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R, ruis, t he dwarf elder in Ogham. The rochat , or rook;ruadh, blood red; November 26 to December 23.

RA, R, space, time, relating to raon, a field, a road, a plain,t he sky. A moon-t it le having many variants as Ur, Er andAra. In Scotland a surviving form from pagan times is Mo-Urie, the Greater Moon. This is sometimes combined asMourie. In the Christian era this designation was attachedto the Irish monk named Maol Runha (640-722 A.D.) whofounded the monastery at Applecross on the Rosshire coast.Here he is buried and travellers take earth from his grave toensure their safe passage into the hinterlands. In thoseparts all oaths used to be made in his name, and his name

appears in many p lace names.

In 1678 Hector Mackenzie travelled to Saint MouriesIsle (now Isle Maree) in Loch Maree hoping to benefitChristine Mackenzie who was sick and valetudinaire. It isrecorded that he and his sons, and a grandson, sacrificed abull to forward their interest. In 1695 the records of thelocal Presbytery make it clear that the locals were stillputting down bulls on the feast day of the saint (August 25)and practising other idolatrous habits includingnecromancy. See r.

RABHART, a t all t ale, senseless t alk, hilariouslyexaggerat ed t ales, " t he t ides of spring."

RADH. Affirming, expresing, saying, adage, proverb, word,

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noise, assertion, speech, an exprewssion of an intentiontoact ; obs. Past af f . of abair, I have said; st il l used as pt . Pr. Isay, I affirm, utter, express. Thus in a combined formsamhradh, conf irming summer, Summers voice.

RAGALLACH. A king of Connaught whose death at the handsof his own child was foretold by a druid. Hoping to avoid hisfate the king ordered his infant daughter to be placed in abag and given to a swineherd to destroy. The compassionateservant left the child on the doorstep of a woman whoraised her as her own daughter. At maturity the daughterbecame one of Ragallachs concubines and fulfilled theprophecy. The historic king bearing this name (645 A.D.) wasassassinat ed by an unrelat ed male ki l ler.

RAID, a for of rad or rod, road, theway, path, track, ditch,seaware cast on shore, the foaming sea beating on theshore, foam, scarify, comne up throughthe ground, blade;rodaih, coarse-featured, ruddy, dark, rotten, smelly,shrunken, rough, forteward; rodair, a wayfaring man. Raide,cunning, slyness; raideachas, boastful, speech, arrogantlanguage, aqrrogance, excesssive pride, slaying, a trial ofskill; but raideil, inventive, cunning, and raid, or raidean, a

judge, ranking soldier, arbitration, decision, appeal,,

entreaty, threat, threatening, good-will, competition; also aquarter of the year; raidheach, prone to making threats;similar t o raic, boast fulness and raicheach, A Queen. Seenext.

RAIDSACH, chief witch, after raidse, idle talk, prattling,verbose, garrulous. raidis, wit chcraft , wit chery,enchantment . Raidhmheas, a dream, romance;raidhmheasach, fabulous account; raidbreach, prayer,

supplication, petition, request; raidse, a prattler, idletalker; raidseachas, witchery, enchantment.

RAIGEACH MANACH, a tonsured monk. The druids had headsshaven in the front from ear to ear. Christian monks had thetop shaven in a circular pattern. The druids and Culdeecler ics had t heir heads shave at t he front from ear-t o-ear.

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RAITHEACH, REITHEACH, covenant ing, aff iancing(Sut herlandshire, Scot land) . See lat t er spelling as well ast he relat ed rai th and rath.

RAITH, a quarter of the year, see raid, above, MIr. raithe,Skr. rtu, a season of the year, a time appointed for worship,t hus rait heach since cont ract s were considered cement ed byt he gods at t hese t imes.

RAMACHDAIR, a coarse individual, cf. ramair, a blockhead,ramhlair, a humorous, noisy, boisterous fellow, related toEng. rambler.

RANN, a division or portion, a quatrain, a stave, verse, acharm, confers wit h t he English run. Allit erat ive poet ry;poetry that flows. Ran-dan, a drunken spree, characterizedby singing. Note ranndair, a murmuring, complaining sound.Cy. rhan, OBry. rannou. Eng. rant.

I am putting you under spells and crosses,And under nine constraints of the walking wandering

sidh mot hers(t he Befind, t he t hree weird sist ers)

That every lamb weaker and more misguided thanyourself

May take from your head and your earAnd f rom y our l ivel ihood,Unless...(here is inserted the demand of the baobh).

(Tales Until Dawn, p. 28, trans.

f rom Gaelic).

RAON, a field, plain, road, OIr. roe, a plain, a place for easyt ravel, Lat . rus, t he Eng. room, ON. rein, a st rip of land.

RAONULL, MG. Raghnall, Ronald, Ir.Ragnall, from ON.Rgnvaldr, ruler f rom t he gods, ruler of t he counsel. HenceReginald, Reynold, M Raonuill, Mac-ranald, Clanranald.

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RASAICHE, ras, shrub, underwood + ach, obs. Bank or mound;a mound-dweller, a gypsy, rambler, part icularly atravelling woman, more specifically a roving lewdindividual. Rasdach, churlish, impolite, a churl; rasdair,satiated.

RTH, obs. artificial mound, fortress, town, Royal seat,cleared land, a fern, residence; currently, a circle, a raft; asurety or bond, cf. Last. rata, a surety before the gods, MEng.road. Eng. ratify. A place of refuge in law, rathach, obs, ahough.

New Brunswick historian Donald S. Johnson hasconcluded that Hy-Brazil was a complete abstraction, an

island having no basis in reality. He explains the circularconfiguration as matching that of the Promised Land of theSaint s, as ment ioned in Saint Brendans Navigat io. Act ually,t here is no such suggestion t hat land was round although itdoes seem to have had an east-west river like that shownon ylla de Brazill as it is represented on a Catalan map ofthe year 1660. Johnson presumes that Brendans Isle wascircular since the men of his expedition walked for fifteendays at its coast finding no beginning or end. He says thatthe walked in a circle and compares Hy-Brazils single

bissecting river with Biblical rivers of life, concludingthat a circle is a fitting symbol for the ChristianPromised Land named New Jerusalem. Like most historiansJohnson has decided that Celtic mythology is based on aGreek model, but the circle was never a Christian symbol.It does symbolize a regenerate earth but it honours theelement al gods, and not t he Lord God.

It is absolutely pagan in its original intention, so

much so that the early Irish missionaries negated it wherethey saw it on standing stones. They did this by inscribingthe Christian cross over it. The so called Celtic-crosses,are nothing of the sort. These derivatives of the tradition ofthe aboriginal cromlechs are still sometimes referred to asthe alien Greek stones, in Gaelic. The circle is endemic topagan theology representing the concept of renewability and

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reincarnation. It is no accident that the Celtic holy wellswere built with circular stone walls in imitation of theshape of the original Cauldron of Life and Rebirt h. It wasgenerally supposed that this life-source was purloined bythe Tuathan gods from the sea-kingdom when theyfo llowed the giants there aft er t heir defeat in Ireland. ThisKettle of the Deep, was eventually buried at thegeographic centre of Gaeldom where it became the astral-genius of Ireland. Cup-and-ring markings are frequentlyseen on megalithic monuments such as the cromlechs ofIreland and Scotland. These are essentially cup-shapedhollows gouged out of the stone, frequently seen surroundedby engraved concentric circles. From the internal cup, asingle radial line is often seen drawn to a point outside the

circumference of the outermost circle. Occasionally asystem of cup are seen joined by a number of these lines,but most often they simply end beyond the outside ring.These enigmatic designs, upon which no light has beenthrown, are found on vertical and horizontal surfaces inGreat Britain, Brittany, and as far east as India, where theyare termed mahadeos, great gods. The fact that they areengraved upon stones which the Irish call Cromm-leacecorroborates this idea, Cromm, being the dark-god,corresponding wit h t he creat or-god Don. A leac is a

flagstone, the word being similar to our English plank. T.W. Rolleston has noted European examples which are richlydecorated and accurately drawn, and he thinks they mayrepresent diagrams or plans of megalit hic st ruct ures. Heobserves the fact that the central hollows may representburial chambers and the circles, surrounding standingstones, fosses or ramparts of earth. The penetratingavenues would then represent doorways by which priestsmoved to and from some int erior holy spot or shrine. More

symbolically, we think the interior represents a place ofrebir t h as well as t hat of deat h.

In cross-section, these rings have the look of thehuman male and female reproductive organs in action, andthe standing-stones upon which they are engraved are moregenerally taken to be phallic symbols. Something of pagan

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Celtic theology is embedded in the sixteenth century Cymricwork known as the Barddas. While it is contaminated byChrist ian beliefs, Rollest an says t hat it does speak of anindependent philosophic system.

Not surprisingly this druidic system supposesantagonistic forces, that of Hu, or God, which isconstructive in intent and result, and that of Cythrawl(corresponding with Cromm) the principle of destructionand chaos. Organized life was thought t o have arise at t hewill of the creator-god, who created the primal substanceof the universe as minute indivisible particles each amicrocosm of the primal god-force. The innermost circlefrom which all else sprang was called Annwn in the Welsh

language, and this confers linguistically with An Domhain,The Deep. It was thought that this innermost place wasone of primal life forms all struggling to evolve out ofchaos. Those ent it ies t hat succeeded were considered t omove to an outer ring of being where life was morepurified having attained triumph over darkness and evil.The third ring of being is termed Infinity, a place inhabitedby god alone. It is predicted that all shall attain to thecircle of Gwnfyd (White light) at the last. In Celticsociet ies, t he mort al god-king, and his queen, were seen as

the fountain and the well of regenerative spirit, thustheir place at the centre of the community, within a holycircle which conf erred wit h The Cauldron of t he Deep.

Stone fortifications were largely ring-forts, thelargest representing the belly of Danu or Domnu, smallerones being microcosms of the larger, all relating back tothe one source of life within the deep-ocean. There arecurrently ruins of ring-forts numbering from thirty to

thousand individual structures, in Ireland alone.

The expressions "lios" and "rth" are usually applied toearthen forts as opposed to "cathair" and "caiseal", whichare of stone. ORiordain not es t hat t he simplest ring-fortconsists of a circular space surrounded by a bank and afosse, the former built by piling up the debris obtained from

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digging up t he lat t er. Rth originally referred t o t heenclosing eart hen bank and lios t o the open space bet weenthis and the dwelling places within, but the word rth isnow used to identify fortifications which are round, inshort , eart hen-ring fort s. It is generally held t hat t heseembankments had no military significance although theymay have saved cat t le from the wolves. It is possible, ofcourse, that wooden palisades might once have been erectedupon the "rath."

The ring-forts vary greatly in size, and their remainsrange from 50 feet in diameter to about 400 feet. Examplesof large, multi-circled raths are uncommon but they doexist and being sited on high land are referred to as hill-

forts. Examinat ion of art i facts associated with these r ingedstructures shows that some are pre-Celtic dating back tot he Bronze Age. Some of the stone circles, formerlyregarded as ritual sites, have recently shown evidence ofpast habitation, and it is now known that the uprights wereplaced as a framework for building banks of rubble, sod andeart h. In some cases wooden post s had t he funct ion ofthese upright stones and in these cases all that remains iscircular plug-holes to indicate this style of construction. Itis assumed some of ring-forts were defensive in intent, but

many have one slight bank and a shallow fosse, whosesecurity must have been theological rather than military inintent .See f ollowing.

RTH. Circle, t he mariner dismembered by t he mer-peopleafter a female of their kind lulled him to sleep with hersong; a not uncommon fate for interlopers on the greatwestern ocean.

RTHCROGAN, RATHCHROGAN. One of t he largest rat hs ofancient times was that held by Queen Mebd and her consortAilill, which was called Rath Cruachan or Rathcrogan. Itsouter circle encompassed numerous other fortresses, andthe place was still used in 645 A.D., when the Connaught

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king Ragalach was assassinat ed on it s grounds.

In t imes past Connaught , Ireland, was alternatelycalled Cruachan from the fame of this residence of thesemi-myt hic goddess-queen. Not ice t he implicat ions of theword crogan , a drink of blood taken to inspire the blood-fury which the Norse called the berserker-rage. Rathcroganhas the further sense of penfold of the banshee, or deat h-maiden. The manner of t he house was t his: Therewere seven companies in it from the fire to the wall. allround the house. Every (circular) compartment had a face ofbronze. The whole was composed of beautifully carved yewwood. Three st rips of bronze were laid in at t he door of eachcompartment. The house from here out was built of pine. A

covering of oak shingles was what it had externally. Sixteenwindows were in it, each with a shutter of bronze, and barsof bronze were made to close each shutter. Ailill and Mebdscompartment was at the centre of the house and it had adoorway front of silver and gold. There was a wide band ofsilver on the side of it that rose to the ridge of the house,and reached all around it from one side of the door to theother. It is said that the place was surrounded by fiveconcentric ramps, three of which may still be seen.Confers wit h t he next .

RTH CRUACHAN, the famous western royal-residence ofthe witch-queen Mebd and her consort Ailill in CountyConnaught . As we have seen, access t o t he west usuallyinvolved an imrama. While t he water rout e was t he mostcommonly used we have noted souterrains, which offeredimmediate temporal displacement from one world to theother. The most famous cave-entrance was Rth Cruachan,the Fortress of the Hip, or Hump, which was once the

personal propert y of Mebd. The name Cruachan wasfrequently given as an alternate name for Connachtprovince, and the old hill itself was described by Christianscribes as t he Gat e of Hell.

The fact that the hill is also termed Rthcrghan tiesit more firmly to the old warrior queen, for the word cr is

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Gaelic for a animal killing pen, blood, death, or apassageway ( for example, t he eye of a needle). Note alsothe fact that the Scottish word cro indicates theweregild (i.e. banshee) of the various individuals in theScot o-Celtic Kingdom, f rom t he king on downwards. Theending gann indicat ed somet hing which is hurt f ul.

The arms of the guests were hung above the arms ofall ot her persons in t hat house." This rth was of drymasonry with a wall thirteen feet thick at the base,surrounded by five concentric ramps, three of which mayst ill be seen. Mebd also possessed an east ern residencet ermed Rth Mebd, sit uat ed in Count y Meat h. Not ice t hat"Many examples of souterrains (underground dwellings)

occur in connection with forts...In some cases they arecompletely enclosed by the forts...(however) not every fortcontains a souterrain and not all souterrains are enclosed inor connected with forts. "The site of this fortress remainsas a huge ruin three miles north-west of Tulsk, CountyRot hcommon. It is a circular sit e about an acre in extent ,surrounded by so many other structures, it has beendescribed as a t own of fort resses.

Rth Cruachan was st ill in use as t he royal capital of

t he prov ince in 645 A.D. when king Ragallach wasassassinated there. The cavern of Cruach was not an easyentrance for there were guardians, some of which emergedinto t he world of men. One of t hese was Ailln, amalevolent Otherworld monster who used to come out of thecave at t he unbinding season of Samhain. A pyromaniacaldreag , or dragon, he lulled the defenders of Tara t o sleepwith sea-music and then consumed them, often leaving theirresidences in f iery ruin. This went on unt il Fionn mac

Cumhail opposed his music by pressing the blade of hismagic spear t o his f orehead. He t hen drove off t he beast andt hen beheaded it . Airt iech was another supernaturalresident of Cruachan.

He had three daughters who once assumed the shape ofwerewolves and raided the countryside in every direction.

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The warrior Cas Corach played music to enchant them andconvinced them that they should assume human form to havea bet t er grasp of the melodies. When t hey shape-changed,the hero threw his spear at them, impaled all three at once,and beheaded them. With this reputation it is not surprisingt hat men had t o be bribed t o ent er the Hill of Cruach. Ailillof Connaught regularly offered a prize of a gold-hiltedsword to any man who would go to the gallows just outsidethe rath and encircle the foot of a dead captive on thegallows wit h a wit he or band of wi l low t wigs.

This device then became as effective as a silverbough in gaining admission t o t he Ot herworld. Severalwarriors went out on the Samhain to try this stunt but none

but Nera followed through to the end of the adventure. AsNera was placing the withe, the corpse spoke asking that hebe t aken down and given a drink. Nera obeyed carrying thedead man half slung over a shoulder. The pair found thefirst house they approached surrounded by flames, and asecond encircled by a broad moat filled with water, so theymoved on. At a t hird house t he dead man was of fered t hreecups of water. The dead man spat out t he t hird cup at t hepeople who had offered him hospitality and its poison killedt hem on the spot . Nera t hen carried the corpse back to t he

gallows as inst ruct ed.

Returning to Rth Cruachan, this gillie saw Mebdspalace aflame and saw beheaded corpses scattered on theground. It appeared t hat Fomor ian invaders had used t heopening of the eye that was the Cave of Cruachan to dowhat damage they could in t he world of men. Nera followedthis crew through the veil before it closed at dawn and onthe other side became the guest in a sidh of the

Ot herworld. Here he was ordered t o carry f irewood andlodged wit h a female of t he species. They became loversand the sigh-woman informed him that what he had seen oft he dest ruction of t he rat h was a possible fut ure rat herthan an event, and that it could be forestalled by escapingt o t he east and dest roying t he ent rance. Nera t herefore t ookhis wife and child back through Cruachan and told king Ailill

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what the future might hold for him and his kingdom.

Ailill reacted by sending Ferghas mac Roth out todestroy the sidh , and the warriors did more, taking greatplunder f rom it s t reasure house. These valuables includedthe crown of king Brion, one of the three wonders of ancientIreland. The Echt ra Nerai is obv iously pagan but t he t alefrom which it der ives is no later t han t he eighth cent ury.

RATH DORCHA, the moon in wane; a bad time for mosttransact ions.

RATHAD SIBH, beauty spot, rathad, road; sibh, of the weefolk. An invisible mark of favour placed on humans who

were related to the sigh or who happened to be in theirfavour. This mark, which was only perceived by t heopposite sex, made the individual irresistibly attractive.Thus Grianne was draw to Diarmuid to the disadvantage ofboth.

R. the moon, the Moon personified, luna, life, existence,duration, a space of time, same as righ and ri, denotingRoyalty; presumed from the Celtic root revi, Skr. ravi, thesun. A form of the Gaelic ra, space, time, raon, a field, a

plain, a road, EIr. roen, Lat. rus, Eng. room, Norse rein, astrip of land. Note the Egyptian sun-god Ra or Re. From thiswe have t he Scot t ish province of Moray. See Mourie.

REABH, a wile or trick, reabhair, a subtle individual,reabhradh, besporting, as a pack of boys from the Ir.reabhach, a mountebank, a devil, the Devil, EIr. rebrad, boysat play, sport . Similar t o t he English rabble.

REABHACH, The Devil, mountebank, trickster, a devil, awicked fel low; reabhair , a craf t y f e l low.

REILIG, crypt, burying-ground, relic. From Lat. religui,rel ics.

RIM, dominion, power, course, order. See R, the moon-

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goddess.

REITEACH, REITEACHADH, t he eye-st one, f rom reidh, sm oot h,well-ordered; reit, concord, conciliation, that whichsmoot hs the way.

1. A device used to remove foreign matter from theeye: " we have t wo eyestones in Cape Breton -an it em sorare and so long out of use it no longer seems to beremembered in Scotland...John Tom Urquhart of Skir Dhufirst t old us of t he eyestone. Lat er, we met John A. Wilkieof Sugar Loaf. He showed us his eyest one... The eyest onewas not originally found in Scot land. They all seem t o havecome from the far east . They are t he colour of f lesh and

about t he size of half a pea. They are said t o be t he t ip of aconch shell. The eyest one is alive, and has t o eat - and bot hmen said they kept theirs in an inch and a half of sugar(John A. uses brown). John Tom somet imes feeds his alittle rum and he changes the sugar every two or threeyears. When t he highland set t lers came to Cape Bret on, t heybrought t he eyest one with t hem. (It) is passed along fromfather to son...the eyestone would be used to get a splinterout of a man's eye...the eyestone could retrieve other thingsas well. John A. said, "I was sawing wood at Bay St .

Lawrence. I got sawdust in my eye and in the evening it gott o be sore. And I said t o me, " You bet t er go where t heeyest one is t onight ." I went and t hey put me t o bed wit h it.Put it in my eye. And you couldn't not ice it . The size of ityou'd t hink it would bother - but it didn't . I woke up and myeye was clear." Bot h eyestones we've seen have a t iny dot -the centre of a perfect whorl - and when placed in vinegar(f or cleaning) one or two bubbles would come out t hat hole.The patient must sit still or lie down while the eyestone

does it s work. This is simply so t hat it will not get lost .In the eye, the eyestone would move around the eyeballsearching for the speck. When it comes out it would havet he speck, and t he eye would be clear." (Down Nort h, pp. 50-51) .

Years ago it was a common insult to say that a person

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was " t wo mean t o f eed an eyest one (see eyesheein)."

2. Espousal to marriage, a ceremony which was also akind of "smoothing over;" the taking of irritants from thesit uat ion. It was formerly held before t he banns ofmarriage were posted and was considered as necessary ast he wedding feast . It was " ag obair reit ach," working atclearing, t he correct way of asking a gir ls hand in marriage.

The last reitach in Cape Breton is believed to haveoccurred in the 1920's. Reitachs were never held on Fridays(originally in consideration of the fact that this wasFrigga's day, a preferred t ime for Norse invasions) . Thebridegroom-to-be and an older friend would come to the

household of the intended. The father, if he possessed anormal intellect would no what was about, but followingthe rules of the rite would make no outright mention ofmarriage. Instead t he visit ors would pretend t hat t hey hadcome to buy a cow or a horse or a boat, and everything saidwas double entendre. The prospect ive groom did very lit t letalking as the father and his representative got down to thereal business of t he evening. As a mat t er of f orm t he fat herwas obligated to offer the hand of other daughters,part icularly if t hey happened to be old and ugly. There was

always a chance that the swain's bargainer wouldunwit t ingly ask for t he wrong gi r l.

All but the intended sat at a table loaded with food;she was kept from the room while the representativedescribed the prospects good characteristics and assuredt he family of his love for the girl. When a bargain wasfinally struck and the arrangements for a wedding had beenmade, the girl was permitted to join them..Liquor was then

placed on the table and the feast begun. In many instances,especially in pioneer communities, this was the first timethe couple had met, and often the contract was brokenbefore the wedding took place.

Some young men were too persistent to let theirlooks prevent the union and often sent a reitach party to

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abduct t he girl, of t en wit h t he connivance of her family. Inone of these cases, where a young Cape Bretoner was "takenby surprise" she " cried her eyes out t hat night. But I heardher relating the story after to the women, and she said,after all that discontent we had eight children together, anddo you know I never let one of them sleep between myhusband and myself." (Down Nort h, pp. 59 -60 ).

RELIG, grave, burying-place, church, crypt. Stone chest forbones of t he dead.

REUL. star, reul na madra, 0r reul an iuchar, the dog=star.

REUL-GHRIGLEACHAN, constellation, a group of stars, often

the Pleiades. "...on the third level of Cosmic event, therising of Pleiades, the winter stars, heralds the supremacyof night over day, the dark half ruled by the realms of themoon. In the three days preceding the Samhain month theSun God Lugh, who was maimed at Lughnassadh, dies by thehand of his Tanist (his other self) who is the Lord of mis-rule. Lugh passes t hrough t heboundaries of the worlds on the first day of Samhain. HisTanist is a niggardly King and though he shines brightly inthe winter skies he gives nothing of his warmth to the land.

He cannot warm the north wind which is the breath of theCrone, Cailleach Bheare. In this we see the ageless battlebetween the light and dark, the forces of growth and decay,l i fe and death,but never good and evil. Between these two great balancedrealms of Sun and Moon lies the ordered universe whichsustains all life in this realm. The cyclic harmony ofseasonal dominance of these realms means on our level thatneither Life nor Death can everhold permanent sway.

( S.McSkimming Dalriada Magazine, 1 99 2 .)

REULTAIR. REULADAIR, an ast rologer. Reult aras, ast rology;sometimes astronomy.

RIADA, RIATA, riad, obs., hang, crucify, currently a crack orsplit in wood, suggesting divisions of land. The ancestor to

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the Dal Riada of Ulster and Alba, the progenitor of thepresent -day Scot s.

In the fourth century there was famine in Munster andits ruler Conaire took his people north into Ulster. He firstsett led Count y Ant rim where t he kingdom of Dal Riada wasestablished. Later he and his followers quarrelled and hecrossed the Irish Sea into Scotland forming a secondkingdom in Airer Ghaidheal or Argyll. The first colonies inthis new place received military help from Tara in order toput down the neighbouring Picts. In the following century, aMunsterman, Lugaid mac Conn, fleeing from enemies, madehimself t he chief power in t his new land. From his soncame the ancestors of the lords of Argyle; the MacAllens,

Campbells and the MacCallums. A hundred years further onCabri Riata established kingdoms in both Ireland andScot land. The Picts were not enamoured of any of t his andwould have driven the Scots from their land, except for theeff ort s of t he high-king Niall of t he Nine Hostages. Theeffect of all this was the establishment of a huge militarypresence in Alba by the sixth century, when it became anindependent kingdom under Aedh ard-righ. For a t ime it waspowerful enough to hold Antrim, in Ireland proper, as anappanage.

RIADH, a snare, hang, crucify; riadh-mhortair, a hiredassassin; raidrananach, cast-off mistresss, an old maid.

RIAGH, obs., religious, this is the same as riadh, above. obs., cross, gallows; riaghail, rule, govern, reign, regulate,settle, order, direct, arrange. Riaghaire, the hangman, ascape-gallows, rogue.

RIAGHLACH, obs., old maid, old wo man. cast -of f mist ress.

RIANBIND. A piper out of Sidh Breg, reputed to be one of t henine best in the world. The ot hers musicians of not e were:Bind, Robind, Nibe, Dibe, Dechrind, Umal, Cumal andCialgrind.

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RIASTARTHAE. RIASTRADH, bat t le fury . Inspired by drinkingcrgan. Riast adh, welt ; reaist air, becoming t urbulent orungovernable, confuse, disturb, disorder, wander withoutpurpose. See Cuchullain and crogan.

RIATACH, wanton, illegitimate, immodest mirth,i l legit imacy, bastardy, cf. Eng. r iot.

RIBHINN. RIGHIANN, rib, ensnare, involve, st eal one s guest ,a nymph, young lady, queen. Ir. rioghan, queen. EIr, rigan, aform of the masculine righ, king Properly righ-bhean,woman-ruler. Mhor-rigan is based upon this word.

RIBEACH, rough, hairy, ent angling, ensnaring, ragged, t orn,cold.

RIBEAG, hair, a hair-rope used for rock face lowering (afterbirds eggs). These were so valuable they often formed partof a brides dowry.

RIBHEID, reed, a chanter,music, barb of a hook, herring-net,a magical ent rapment . See next .

RIBBINN, RIBBINNE, RIBBINNEABN, a nymph, one of t heribbinn-shith, a fairy; a maid, beautiful, a female, a younglady, Queen, serpent. Ribleach, an entaglement of the mindor body , knot t iness. See next .

RICHEAD. kingdom, richlean, a dwarf, richasan, carbunculus,having a knot t y surface.

RIDIR, RIGHDIERE, a knight , EIr. rit ire, a rider f rom AS.

ridere, a horseman, ridda, a knight. Germ. ritter. In amanuscript history of Clan Campbell (1828) it is said thatthe word is derived from righ + dei , god-king, but the wordcame t o be applied t o all virt uous warriors. This was t hename used by Highlanders in mentioning the chiefs ofCampbell, and t he ruins of t heir cast le, Eredin, was namedLarach tai nan Righderin, the ruins of the house of the

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knight s. In fo lklore t he word is reserved to kings havingsmall power.

RIDIRE RUADH, t he Red Riders, seen by Conaire Mor as heapproached Da Dergas Hostel. This was the last of a numberof geise broken just before the king met his final doom. Thecolour of their gear marked these men as visitors from theOtherworld.

RIGH, a king, dress or enshroud a corpse, as an interjection:st range! OIr. ri; Cy. rhi; Gaul. rix; Lat . rex; Got h. reiks; Eng.rich; Skr. raj, our rajah. Appears in combined forms, and isf eminized; t hus Mhorrigan, mhor+ rigan, Great Queen. Thisis the Gothic reika, prince and reiki, kingdom are

similar to the Gaulish rix and rigon, It would seem difficultt o prove which of t hese came first , and thus conclude asPadraic Colum has done that the Celtic people had moreadvanced social and polit ical forms. Nevert heless, t hiswas a widely held prejudice in Victorian-Edwardian Britain,and other words of unquestioned Celtic origin include themodern German reich, empire; amt, office; bann, an order;frei, free; geisel, hostage; erbe, inheritance; werth, worth;weih, sacred; magus, slave; hathu, battle; helith, hero (saidto correspond with Celt); heer, army; sieg, victory; beute,

booty, and so on.

Where men, such as Hu Gardarn, became mortal-gods adifferent relationship was seen to exist between them andmen. While t he immort al gods were insensit ive t o flat t ery,somet imes called propit iat ion or worship, t he priest -god-king was open to all kinds of cajoling, threats, patronageand promises. Fraser has not ed t hat our ancestors,"imagined that men may attain to godhood, not merely after

their death, but in their lifetime, through the temporarypossession of their whole nature by a great and powerfulspirit . No class of t he communit y benefit ed so much askings by this belief in the possible incarnation of a god inhuman f orm."

While this allowed the king a lot of leeway in bullying

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his subjects, he was always in mortal peril when hispowers were perceived t o fail. An inaccurat e weatherprediction, inability to pursue a successful war, or obviousfailings in health, might lead to a suspicion that the god-power had seeped away. Throughout nort hern Europe t hisled to instances of ritual murder, thus Iain Moncrieffespeaks of t he Gaelic " sacrificial cult of t he divine-king" ,which he explains "venerated the continuity of the embodiedlife force." More simply, members of t he communit y took itupon themselves to kill kings who were seen to be in failingspirit . This was done benevolent ly since it was supposedthat the god-spirit should be returned to the earth to bereborn in a more appropriate body.

In those times, the mechanics of human reproductionwere not well understood, and it was guessed that womenwere impregnated through the food that entered theirbellies. If an ent rapped god-spirit could be reduced t o"earth" and the earth used to grow crops it was reasonedthat the spirit might then be transferred through a graininto the womb of a woman, so that a god like Hu of Aodmight be reborn. This belief led t o t he business ofconsigning bodies to funeral pyres, afterwards scatteringt he ashes on the fields where " corn" was grown. Collin de

Plancey has noted that, "It was held, during the seventeenthcentury, that corpses, the ashes of animals and even theashes of burned plants contained reproductive seeds; that afrog for example could engender other frogs even as itdecayed and that ashes of roses produced new roses..."Among the Scots, even less spirited men were expected toundergo periodic reincarnations, and mothers-to-be lookedfor dreams so that they might correctly name the baby afterit s appropriate ancestor. Where dreams failed, t he mot hers

consult ed baobhs, or wit ches, whose hindsight was expect edt o reveal t he necessary informat ion. Unt il very recently,my own family has included a member known as Hugh ineach generation.

Within some tribes, the incarnate human gods served aspecified period of years as king, it being thought canny to

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kill him while he remained vigorous and capable ofprot ect ing his people and land. The Greek kings werelimited to a tenure of eight years and certain of the OldNorse kings to nine, in order to reinvigorate the spirit oft he land. Fraser has suggest ed t hat t he ancient nine-yearfestivals at Upsala in Sweden included rites of humansacrifice, which at first may have included the king and hisclosest adherents. Olaf t he Tree-Hewer, a King of Norwaywas sacrificed as a proxy for Odin during a famine in 710.Halfdan the Black, another king of this realm, was luckierunt il he fell t hrough the ice in 863. The Old Norse hist orianSnorri Sturleson noted that "he had been the mostprosperous of all kings. So great ly did men value him t hatall requested his body for burial in their various provinces.

Eventually it was settled that the body be distributed infour places...and each party took away their own share andburied it . Being a subt le people, t he Scot s made no publicdisplay of their regicide, but simply arranged that theirchief should be done in by a kinsman while his back wast urned, somet imes in t he heat of batt le.

Kings were not always willing partners to their owndeath and Aun, King of Sweden hit on the idea of offering hissons as subst it ut es. If t he king was divine, it was

considered that his offspring could be no less so, and shouldprove equally useful at returning some of the spirit of thegod t o the soil. Aun claimed he was led t o this procedurethrough the divine inspiration of Odin, and afterwards putdown one of his sons every nine years, and would havesacrificed his tenth heir, except that Swedes could not helpnoticing his diminished powers and selected him instead.Afterwards it was discovered that less important kin-folkor even unrelated deputies might serve as "kings for a day".

In the last years of the fires, a condemned prisoner wassubstituted for the king's advisor and multiple sacrificeswere made, perhaps on the basis of the idea that all mencontained at least a spark of the "divine-flame" and thatquant it y might make up for a lack of qualit y. In t he mostbenign clans, the place of the king was filled by a "mogaire"or mock king, who was given a short but happy reign

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followed by a mock execution, the authority and the god-spir i t aft erwards being reincarnat ed in t he old king.

Pretend deaths of a monarch survive in the activitiesof the English whitsuntide mummers, and in the Scottishgoloshans or galat ians. Also known as gysart s, guisers, ordisguisers, the goloshans wore masks, since recognition" broke t he luck". Each of the f ive or six t ravellingcompanions appeared on Samhainn eve wearing whit esheets and a dunces caps, "casques of brown paper shapedlike a mit re. They journeyed from house t o house and put ona playlet couched in expressionless doggerel. In an 1815version a character who identified himself as "The Admiral"used a wooden sword t o cut down "King Galat ians". In every

version, the hero is revived by some equivalent of themummer referred to as the "Doctor", who appears to be alat t er-day druid. Once a fee has been set, t he Doct or goesto work applying "Inky Pinkey, a little to his nose, a littlet o his t oes." In Falkirk t he elixir of life was called hoxy-croxy, and in some places the resurrection occurred witht he passes of a magic wand. To show t hat Galat ians is anew-born monarch, the resurrected hero was afterwardscalled " jack" . If t hese plays are based, as we suspect , onactual incidents of king-killing, the need for disguises is

obvious!

We have already mentioned the schizophrenic natureof divine kings, which is most clearly seen in the Old NorseGod Tyr, Tiu, or Tue, who is also called Deo, Deu or theDeuce. This alt er-ego, or second personalit y is st illreflected in our own minor devils and the English Devil, whois the Anglo-Saxon Deoful, literally one full of the spirit ofTyr, t he god of war. In his benign role Tyr was a god of t he

sky and martial courage but his berserker side was greatlyfeared. Odin and Uller present a similar ying-yang situat ionas do the Celtic boon-companions, Lugh and Ogma, theformer a god of free love, horse-racing, gaming and war, thelatter a straight- laced supporter of world-order, ratherthan chaos, the inventor of ogham, a cryptic "puzzle-language" f avoured by Gaelic orat ors.

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Mortal-gods who went "to earth" were expected tot ake t he evil aspect s of t heir personalit y wit h t hem. InScotland this was managed through a rite formerly knownas "burning, shooting" or "beating out the witches"; thebaobhs or witches being personifications of the evilimplicit in t he divine spirit . On Samhainn eve, t he devils ofScotland were smoked from the air by the "samhnagan",f ires l it t o reduce t he " king" t o ashes. In some places sharpobjects, such as sycthes, sickles and swords were placedupright in t he fields t o impale falling wit ch-spirit s. Whenfirearms became available, they were shot off into the airwit h similar eff ect . Once t he errant spirit s which causeddisease and ill-luck were down, they were herded together

by disguised humans, who used switches to reunite themwith god-representative. He was chased through the villageon a spiritual clean-up, and made to round the communalfire three times, before being burned.

Until he was actually put down, the god-king was thecent re of fest ival r i t es which are st i l l remembered. He wasexpected to draw all evil from the community before hisdeath, and used to parade the countryside on that account.On what was formerly the last day of the year, Fraser says

that, "it used to be customary, in the Highlands of Scotland,for a man to dress himself up in a cow's hide and thusattired go from house to house, attended by young fellows,each of them armed with a staff, to which a bit of raw hidewas t ied. Round each house t he hide-clad man used t o runthrice "deisal", that is according to the course of the sun, soas to keep the house on his right hand; while the otherspursued him, beating the hide with their staves and therebymaking a loud noise like t he beat ing of a drum. In t his

disorderly procession they also struck the walls of thehouse. On being admit t ed, one of t he party, standing wit hinthe threshold, pronounced a blessing on the family in thesewords: " May God bless t he house and all t hat belongs t o it ,cat t le, stones, and t imbers! In plent y of meat , of bed andbody clothes and health of men may it ever abound!" Theneach of the party singed in the fire a little bit of the hide

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which was tied to his staff; and having done so he appliedthe singed hide to the nose of every person and of everydomest ic animal belonging t o the house. This was imaginedto secure them from diseases and other misfortunes,particularly from witchcraft, throughout the ensuing year.The whole ceremony was called " calluinn" because of t hegreat noise made in beating t he hide. It was observed in theHebrides, including St. Kilda, down to the second half of theeighteenth century at least, and it seems to have survivedwell int o t he nineteenth cent ury."

Moncrieffe identifies the old religion with medievalScottish witchcraft and says that witchcraft and the dawnreligion had a horned deit ies as t heir cent ral f igures. This

is understandable when it is recalled that all clansmenthought of themselves as possessing totem animals, intowhich their souls could pass under certain conditions.These creatures continue to be represented in the heraldryand on t he arms of Scot s. The Anglo-Saxons somet imesthought of Woden as Herne the Hunter, the pursuer of thesouls of dead men, who is represented as antlered deity.His personality is exactly that of the Celtic earth-godknown as Cernu, either name being defined by the Englishwords horn and corn.

RIGHAIRLED. The fourteenth king of Ireland in the Milesianline of Eber and Eremeon. He is credit ed wit h int roducingt he war-chariot into Gaeldom.

RIGH FHAIDH, royal prophet . A king w ho is a p rophet .

RIGH-NA-COILLE, king of the forest, the oak tree.

RIGHINNEACHD, craftiness, artificiality, court-talk, righ,kingly; neach. somet hing.

RIGH NA GEASAN MOR, t he King of t he Great Enchant ment s,the Quarter-Day king. Also, a king of the Daoine sidh att he t ime of t he Milesian invasion of Ireland. See Baldar, et c.

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RIGH-RATH, t he Roy al f ort ress or seat .

RINNEL, from which rinn, ro+ind, having a fore-point, orsharpened end. A king whose reign saw the introduction ofpoint ed weapons int o t he Gaeldom.

ROANE, ron, pl. roin, seal. Perhaps f rom Teut onic modelsalt hough the Anglo-Saxon hron indicates a whale. A memberof the Daoine mara travelling in the form of the Lager seal.The highland version of the selkie of the northern islandsand the morrigan of southern lands. The equivalent of t heEnglish merman and mermaid. " The Irish name is merrowand the legends told of them are similar to those of othercountries." Descendants of the Fomorian sea-giants. The

largest colonies of seal are found on the north shore ofSutherlandshire and sightings of the roane are still made int hat region. The silkies commonly took t he form of mermenor woman, but Nancy Arrowsmith says the roane alwaysappeared as seals. Like ot hers of t he sea race, t hey cameashore in human form and even attended local festivals andmarket s wit hout being not iced. Fishermen were not usuallytroubled by the sight of a male of this species, but thefemales were thought to be omens of changeable weather.Some said that her appearance indicated bad luck with the

sea or t he f ishery. People who were t hought t o havedrowned, but whose bodies were never found, were assumedto have been abducted to the undersea world where theylived in perpet ual bondage. The Gaelic sea-people wereunder the command of Ler, the immortal god of the sea.Little is known of this elemental, but he seems to have beenthe Anglo-Saxon Aegir, a gaunt old man, with claw-likefingers, t hat grasped aft er t he ships of men. His avocat ionwas shared by his mate, the goddess Rann, who actually

spread her magic net near dangerous rocks, enticingmariners there with promises of sexual or other favours.

ROC. RUIC. Anything that causes entaglement, a fish-hook,entanglement, curl, wrinkle, pleat,, the species of seaweedsometimes called tangle, a skate (the fish), sunken, aseaweed covered rock, hollow impotent cough made by a

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person with something stuck in the throat, hoarse cry orvoice, a rook, a ret ching sound.

Also, the steward of the love-god Aonghas Og who hada son by the wife of Donn. The infuriated god crushed thechilds head between his legs but Roc used druidic arts torevive it as a huge boar (lacking ears and a tail). Roccharged t he boar wit h fo llowing t he career of Donns ownson Diarmuid and it eventually gored and killed the hero.

ROCABARRA, a largely invisible rock seen off the Hebridesof Scot land. It has been seen t wice and it s t hird appearanceis expected to herald the end of the worlds of men and thegods.

ROCAS, the rook, a crow, roc, t he voice of a crow, f rom N.hrokr, AS. hrc, the English rook. Confers wit h G. rc, ahoarse voice., Bry. rocha, to snore. After the steward ofAonghas Og. Roc had a illegit imate son by the wife of Don,t he father of Diarmuid ua Duibhne. The angered husbandbroke the child over his knee, but Rocas touched it with hismagic wand and it was reincarnated as an earless taillessboar. This was t he boar t hat dest royed Diarmuid. A t ot emof all the sea-people. See snaithean.

ROIN, ROINEAG, RIOINN, RIONNEAG, Ir. roine, a hair,especially the hair from a horse, Cy. rhawn, long coarseblack hair, Bry. reun, a hair or bristle, Skr. roman, hair, cf.Ir. ruain, the hair from the tail of a horse or cow. Based onRhiannon the dark-haired Welsh goddess who the Gaelscalled Samh or Mhorrigan. These hairs were considered tohave magical properties. See snaithean. See romhan. InRomano-Gaul the goddess Epona, divine Horse, became the

favourite with the Roman horse-legions. Her worship mayhave been introduced into Britain at the time of theinvasions. At the least, her attributes became fused witht hose of Rhiannon and t he Irish goddess Macha. Anot herIrish goddess who may be connected was Etain Echraide,The Horse-ride, the wife of Midir and of the king EochaidAirem. There is a single enigmatic Gaelic verse that alludes

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to the sacrifice of horses in ancient times. More recentlywe have record of the ritual killing of white mares intwelfth century Ireland. According to Giraldus Cambrensis,a white mare was then essential to inauguration of thechief of one clan in Ulster. This king appeared before hispeople on his hands and knees (like a stallion) and declaredhimself to be a horse. He then had ritual sex with the mareafter which it was slaughtered and cooked. The king sat in abath made of broth from the animal, and there ate the fleshand drank its body liquids. In this rite the mare representsfertility, a necessary virtue supposedly transferred to theking by this peculiar act.

ROITHEACHTAIGH. The invent or of t he wheel and t he

chariot. Lit erally, t he possessor of wheels. Note t hat t hesun was imagined to be a wheel that rolled daily across theheavens. The Gaullis god Taranis, who is t he Gaelic Tar andthe Old Norse Thor is sometimes pictured as a wheel-god.An altar at Tullie House, Carlisle is decorated with a wheelon the left lateral face. Rice says that the presence of thiswheel suggests dedication to a native sky-god rather thana Roman deity. In Chester this god is ment ioned as Tanarus.Numerous votive wheels have been recovered throughoutBritain and in the Welsh mabinogi mention is made of a god

named Taran. In the Irish Tain one of the heroes is describedas wearing a wheel-shaped broooch. When Elathu came toIreland to mate with Eriu it is recorded that he had coicroith oir, three wheels of gold at his back. Thunder godswere smiths and tinkers and the movement of their carts inthe upper air was equated with the roll of thunder.

ROMHAN, wild talk, raving, the Eng. row and Roman (fromt heir dark hair and evil disposit ions?) See roin. Cf . Cy.

rhamant, romance and the Ir. ramas from which the G.imrama, a sea-quest.

RONAG, ROINAG, a hair, especially a horse hair, Cymric,rhawn, long coarse hair. Confers wit h ruain, hair of the t ailof a cow, the English rowan. At t he quarter-days sainingrites were required. Old women gave special care t o cat t le

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at these witching times, tying red or blue ribbons into theirt ails and saying t heir words over the udders. In orderthat cattle might retain their virtues a ball of cows hair,termed the ronag was put into the milk pail on the day inquestion , or at least by the following Thursday (ThorsDay) . See roin, above.

RONG, the vital force, the spark of life, also a joining spar,a ladder; rongair, a lean person worn out from sexualact iv it y . The passing of the sea-spirit to t he land was t ot he det riment of t he elder kingdoms. It is a t enant of magicthat sexual activity bleeds away the spirit of the weakerpartner, a fact noted when men cohabited with the sidh ort he Fomors. Af t er a single night under t he hill or west

of the sun it was noted that men and women invariablyreturned to their families drained of spirit so that theyalmost always weakened and died. The purloining of t hekettle of life may represent the loss of the western genepool of t he giant s. In t he lat t er days, t he magic peoplesstole humans into their kingdom for it was said that theycould not reproduce among t heir own kind.

ROPAIN GORM, the little blue-green rope; the blue clue ofwitchcraft. Into a kiln-pot throw a clue of blue wool.

teased, carded and spun by yourself from the fleece of amale lamb. Keeping hold of one end of the thread begin towind it off onto a fresh clue (bobbin). As you come near theend you will find an invisible hand has grasped the threadlying in the kiln. Wha hands? you must ask. Your loverwill thereupon disclose his name. Magic-makers kept thesesame blue clues, balls of winded thread, on their personat all times. On witch who went to the stake at Barhillsupposedly called out not to be burned without her thread-

charm, which she had left at home. She promised the crowdthat if they would bring it to her she would reveal thesecrets of her art. The clue was produced. She took one endof i t and threw i t in the air and aft er a few word s v anishedin a moment.

ROSAI. An alternate name for the ollamh, or professor of

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art s and craft s. Relat ed t o ros, knowledge.

ROS GNATHSAIL, natural laws, ros, seed, flowing fromknowledge; gnath, custom. Part icularly those having t o dowith mechanics: the lever, the wheel and axle, the inclinedplane, et c. The source of many magical eff ect s.

ROSAD, an evil spell, " st anding bef ore obst ruct ion."

ROSUALT, proud horse. A might y sea monst er cast ashore ont he plain of Murrish in Count y Mayo. The sea-serpent is saidto have lived for three years in its exposed position and itsvomit killed fish and swamped the curraghs which happenedt o be at sea at t hese t imes. The t hird spasm ended wit h a

pestilence that spread from four-footed creatures to manyof t he men in t hat place.

ROTACH, rough weather, a hand rattle used to frightencattle and men. This device was sometimes mounted on thenet her end of a short spear, and was referred t o as a dart.

RUADN. A son of Breas and t he goddess Bridd. At t he t imeof the second battle of Magh Tuireadh, he was sent to spy ont he smit h of t he gods. He wounded t he met al-worker but

was himself killed in combat . The goddess Mhorrigan, whois a form of the Bride, appeared as a keener after death fort he f irst t ime on t his occasion. Also t he name given aChristian saint, one of the twelve Apostles of Ireland,who shelt ered a kinsman against King Diarmuid. The HighKing violated sanctuary and for this he and Tara werecursed. As a result Tara was desolate forever, as Ruadanhad promised.

RUADH, red, Red,ruddy, brown or tanned, deer, hind, roe,strength, virtue, Saint Anthonys fire. EIr. ruad, Cy. rhudd,Bry. ruz, Lat. rufus, AS. read, Scot reid from which thefamily name Reid. The prime colour of the gods, a huesuggesting war-like activities. Also, the son of Rigdon, andt herefore probably t he sun-god Lugh. He voyages wit h t hreeships into the wat ers nort hwest of Ireland. Some say he

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was becalmed. Wit h his crew get t ing weaker he wasapproached by three Fomorian goddesses, who took him tot he seabed for rest and recreat ion. For nine months he sleptand caroused with them, without fearful hurt, under thesea, f ree f rom waves, on nine beds of bronze. Collect ivelyt hey bore him a son. When Ruadh refused to st ay wit h themthey cut off the boys head and threw it after the retreatinglandsman. see next .

RUADH ROSESSA, ROSEISG, ROFHESSA, Red of t he EvilSpells, the Knowledgeable Satirit. The Dagda in his guiseas the god of druidism. Ross has noted that one of the godsof Gaul is Rudiobus, whose name also contains the wordred. (and) is equated with Mars. See also Rudraidhe and

entr ies immediately below.

RUAMHAIR, to dig, delve, EIr. ruamor, root up, from rou, theEng. root , not e t he Lat . rata, minerals. The craf t of miners.

RUDHA, a blush, a form of ruadh. Also rugha, a reddening ofthe face due to excitement or embarassment. Related isruicean, a l i t t le redness, a pimple, and ruit ach, ruddy.

RUDRAIDHE. On of t he sons of Part holn, a survivor who

returned to found the northern royal house of Ulster,Ireland. The men of Ulster were alt ernately called t heRudraidhe or Rudricans.

RUITH NA H-AOINE, ruit h, f ast speech; Fridays count . Not ethe goddess Aoine or Anu? A wish for bad luck!

RUITHEANNA, ruith, run. The quasi-rhymthmical form of theoldest tales. He poetical form used by the Gael before he

form alized verse, met re and rhyme. Not ice t he nest !

RUITHIL, a reel or wheel dance. In honour of t he sun-godLugh who wheeled daily through the sky in his fierychariot.

RUN, mystery, secrecy, an intention, love, a secret, Cy. rhin,

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ON. runr, Eng. runes. The root is revo, to search out. See rann.

RUTHADH NA SIRACH, t he Fairies Point , near GaolinCast le, Kerrera, near Oban, Scot land. In years go by achangeling was deposit ed here. The family not iced t hat t hegirl did not grow and was always delicate. A visitor fromIreland eventually came to the castle and identified thelittle girl as a little woman: Tha thusa sin a shirach bheaglennan brian mac braodh, So there thou art, the little fairysweetheart of Brian MacBroadh. Totally offended at beingidentified, she rasn fromn the castle and threw herself offthis headland; hence the name.