties of Ireland (adapted from Lord Killanin and Michael V. Duignan, The Shell Guide to Ireland [2nd edn] (London: Ebury Press 1967), by the Ulster Place-Name Society).
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 105 Ireland Names containing Bealtaine, with parish, county and grid-reference: Bealteine, Gollan hill, Figary townland, Fahan, Inishowen H 3427 John Toland’s account of a cairn-site at ‘Fawn-hill’ in Donegal, where bonfires were lit at Midsummer, and which was named as Bealtaine, has already been quoted above (Toland 1718, 115). This place-name, now forgotten, was not a townland but a minor name for a hill-top. Toland’s two cairns facing each other appear to be those on the twin-peaked Gollan Hill, 211m, in Figary townland north-east of Fahan (C 3427) and Inch Top c. 200m on Inch island (C 3125), both on 1:50,000 Sheets 2 and 7. The cairn on Gollan Hill is ‘in mountain terrain with marvellous views’, and the site has been Christianised with a modern cross (Lacey et al. 1983, 61, site 252).
Beltany, Cappagh, Co. Tyrone. H 4081 (Sh. 12)27 Bealtaine ‘Mayday’ (Muhr 2007, 85). Probably the best-known example of the place-name Beltany in Northern Ireland is the townland from which the stretch of the main road from Omagh towards Strabane near Newtownstewart has been named. Beltany townland in the parish of Cappagh is on the slope of a hill now called Bessy Bell, 1387 feet, 423m, which has long been a landmark for travellers in the area. The hill has a summit cairn and nearby holy well and barely-recognisable old graveyard. At its lower end near the river Strule, Beltany contains a megalithic court tomb which in winter, when the trees are bare, can be glimpsed from the road below (Muhr 2007, 74–79; NISMR ref. Tyr 025: 008, Grid H 4182). Beltany is on the eastern side of Bessy Bell and now reaches almost to the summit crowned by Donald Gorm’s Cairn (although townland boundaries on high hills were only fixed by the Ordnance Survey of the 1830s). Baltiny was shown on the Escheated Counties map in 1609 (Strabane Sh. 15) and, when the land was let to a local Irishman Turlogh O’Quyn in 1629, the names of subdivisions were listed: the towne-land of Baltaghny, 3 sessioghs, viz. Cloghogall, Drumhibryen and Clonteane to Turlogh Oge O’Quyn for 6 or 7 years (Inq. Ult. Tyr. §5 Car. I). The division of Cloghogall (cloch thógála ‘raised stone’) was probably based around the tomb mentioned above (Muhr 2008, 229–30). Despite being
27 Photographs by Kenny Allen 2010:
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 106 Kay Muhr described as ‘largely destroyed about 1898’ (Chart 1940, 230), it is still an impressive monument. The rector in 1813, Dr Fitzgerald, attested that the fire custom was held on Bessy Bell at Midsummer. He located the ceremony at the summit cairn and tried to use it to explain the Scots name of the whole hill, ignoring the Irish term Bealtaine: There is a tradition that derives the name of this mountain from an idol, Bell, whose religious rites were performed on its summit in times of paganism, and were called Baase; hence Baase Bell meant the cer- emony of Bell, since corrupted into its present name. The idol alluded to was probably Beal, that is Apollo or the sun, their chief god, who was propitiated here by fire, a custom still practised by the Irish on every midsummer eve ... lighting fires on Midsummer’s eve, round which they drive their cattle to preserve them, as they believe it will, from ac- cident during the year.28 In fact, it seems clear that the name Bessy Bell was imported from Scottish tradition in the mid-18th century, probably by the Abercorn landlords of the area. Bessy Bell is partnered across the river Strule by a lower hill called Mary Grey, and Dr Fitzgerald also comments that these are ‘names that are celebrated in old Scotch ballads, but the connection if any I have not been able to trace’.29 The ballad beginning ‘O Bessie Bell and Mary Gray/They war twa bonnie lasses’ tells of two girls so-named, daughters of the lairds of Lednock (near Comrie PER) and Kinvaid (near Perth) who fled to the hills to escape an outbreak of the plague. Unluckily, the young admirer who brought them food also brought the infection, and their grave can still be seen near Lednock House. The first reference to the ballad is in 1688 and the plague may be that in Perth from 1645–47.30 The hill was earlier called Sliabh Troim ‘mountain of the elder tree’ and the loss of this tradition was regretted.31 Until recent years, Bessy Bell was climbed by local people to pick bilberries on Cairn Sunday in early August – in other words, it was also a Lughnasadh 28 Survey of Ardstraw, in Mason 1814 i, no. v., pp. 109 and 124. Lewis (1837 I, 58) had obviously read the parochial survey for Ardstraw, as he quotes ‘Bessy bell or Boase- Baal, on which in pagan times sacrifice is supposed to have been offered to Baal or Bel’, noting the ‘large and curious cairn’. 29 Mason’s Parochial Survey 1814 i, p. 109. 30 Muhr 2007, 73: Child, F. J., 1965 iv, no. 201, pp. 75–77; Opie 1952, 71, poem 39. 31 Noted by John O’Donovan (1856 iii, 424 n. a) with the comment that ‘It has since been changed by the proprietor to the unmeaning appellation of Bessy Bell’. For stronger objections, see Muhr 2007, 72.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 107 site, although not mentioned by Máire MacNeill (1962/82). Although the bounds of Beltany townland did not extend as far as the summit cairn, leaving a white stone at the holy well at the top end of Beltany formed part of the ritual (Muhr 2007, 86; Thompson 2005). John O’Donovan’s interpretation of the name was simply Bealltaine ‘May- day’, although the later local investigator McAleer (1936, 49) offered Baile teine, which he translated ‘town of the druidic fires’.
Beltany, Clogher, Co. Tyrone, H 5358 (Sh. 18)32 An Bhealtaine ‘Mayday’ This townland of Beltany lies on the same ridge and to the north of the landmark hill and townland of Knockmany, famous for its megalithic tomb with decorated stones (NISMR ref. Tyr 059:001, at H 5556; Muhr 2011, 244– 45). Beltany contains Beltany Hill of 658 feet (180m). The name was first recorded as Baltiny on the map of Clogher barony in 1609 (Escheated. Co. Maps 18), later as Beltaney in 1666 (HMR Tyr. 266). Its proprietor in the 1830s, the Rev. Gervais, used the spelling Beltinny (O’Donovan OSNB). However, no seasonal traditions are recorded about it. John O’Donovan’s interpretation of the name was again Bealltaine ‘May-day’, while later McAleer (1936, 15) translated Bealtaine as ‘May day or town of the bonfires’.
Beltany, Raphoe, Co. Donegal, C 2500 (Sh. 6) An Bhealtaine Probably the best-known example of the place-name Beltany33 is a townland in the parish of Raphoe in Co. Donegal. Beltany sits on a hill-ridge about 300 feet (100m) high in an area which was clearly a place of importance in the ancient past, occupied by the largely destroyed passage-tomb cemetery of Kilmonaster (Lacy et al. 1983, 36–37). The hill-top is now divided into three townlands, Beltany, Tops and Drumineney. It is surmounted at the south-west by a magnificent stone circle of which 64 stones survive.34 An ancient stone head which is in the National Museum in Dublin is reputed to have been found nearby (Lanigan Wood and Verling 1995, 52). An outlying standing
32 Kenny Allen photo:
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 108 Kay Muhr stone, 2m high, is lined up with the hill-fort and cairn on top of Croaghan Hill (217m, C 2997) five miles to the south-east (Lacy et al. 1983, 37, site 86). There may once have been a path up to the top of the ridge from the north-west – towards Raphoe – following a line of three standing stones on that side of the hill.35 However, the lane in current use for access from south of the summit is clearly old. It runs east-west and continues down the south-east slope of the hill into Bogagh townland. A higher hill on the 1:50,000 map (179m, C 2905), in Woodlands townland north-east of Raphoe, is called Mullasawny, apparently Mullach Samhna ‘summit of Samhain’, thus celebrating another quarter day (Joyce 1869 i, 203; cf. Toner 1996, 122–23: Drumsamney townland in Co. Derry; cf. Drumsawna in Fermanagh). From an annal reference in 1417 describing an attack by Domhnall Ó Néill on Neachtan Ó Domhnaill in a strong point at Carn Glas ‘grey cairn’ between Raphoe and Donaghmore, John O’Donovan identified Carn Glas as ‘the hill now called the Tops’.36 If the location is correct, it is probable that the name originally denoted the stone circle. Carn Glas also formed a delimiting point between the bounds of the 12th-century dioceses of Derry or Raphoe and Ardstraw.37 In 1609 Carneglasse was listed as four quarters of church land – part held by the ‘sept of the Cormockes’ – belonging to the bishop of Raphoe (CPR Jas I, 381a). Four quarters was a large area. Robert Hunter remarks on large quarters in Donegal, referring to a quarter of a ballybetagh, and thus containing ‘a multiple of modern townlands’. He also referred to the ‘difficulty of establishing which group of modern townlands represents the quarter of that time’ (Hunter 1995, 309, 305). In 1654, Beltany, now a normal-sized townland of 295 acres, was the name of one quarter (i.e. 3 or 4 townlands) of church land belonging to the bishop, and let to a minister, Mr Humphrey Leigh. The duties payable in 1640 had been considerable: ‘8 muttons, 48 capons, 48 hens and 16 dayes service of man and horse’, but the Rev. Leigh was getting it at half rent, ‘through poverty of ye people being like to bee wast’ (Civ. Surv. iii, 45). Apparently the same unit appears as Beltony in the Irish ‘Census’ c. 1659 (Census 52). As a quarter of a ballybetagh, it probably included the townlands of Drumineney and Tops nearby (C 2400, Sh. 6), also church lands in the parish of Raphoe but
35 Lacy et al. 1983, 88: sites 493, 494, 495 in Tops Demesne. 36 O’Donovan 1856: Carn Glas eitir Ráth Both 7 Domnach Mór, AFM iv, 832n (Not in AU); Devlin 2000, 94 n.16. 37 Keating’s record of the limits of the dioceses, Dinneen (ed.) 1908 iii, 302‒03: ‘The see of Ard Sratha, from Sliabh Largha to Carn Glas … The see of Doire or Raith Both … from Carn Glas to Srubh Broin’.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 109 not mentioned in these sources. From its site on a ridge with a fine view, and with a natural bowl or amphitheatre on the west, Drumineney townland was probably Droim an Aonaigh ‘the ridge of the assembly place’, while the name Tops seems to refer in English to the ‘top’ of the ridge, rising to 102m, where Beltany and Drumineney are situated. The northern end of the ridge, descending towards Raphoe, is called Tops Demesne. It is possible that the English word Tops translates Irish barr (
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 110 Kay Muhr Errigal, Carntreena). Beltany Mountain (locally Cnoc na Bealtaine) extends from Beltany Lower and Upper towards Aghla More and, rather than being a notable summit, must represent the allocated summer grazing for the townlands of the name lower down.42 The original land unit was already divided in 1654. Beltanny, counted as ‘half a quarter’ (and thus possibly two townlands43) was held by Thomas Dutton, while another part called Beltany – ‘one half quarter … bounded west by the other half quarter’ – was held and then forfeited by Torlagh og mcOwen mcConnor og O’Gallogher (Civ. Surv. iii, 116, 137). Torlagh’s landholding was noted by Fergus Gillespie, who placed the old patrimony of the O’Gallaghers in the area (Gillespie 1995, 812). Earlier and later spellings are Vealeatinny in 1608 (Anal. Hib. iii, 172), Baltinee half qr (Census 56) and Lower and Upper Bealtinny, shown on Olphert’s map of 1725. The hill called Croc na Bealteine was held locally to have uaislíneacht ‘gentleness’ – and was also a Lughnasadh site – following an account in 1942 by an old woman recalling her mother’s stories of young people assembling to make bilberry bracelets there (MacNeill 1962/1982, 141). Further sources for Beltany given by
42 Thanks to Cathal Ó Searcaigh for pointing out the topography of the Beltany townlands to me from above in 2003, as we descended the east side of Carn Traonach on the annual walk which traces the route once taken from Gweedore with bodies for burial in Tullaghobegly graveyard. 43 Hunter (1995, 283–324) has notes on large quarters: (p. 309) ‘here a multiple of modern townlands’; (p. 305) ‘the ‘difficulty of establishing which group of modern townlands represents the quarter of that time.’
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 111 Scotland (north Fife) can also provide a May-morning example: In 1723 one Margaret Roberton in Byres of Balmerino is reported to have gone ‘to nine wells on the Road-day morning to take away her neighbour’s milk’ (Campbell 1899, 462). ‘Road-day’ would appear to be a variant of ‘Ruid-day’, or Holy Cross Day (3 May).44 However, the May cattle-migration interpretation of the name was used by Charles Doherty for Tullaghobegley, adducing an oral account of booleying recorded from local man Niall Ó Dubhthaigh, born in the late 19th century: The settlements would seem to have started life as summer grazing ground, and were part of the system of transhumance. Beltany itself is probably named from Bealtaine, ‘May’, since Mayday was traditionally the beginning of this season. (Doherty 2000, 59n; Ó hEochaidh 1943/4, 130–58) The editor of the account used the form Baile na Bealtaine ‘townland of Bealtaine’, while Niall Ó Dubhthaigh himself simply used An Bhealtaine ‘the Bealtaine’, without comment on the name (Ó hEochaidh 1943/4, 130, 140).
In the following examples, Bealtaine is used as specific: Lisbalting, Kilcash, Co. Tipperary (S 3226)45 Lios Bealtaine ‘the ringfort of Bealtaine’ Lisbalting townland in the parish of Kilcash, a little east of Clonmel Co. Tipperary [S 322 260], was not referred to before 1840 but has been accepted as Lios Bealtaine on
Maytown, Ballintemple, Co. Cork (W 95766 63598) Baile Maoilbhealtaine ‘Maoilbhealtaine’s settlement’
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 112 Kay Muhr Ireland now called in English Maytown (in the parishes of Ballintemple, Co. Cork, Rosslare, Co. Wexford, and Killevy, Co. Armagh), although only one of them contains any reference to Bealtaine. Maytown in Armagh is a phonetic approximation to a name beginning Má ‘plain’, Maytown in Wexford appears to reflect a surname, while it has become clear that Maytown in Cork derives from Baile ‘settlement’ plus a rare personal name Maoilbhealtaine ‘devotee of May’. The name Maoilbhealtaine does not appear in the major genealogical collections (ed. O’Brien 1962, Ó Muraíle 2003) but is constructed similarly to Maolchallainn ‘devotee of the calends’ which gives rise to the surname Mulholland. Spellings like Balymolbaloyny in 1301, Ballymolnealtyny (for -vealtyny) in 1490 and BallyMcBeawltins in 1656 show the development towards the local interpretation that the townland was named from the month of May, thus ‘Ballynabaultine or Maytown’ in 1811
Meenabaltin, Moville Upper, Co. Donegal C 4935 (Sh. 3)47 Meenabaltin townland is on the southern slope of Creehennan Hill (351m; to the east of the road through Glentogher) in the parish of Moville Upper in Inishowen. Creehennan is itself a townland today, downhill from Meenabaltin, but it was recorded in 1659 (Census 60) as a quarter land which probably then included Meenabaltin. To the east is the large townland – historically another quarter – of Drung, meaning ‘assembly site’, and which contains a megalithic tomb. In 1970 Mabel Colhoun was shown, by a local farmer, the remains of a megalithic tomb in Meenabaltin, high up on Glencaw Hill, although she was uncertain of the exact location. Lower down to the west there are tombs facing each other across the valley in the townland of Carrowmore or Glentogher, just west of the modern-day boundary with Meenabaltin.48 Although early evidence is lacking, the name is probably Mín na Bealtaine ‘the mountain green spot of May’.
Tamnaghvelton, Kilmore, Co. Armagh, J 0047 (Sh. 20)49 The townland of Tamnaghvelton is not shown on the 1:50,000 map, but it
47 Photo from Richard Webb, 2013:
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 113 contains the hamlet of Laurelvale and a minor name Sandy Hill, and lies in drumlin country between Portadown and Tanderagee. It was first recorded as Tawnoughnevaltine c.1587 (CSP Ire. 1586–1588, p. 334), then as two units labelled tannabaltiny and taunabaltinie on the 1609 map of Orior barony (Esch. Co. Maps Sh. 26, MPF 1/59), and then as Tawnavaltiny in 1610, when it was granted to John Bourchier. At that time it was the chief townland of the ‘manor of Tawnavaltiny’, consisting of nine townlands (CPR Jas I 181a.). In 1835 the Ordnance Survey Memoir recorded that the manor name, with the pronunciation [‘Tony-’baltoney], had been used in the title given to Lord Toneybaltoney (OSM i, 73). However the current spelling with -velton is attested from 1661, and the name appears to be derived from Tamhnach Bhealtaine ‘May field’. This Irish name as restored by O’Donovan has been put forward since 1969 as the equivalent of the hamlet of Laurelvale in the mid-east of the townland (AGBP 1969, 103). Tamnavelton townland is situated where the Armagh hills begin, north-west of Tanderagee, but does not rise very high. The OSM gives Tamnavelton Hill as 255ft (OSM i, 61; 78m), while there is a spot height of 159ft (49m) at Laurelvale on the 1-inch map.
Tullabaltiny, Tulach Bhealtaine ‘May hillock’ c. H 7659 In Tyrone, there was a townland name now obsolete in which Bealtaine was the descriptive element, the generic being tulach a ‘mound, knoll, small hill’. The 1609 map of Dungannon barony shows a townland called Tullabaltiny in the drumlins north-west of the village of Eglish, in the parish of Clonfeacle (Esch. Co. Map 11). This name, to be understood as Tulach Bhealtaine ‘May hillock’, is not attested further, and the land unit has disappeared. The name was noted from the 1609 map in a local study but was not remembered in local tradition (McAnallen and Logue 2011, 35). This is also the form of the single Scottish example, given below.
Scotland Tullybelton, Auchtergaven parish PER NO034336 Tulaich Bhealltainn ‘hill (or mound) of Beltane’50 The earliest reference so far identified to the lands of Tullybelton, which lie c. 13km NW of Perth, is in 1369, when ‘a certain land called Tullybelton’ (quadam terra dicta Tulibeltane) sheriffdom of Perth, is recorded as paying 3 s. 4 d. into the royal exchequer (ER ii, 298). By 1590 at the latest, the lands
50 Ainmean-Àite na h-Alba website:
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 114 Kay Muhr had been divided, with Litill Tullibeltane recorded in that year (RMS v, no. 1753). On the OS 6-inch 1st edn map (1867) there appear Tullybelton (a hamlet with a smithy at NO031341), Little Tullybelton, Tullybelton House (NO034336), Tullybelton Mill (Corn) and Tullybelton Loch (in the hills a few kilometres to the west).51 Eglish Historical Society’s fine book on their local area of Tyrone in Ireland included nineteenth-century information on Scottish Tullybelton,found during their research on their own lost Tullybaltine discussed above. Near Scottish Tully Beltane there were in the 1890s two so-called ‘druid temples’ of upright stones and, by one, a well still held in great veneration … and on Beltane morning supersti- tious people go to this well and drink of it, then they make a proces- sion round it nine times, after this they in like manner go round the temple.52 Thus it appears May Day was celebrated in the locality, near standing stones, but without reference to the fire custom. The NSA for Auchtergaven parish (1838) situates the well near an old chapel and graveyard and records that an annual fair or market –date not given – was once held there: at the Hole of Tullybelton, a beautiful dell, at which many Highlanders attended to sell wool, cheese, butter and other produce of their land and industry.53
Other apparently similar townland and parish names have different etymologies. Thus O’Donovan restored Balteenbrack in the parish of Ardfield, and Balteenbrack in the parish of Fanlobbus, both in Co. Cork, as Bailtín breac ‘speckled little town’ (O’Donovan OSNB). These are missing the final syllable of Bealtaine, although the latter was Baltinebracke in 1659 (Census 216) and early 17th-century spellings have no internal -t-. O’Donovan explained Boolteenagh townland in Durrus, Cork, first named in 1755, as Buailtíneach ‘a place full of booleys or mountain dairies’ (
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 115 pre-existing name deriving from Old English boðl-tūn ‘house enclosure, house- farm’, coined during a period of Northumbrian settlement.54 None of three Manx place-names popularly considered to contain Boaldyn does infact do so: Baldwin in Kirk Braddan, possibly from Old Norse valla(r)- dalr ‘field dale’; Balthane in Kirk Malew possibly from Gaelic Both Ultáin ‘Ultán’s hut’; Chibber Balthain in Kirk Christ Rushen is more likely Tiobair Ultáin ‘Ultan’s Well’ since it was also recorded as Chibber Oltane (Broderick 2000 v, 30, from völlr; 2002 vi, 62, 375).
Explaining the Evidence We have noted how the term Bealtaine in Early Irish was applied, as it still is, to that time of year when spring becomes summer, but also how its etymology refers to a pastoral fire ceremony, once widely celebrated in Gaelic tradition on May Eve but in Ireland later often moved to St John’s Eve or Midsummer. Even then it might still be known as Bealtaine (Toland 1718, 115; OSM v, 72). This highly visible ceremony, in which cattle were driven between two fires to purify them from disease, seems a likely origin for the element Bealtaine in place-names, even though fires are not remembered at each location. However, given the long practice and ubiquity of the fire custom, as attested above, but the relative scarcity and apparent late creation of Bealtaine place-names, it seems likely that some further aspect is relevant to the origin of the names. Another traditional custom of the same time of year was transhumance or booleying, the movement of cattle to hills which provided summer pasture for the lower lands below. This could have also given rise to the place-name, as has been suggested for Bealtaine in Tullaghobegly where booleying was remembered, but since this custom was also widespread in the past there must again have been some aspect to the location or timing which was particularly memorable. In 1718 John Toland and in 1811 the rector of Ardstraw described the fire ceremony at Midsummer, at places called Bealtaine on particular hills in Ulster, Gollan Hill and Bessy Bell, although the custom has not been recorded for the other places named Bealtaine. Topographic investigation of the identifiable places, by map and via photographs posted on
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 116 Kay Muhr Bell) and possibly at Meenabaltin; and standing stones near Tullybelton PER in Scotland. These monuments were built in the Bronze Age and it is unlikely that their recorded names stretch back so far, although Toland may well be right in suggesting that in Gaelic-speaking pre-history the druids adopted the sites for their own worship. Certainly, ancient monuments were incorporated into medieval Irish tradition, and their presence suggests that the hills on which they were situated were long-accustomed assembly places, landmarks where people of an area might congregate to celebrate the rituals of the season. Two hills, Cnoc na Bealtaine at Tullaghobegly and Beltany/Bessy Bell in Cappagh, also had traditions of gatherings at Lughnasadh, while it appears that fairs were held at Beltany/Drumineney at Raphoe and Tullybelton PER (see above). Of the terms qualified by Bealtaine, tulach (Ireland and Scotland) is a ‘knoll or hillock’ rather than a ‘high summit’, and mín and tamhnach both refer to grassy spots although mín is a word associated with hills. None of the five names where Bealtaine functions as the specific have traditions of the fire custom, though a holy well ritually visited on May morning was remembered at Tullybelton in Scotland. However, it is probable that the movement of cattle and the holding of the fire ceremony were originally closely connected. As commented on by Ramsay in Scotland, Beltane was ‘celebrated by the people of each hamlet on some hill or rising ground around which their cattle were pasturing’. In the past the fires would naturally be lit on hills because in summer that is where people and cattle were living. In this context, the OSA references – where ‘herds and young people ... kindle fires in the high grounds’ at Loudoun AYR, ‘cowherds, … assemble by scores in the fields’ at Logierait PER, and ‘all the boys in a township or hamlet meet in the moors’ at Callander PER – make sense: the situations may be ‘marginalised’, and comfortably out of sight of the minister thus recording them, without the custom being in decline.55 The broken Battle Stone, a block of Highland grit on raised ground outside Dunblane PER, near Stirling, was enclosed in an iron cage in 1840, which bears the following inscription: ‘The Gathering Stone of the Highland army on the day of the memorable battle of Sheriffmuir, fought in November 1715 ...’ The tradition was recorded by Hunter (1883, 289), who described the ‘three grey boulders’ at the junction of which the standard of the Scottish clans is said to have been placed, and stated that ‘the current local name is Battle Stone but it is said to have been formerly known as the Beltane Stane’. Both Beltane Stone and Gathering Stone are indicative of longer use as an assembly site. The popular reinterpretation of Tarbolton as ‘hill of Beltane’ is understand able from the information on ‘superstitious rites … annually performed’ there 55 OSA (1792), Loudoun AYR iii, 105; (1793), Logierait PER v, 84, and (1794), Callander PER xi, 620; Hutton 1996, 225.
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 117 recorded in 1845 (NSA v, 741–42), although the Rev. D. Ritchie explained the name as ‘town at the hill where Baal was worshipped’. Each year ‘on the evening preceding the Torbolton June fair’, a huge bonfire was built on an established fire-place on the hill, from fuel asked from each house and ‘invariably given, even by the poorest inhabitant’. The inhabitants, ‘old and young, men and women’, assembled on the hill and watched the youths leaping the flames. This appears to be a midsummer fire, no longer sacred, but still functioning as part of an assembly and fair. The names must be derived from an aspect that was noteworthy at the time they were coined. Six of the ten place-names have borne the name since the mid or early 17th century at least: with Beltany in Raphoe and Tullaghobegly recorded in 1654, and Beltany in Cappagh and Clogher in 1609, as also Tamnaghvelton, Kilmore, and Tullabaltiny, Clonfeacle. This dating, in the same century as Keating wrote, suggests that they could perhaps record either fires that had been changed early from May to St John’s Eve, or fires that were still lighted on May Eve when others had changed to June. However, there is no record to bear this out. Moreover, Tullybelton in Scotland is attested as a settlement-name from 1369, roughly two hundred and fifty years earlier, and in Scotland the May Eve date of the fires generally held firm. In some instances, such as Beltany at Raphoe, Bealteine or Gollan Hill, and the now-obsolete Tullabaltiny in Clonfeacle, the evidence suggests that Bealtaine may have functioned as an alternative name. If the practice or location of the fires changed, the place-name label may have been changed too. Apparent changes may also have been due to the re-organisation of large and small land units, since in Raphoe and Tullaghobegly in Donegal, and possibly in Kilmore in Armagh, the names Beltany and Tamnaghvelton appear to have been used to name a larger unit, a quarter of a ballybetagh. Meenabaltin in Moville, though it may have existed, was not referred to in the 17th century, being then part of the quarterland of Creehennan. It seems most likely, then, that the Beltany names were coined to record sites of fires that were salient – because they were more elevated, larger and thus more visible than most, and also durable – as reflecting wide community participation from around these hill sites. Keating implied that the Bealtaine fires were held for a local area, but the size of area he had in mind is unclear. Gollan Hill, Beltany in Raphoe, Beltany on Bessy Bell and even Beltany in Clogher were on landmark hills or ridges with a wide view, so that fires there would be visible from all the lower lands below. One could adduce other hills named from fire, such as the hilly townland of Tintagh explained as ‘fires’ in Lissan parish, Co. Derry, where John O’Donovan noted ‘probably from May fires held on their
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 118 Kay Muhr lofty summits’ (OSL Derry, ed. Mawhinney 1992, p. 136: JOD 1834).56 Tinto Hill in Lanarkshire also means ‘hill of fire’, as MacKinlay noted, adding that it, and Dechmont, also with a good view, were ‘specially associated with Beltane fires’.57 Unfortunately, there is no information about fires on hills that were also the booley-ground for a region, such as the Deer’s Meadow in the Mournes described by Harris in the 18th century (Ó Mainnín 1993, 136). The sources presented show that the later Irish Bealtaine fires were held several to a townland, sometimes moved downhill to roadsides, and that what was formerly a community event became more and more restricted to small groups of close neighbours or individual farms. Neither my speculation on naming from older, higher, brighter, communal fires, nor the name evidence presented, can account for the general paucity of Bealtaine townland or other place-names further south in Ireland.
Bealtaine in the Gaelic year: further thoughts As discussed at the beginning, in Ireland Bealtaine is the name of May 1st, the month of May, and, despite transfer to Midsummer, the fire ceremony; this last being the practice which best represents the etymological meaning ‘fire of Bel’. It has been noted that in Scotland Bealltainn always referred to May Day and to the fire ceremony held then which was likened to Baal-worship. However, the cleansing ceremony of teine-éigin or ‘need-fire’ could also be made use of on occasions of actual disease, as in the descriptions quoted from Martin Martin and the newspaper account of the old-fashioned Perthshire farmer in 1835. One more comment about the meaning of Bealtaine and the Celtic year may be in order. Tochmarc Emire repeats a tradition that in early Ireland there were four quarter days but two halves of the year. The spelling used for Samhain – samfuin
56 Similarly, Tents townland in Cleenish, County Fermanagh. Far more exciting is the lost Léim na Tine ‘the leap of the fire’ (1654 ‘topp of the hill of Leametynea’, Civil Survey IX, 9) near the ancient assembly site at Leac Mhic Eochadha in Loggan Lower, Crosspatrick parish, Wexford, last attested as such in 1592. Thanks for this reference to Conchubhar Ó Crualaoich. 57 The NSA (1845) for Cambuslang LAN, vi, 430, describes Dechmont as ‘the place where our forefathers lighted their Beltane fires’; and the NSA (1845) for Carmichael LAN, vi, 518, explains Tinto as ‘hill of fire’ but cannot say whether fires were ‘lighted on it at Beltane’. See MacKinlay 1893, 284–85; Watson 1926, 205, 400; Livingstone 1997, 21. Watson (1926, 205) notes that the cairn of Tintou was mentioned c.1315; the name is teinteach ‘place of fire’; and ‘the cairn on its top was doubtless a beacon cairn’. He also mentions rivers called Teinntidh ‘fiery’ (Watson 1926, 443, 475). Although Watson (1926, 400) suggested a British element, Dechmont, like Deehommed hill and townland in Co. Down, which is pronounced ˈDechamant (
The Journal of Scottish Name Studies 10, 2016, 89–126 Bealtaine in Irish and Scottish Place-names 119 – suggests the glossary interpretation of the word as fuin ‘end’ of summer (Stokes 1862, 137). Samhain clearly begins with samh ‘summer’, but by implication the full word means ‘summer’ too. The early Irish term cettamain, which is still used in Scotland for May, An Cèitean, rather than Bealtaine, is a clearly a compound of céad ‘first’ and Samhain, with its ending, although Cormac’s Glossary explains it etymologically as céad-shamh ‘first month of summer’ (Stokes 1862, 11). Meitheamh, Irish for June, is etymologically ‘middle summer’. When discussing Samhain, Minard comments on the Welsh name for the month of June, Mehefin, which is also a compound containing the full word samhain (Gaulish Samonis), and etymologically means ‘middle of summer’, while Gorffennaf ‘July’ is etymologically ‘end of summer’ (Minard in Koch 2006 iv, 1558). Bealtaine is an extraneous name in this threesome of months, although it functions as a pair with Samhain when they are regarded as festivals (with appropriate rites) beginning and ending the light and dark halves of the year. Months may be a misnomer, as the farming (and fishing) calendar depends on the weather as much as on the position of sun and moon. Apart from keeping the names Bealtaine, Meitheamh, Lughnasadh and Samhain, Ireland has largely accepted the months and days of the Roman calendar. Scottish Gaelic retained some usages from older tradition, where many of the names now used for ‘months’ referred to recurring seasonal changes in the weather rather than fixed dates.58 See the definitions in Dwelly: for example of Am Faoill(t)each, roughly February, when winter modulates into spring (p. 413); Céitean ‘May, spring’ or ‘summer’ (p. 187); Lùnasdal (p. 610); Mìos marbh ‘dead month’ (p. 661); An Dùdlachd (p. 370). If it is allowed that the fire ceremony of Bealtaine was held of old in response to the growing season, as Frazer suggested, or when the weather became suitable to take the cattle to the hills, problems with differing dates fall away, and the likelihood that the place-name derived from rites at traditional hill assembly sites increases.
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