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U, ur, t he yew-t ree. The number five; uiseog, t he skylark;usgdha, resin-coloured; t he summer solst ice.

UACOMAGI, VACOMAGI. One of t he early Scot t ish Gaelictribes. Men of the open plains. They occupied the GrampianMountains in the vicinity of Speyside and East Perthshire. Evident ly (a) Celtic (word) but of unknown meaning. Magiis t he OIr. mag, great. pot ent , maglos, a chief. Wat soncapares Uacos with the Gaullish god Esus who is the GaelicAod.

UADH-BHEIST, UATH-BHEIST, uadh, a p ref ix sig nif ying dread;dread, horrible, foul beast , a monst er. Part icularly, af abulous species. See uat h.

UADH-CHRITH, terror, dread shaking, to quiver at the sightof horror.

UAGHACH, full of graves, a place of caverns, terror, dread.See next ent ry.

UAIG, UAIGH, UAGH, a grave, MIr. uag, allied wit h Got h. augo ,Eng. eye Cf. uaigneach, secret, lonesome, relating to uath,lonesome, single, by oneself , ON. authr, empt y, Got h. auths,a wast e, a deser t . In an art icle for Oceans magazineNorman D, Rosenberg has identified the earliest settlers onthe northern islands of Europe as neolithic farmers andherdsmen from the eastern Mediterranean forced fromtheir lands by their own poor husbandry and soil practises.His contention that they were led to their voyage by thevoice of a priestess, following the advice of a mother-

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goddess, seems speculative, but t he idea t hat t hey went t othe forest and created water-tight and resilient wooden-hulled ships with stone axes and awls, has got to bewrong. The making of seaworthy ships is not a merely amat t er of a desire for survival.

Truthfully, no one knows who first came to theHebrides and what mat t ers drove, or pulled them t here. Theislanders of historic times have characterized themselvesas A race of f ishermen who do some farming. ConsideringRosenbergs assessment of the Hebrides as a treelessarchipelago amidst flagstones and heather, it is hard topicture it as the paradise of any group of agriculturistseven in t he warmer climat e of t he dist ant past . Furt her, t he

long trip along the shores of the Mediterranean, aroundSpain and through the long reaches of the English Channeland the North Sea would have been more fraught withdangerous possibilities than any ocean-crossing. It seemsmore likely that the islands were populated from nearbyPent alande, t he place of t he Pict s and later t he Scot s. Itwas probably approached by sea-men, and possibly some oft hem were ul t imately f rom t he myst er ious west .

They did leave impressive passage graves, the best

known being Maes Howe (pronounced hoo) on Mainland, thelargest of t he Orkney Islands. It is supposed t o have beenerect ed in 24 0 0 B.C. which makes it a pre-Tuathan st ruct ureof Neolithic t ime. Consist ing of stone slabs, weighing asmuch as three tons, and measuring as much as 18 feet inlength it is an undeniable masterwork of dry-masonry, putup by folk who were contemporaries of the Firbolgs and theFomors. The whole place is current ly hidden beneath a 24foot high grass mound which is about 1 15 f eet at it s

greatest widt h. This underground place was not built f orgiants as the 36-foot entryway is never more than 4 to 5feet in height . At t he end of t his cramped passageway t hereis a 15 foot square room, with wall niches assumed to haveonce held t he bones of t he dead.

The people who came here may have been devot ed t o an

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earth goddess as Rosenberg has suggested, but the entranceshaft is aligned for penetration by the sun at mid-winterand mid-summer and these were the times when Lughferried men t o t he west , or t o t he east , in his solar wind-ship. North of this location there are other stones thoughtaligned to the movements of the sun and the moon. Similarsouterrains are found all over Ireland.

In Scotland where they are termed earth-housesorweems (from umah, a cave) and as wags (from uaigh,a grave or vault ) . One of t hese at Jarlshof, Shet land, hasbeen dated to the Early Iron Age, but others in Scotland haveincorporat ed Roman rubble int o t heir walls. In Cornwallthey are termed fogous, and here most are of the early Iron

Age. They are even found in Iceland, where t hey exist asrock-cut t unnels. There is an early Iron Age example inJutland, otherwise they are not known on the continentexcepting the somewhat similar souterrain-refuges ofFrance. Obviously, not all of t hese st ruct ures were creat edby the retreating Daoine sidh, but many are early enough tohave seen use by t hese bronze-age peoples. See next .

UAIGEALTA, weird. eerie, lonesome. And see next .

UAIMH, UAIGH, a cavern in t he eart h, a den; MIr. uaim; OIr.huam, similar to the English wame or weem, which areot her forms of womb. The lowland form is consistent lyapplied to the caves of Fifeshire, where there are alsofamilies bearing t he name Wemyss. The name is applied toearth-houses and is the equivalent of the Irish brugh, "thet umuli found on t he Boyne and elsewhere." It is also used t oidentify "the fairy dwellings in the Hebrides." (CelticMonthly, 19 02 , p. 89) .

UAIL, wail, howl, funeral lament.

UAINE, (ua-niu), green, pallid, livid, pale, death-like, at theedge of death. The green sickness described as adebilitat ing menst rual f low in women. Uaineach, t edious.The colour especially reserved to the Daoine sidh and never

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named for fear of drawing t heir unwant ed at t ent ion. Noticethat these folk and the black-elfs of Scandinavian andGermany were reported to have a blue-black skin colour.Sometimes unusual power can lie hidden in the actualshape, colour or name of a remedy or medication. Studieshave shown how tranquilizer tablets coloured green havecalmed the nerves of anxious patients, but not when thosesame tablets were coloured yellow... anthropologist CecilHelman, 1991. See datha, colour.

UAINE BHUIDHE, t he Green-f ist ed one. The Otherworldminstrel, whose birds followed wherever she travelled. Shewas by law caused to visit one sidh each year. And whenshe came across to the sidh the bird-flock perched on the

cornices and couches everywhere. And thirty birds wentinside where they made much singing. When musiciansplayed the birds joined in. Note above, She is obviouslyBua, and t hrough her, t he Mhorrigan.

UAIR, the allotted hour of death which those with the threesight s could ident ify for t hemselves and ot hers. Hour, anygiven interval of time, life, the life-span, weather, season,rotat ion.

UAMAN. The sidhe in Connaught ruled by Ethal Anubhail, thefat her of Caer.

UAMHAS, dread, horror. see uat h and bas. See uaimh, t hus, acave-dweller. Usually disassembled as uath + bas, dreadeddeat h. Relat ed t o uadh and uamhunn, horror, awe in t heface of t he unknown, OIr. omun, fear, Gaul. obnus, fear. SeeG. amadan.

UATH, obs. dread, solitary, alone, dreadful; t he Bry. eus,heuz, horror. Perhaps conferring with Cymric god Hu? theGaelic Aod. The root is pu, foul, t he Lat in put ris, t heEnglish put rid. foul. A former name for the hawt horn plant .A Fomorian hero entitled, in full, Uath mac Imoman (theroaring one; The Ocean). During t he t ale, The Feast ofBricriu, Cchullain, Laoghaire and Conall went to Uaths

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Lake, so that he might judge which of them was thegreatest warrior in Ireland. Uath suggested a t est in whichthe heroes cut off his head in return for a promise that theywould submit t o similar abuse on the following day. All butCchullain refused the offer knowing that the shape-changer could reform himself while they were certain todie. Af t er Cchullain st roked of f t he sea-giant s head, helaid his head before his opponent, but as the axe fell itreversed its position and the hero was spared, whereupon hewas hailed t he t rue champion of t he count ry. Laoghaire andConall refused to recognize this judgement and manyquarrels resulted. Also, an ancient common name for theplant called whitethorn. A more sedate remedy thanfo xglove for regulat ing blood pressure.

UAITHNE, UAITNE. The Dagdas harp. See uath. The Harp oft he North. Enchanted, it would f ly t o his hands oncommand. Also t he Dagdas harpist who had an af fair wit hhis mate Boann, giving rise to three famous musicians,whose playing was so sorrowful it led to the death oflisteners. Sometimes entitled Dur-da-Bla, the Oak of theTwo Blossoms or Coir-cethar-chuin, the Four-AngledSource of Music. It was carried off by the Fomors as theyretreated into the western ocean, but the Dagda and Ogma

fol lowed and ret r ieved i t . Af t er ravaging t he undersea worldthe Tuatha daoine carried away many souvenirs, among themthe Glas Galveen, a heifer whose call returned all thetribute cattle that the Fomorians had carried away fromIreland.

UAMAN. The sidhe of Connacht ruled by Et hl Anubhail, whosedaughter was sought as a mat e by Aonghas Og.

UAMHAS, UAMHAIS, monster, spectre, apparition, dread,horror, fr ight , dismay, ast onishment , horr id deed, at rocit y.

UAR, t he Cruel One. He and his Fomorian sons, who livedin Munst er, clashed wit h Fionn mac Cumhail. All weredescribed as foemen, lame-thighed, left-handed, a race ofwondrous evil from the deepest pits...venom in their

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weapons, and on their hands and feet, indeed on every partof them. See famhair, Nathair, Cromm, Cailleach bheurr.

UASANTAS, an appeal hill; a place where laws wereadjudged.

UATH, dread,terror. Cor. uth, Br. eus, heuz, the Gaelic godHeus. This invader conquered the "few savage Gauls" wholived in present-day Britain. See also Ugh and Lugh. The day-god corresponding with Aod. The Earth. Also the antiquename for t he hawt horn; ot her obsolet e meanings includesolitary, alone, single, lonesome, terrible.

UATHACH. The daught er of Sgat hach. When Cchullain was

admit t ed t o t he milit ary academy on t he island of Sky hewas greeted by this lady who was gate-keeper. As shepassed him a bowl of food, he inadvertently crushed herhand causing her t o scream. Thinking she was being raped,her boyfriend Cochar Crufe challenged the hero. Cchullainkilled Uthachs lover and was then forced to take on dutiesas gate-keeper becoming her mate in the process.

UB. Spell, charm, incantation, ceremony, also written ob.

UBAG, UBAIDH, a charm, an enchantment, an incantation,spell, supert it ious ceremony. OIr. upt a, fascinate, f rom ba,t o speak. Confers wit h Ir. upt ha, upadh, a sorcerer, Manxobbee, sorcery. The root may be ben, to hurt by touching.Gaelic ubagach, skilled in these arts.

UBAGACH, skilled in making charms, enchant ment s orincantations, charming, enchanting, superstitious. Actinglike a charm. Ubagaich, to subdue by spell-casting;

ubagaiche, one who subdues using charms or medicinals.Ubaig, to enchant.

UBH, an egg, the Egg personified.Less often, the point of aweapon. Somet imes used as an interject ion expressingdisgust or amazement, the equivalent of Eng. phew. Note theOIr. form og or ub, thus the god Og, Lugh or Aod. ON. Ygg, one

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of the names of Odin. Cy. wy, pl. wyan, Cor. uy, oy, Bry. u, vi,Lat. ovum, Eng. egg. the phonetics as between Celtic andthe other languages is somewhat difficult; but theconnect ion is indisput able. See Ugh.

The egg was often represented as a repository for thesecond soul. In Scottish folklore the tale is told of af isherman, who being unmarried, and wit hout heirs,promised that he would surrender his son at the age oft went y t o a sea morgan. Event ually he did marry and hiswife gave birth to a son, who learning of his fathersbargain tried to escape his fate by journeying in parts awayfrom his homeland.

During his t r ip, t he lad was const ant ly reminded of hisdestiny by the strange creatures who opposed him: twoFomorian giants, an old crone and the three-headed serpentof Loch Laidly (represent ing t he t riune goddess) . In eachcase he was able to put down these monsters, and aftersaving the life of a local princess, acquired her as a bride.The one thing that the Mhorrigan could never tolerate was afemale competitor, so on this young fellows twentiethbirt hday she appeared wit hout leave or asking and swallowed him whole. This is a polite way of saying that

t he Mhorrigan was nubile and nearly irresist ible as anobject of lust. In polit e versions of t he t ale, a sea serpentensnared the youth and carried him down into the depthsof t he loch.

The princess, to retrieve her prince from theOtherworld, took the advice of an old soothsayer (druid)who remembered that mermaids were unable to resistbeaut iful music. The princess t herefore to ok her harp t o t he

shore and played upon it unt il t he sea morgan surfaced. Shet hen stopped her hand, at which t he mistress of t he seasasked her t o Play on!

She said she would but only after seeing that herhusband was unharmed. To oblige t he morgan t hrust t hecaptive man out of the water until he was visible above the

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waist . The musician t hen cont inued, and t he piece was sosent imental t hat t he mhorrigan lost her grasp and t heprince shape-changed himself into a falcon which brokefree.,

In one of the variants of this tale the sea-monsterregurgitat ed t he man. Seeing t hat she had been t ricked, t hemorgan took the princess in place of the man who hadescaped her grasp. The prince, in turn, consulted the druid,who assured him that there was only one way to overcomet he morgan: In t he island t hat lies in t he midst of t he lochis the white footed hind (doe), and if she is caught therewill spring out of her a hoodie (crow), and if she is caught,out of her will come a trout, and the trout containeth an

egg, and here is encapsulated the soul of the sea-maiden,and it t he egg is crushed she will die. Now t here was noknown way of crossing to Eilean Mhorrigan for the sea-maiden routinely sank each boat and raft that ventured upont he loch ( a met aphor for t he ocean).

So it was that the prince decided to jump the gulfusing his black stallion (a symbol of storm clouds). On theisland this prince called upon his magic black dog to trackand bring down the doe. When t he morgan shape-changed

into a crow his totem falcon brought her down, and the troutwas caught up by his magic ot t er. When t he egg spewedfrom the troutss mouth, the prince put his foot upon it, andthe witch cried out, Break not the egg, and all that you askwill be given up t o you! The prince t hen demanded hiswife, and having her in his arms stepped down soundly upont he egg.

UBHAL, apple, Ir. ubhall; EIr. uball, Cy. afal, Br. avallen from

which the mythic kingdom of Avallon. AS. ofet, fruit.Mythological heroes often sought golden or silver apples, asymbol of the Sun and the Moon in the Otherworld, and wereadmitted to the west using apples or a bough as a passport.

Numerous rites of divination for the Hogmanaytherefore hinge on the use of apples which are associated

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wit h Lugh and his Samh: The ordeal by water where anindividual proved his innocence of crime by survivingdrowning continues in the popular Halloween game ofducking apples. A large wooden tub, representing the ocean,is filled with highly polished apples which the master ofceremonies attends with a porridge stick or some othersymbol of druidic authority. It is the duty of this person tokeep the apples moving while each one of the companyattempts to take an apple between his teeth without the aidof his hands. If he fails to reach the Undersea Kingdomand come back with a prize in three tries he must waitwhile others have their turn. The apple may be eaten but inearl ier days was frequent ly used in ot her r i t es.

Sometimes attempts were made to take apples with at wo-t ined f ork held bet ween t he t eet h. Occasional ly a silvercoin was placed in the tub. Whoever could lift it from thebottom in his lips was reckoned to be lucky in moneymatters. Apples were also involved in an ordeal by fire,which is no longer much practised. A small rod of wood wassuspended horizontally from the ceiling beams by a cord,and when balanced, a lighted fir candle was fixed on one endand an apple at the other. The rod was set twirling and eachmember of the company attempted to take a bite from the

apple without losing eyebrows or hair. In these degeneratedays, the element of fire is usually omitted from this formof dousing. A bannock smeared with honey or molasses wasoft en subst i tut ed for t he apple.

If the apple was not consumed immediately it could betaken, at the hour of midnight, to a room containing amirror. Standing with a back to the mirror the suppliantwas advised to eat eight bits, throwing the ninth over his

lef t shoulder. Glancing backward, he expected t o see t heimage of a future spouse in the glass. Alternately, he or shecould retain the ninth piece and walk backwards towardsthe mirror while eating it. If the hair was combed whiledoing this it was said that the face of the spouse wouldgradually materialize in the glass. The rite of paring theapple also had to take place at midnight, and the ribbon had

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t o come away from the fruit in an unbroken spiral. Attwelve the parings had to be swung three times over thehead without breaking, and flung finally over the leftshoulder. The breaking of the paring signalled the end ofhope for matrimony in the coming year. The paring, placedabove t he house lint el, would give a clue t o the ident it y ofthe name of the spouse as his or her name would correspondwith that of the first person of appropriate sex whochanced to pass through the door. It is said that kailstocksand sprigs (of greenery) were used in the same way.

In legend, heroes who wished to pass t he great Oceanand enter the western lands was advised to pick sixteenapples and throw them one by one into the Atlantic. They

could then be used as magical stepping-stones to approacht he Ot herworld. It was somet imes observed t hat t he livesof western folk were embedded as a second soul in an apple.When one Fomorian princess fled her father she first slicedan apple into an appropriate number of parts, and each bitcried after her as she departed for Ireland. Again anothergirl blocked pursuit by placing the giants soul-apple underthe hoof of a filly. When it was crushed the giant died forhis soul was in t he apple. This cavalier use of apples wasreferred to as cluich an ubhail, the apple play, a very

deadly game.

When Gaelic heroes tried to pluck apples in the mythicislands they were often frustrated by branches whichdanced out of reach. While it was fools play to trif le wit happle-souls, heroes who carried of f apples t o t heirhomeland of t en acquired a west ern woman as a prize. Thusone poverty-striken, but able, man acquired a golden applefrom three ravens and with their help flew over the sea to

the ends of the world and came to the place of the tree oflife. When he and a princess of that land tasted the applethey afterwards married and lived prosperouslly together.This tree seems to be the Norse world-tree for it was saidto grow on a sort of tree of which there is but one in thewide world. It is stated that Celtic priests reverenced theapple as sacred, which may help to explain why this is the

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fo rbidden frui t in much non-Celt ic lore.

UCHD-MHAC, breast -son, fost er-son. OIr. pokt u, t he Englishpap, breast. "Fosterage consisted in the mutual exchange ofthe infant members of the families, or of sending a child tobe reared in another family, the sons of the chief beingincluded in t he pract ise. The custom had the advantage ofenabling one half of the clan to know how the other halflived. It exacted respect and devot ion among families ofdifferent grades of clan society that intensified the bondsof clanship. "A Gaelic proverb follows on this: "Affectionateto a man is a friend, but a foster-brother is the life-bloodof t he man." Again: " One is kindred t hrough parent age t oforty degrees, but through fosterage to a hundred."

UDAIL. inhospitable, churlish, udlaidh, gloomy, cf. ON. utlagian outlaw. This was considered the ultimate display of badbreeding and poor manners. Because of t his fault Bres lostthe high-kingship of Ireland.

UGH, UIGH, UBH, egg, uighean maola feannaig, t he egg laidonce in seven years by a cock. At the Samhuinn the ale-glasswas filled with water and the gealagan uighe, the white ofthe egg. was dropped into the liquid. The female whose

fortune was read was required to lay a hand on the rim forthe space of a minute. In that time the white would assumefantastic shapes whose outlines prognosticated the futre:Seeing fortifications supposed the girl might marry asoldier; a fleet of ships, a pulpit, a furrowed field, a forestsupposedly pointed to the occupation of a future mate.Sometimes unwanted visions appeared, a coffin or atomestone pointing to death for the egg-breaker.

UGH. UTH, LUGH, the Eng. Hugh. Sometimes seen as Leug, thesun-god and mate of Samh or Summer. Sometimes entitledNuall airean. Uisdean, Huisdean, in Argyle Eoghan, from theearlier form Huisduinn, Hu's man. Similar to t he Cy. huan,the sun, and derived perhaps from the Welsh god Hu, anagricultural-war deit y. Aod is a Gaelic equivalent , and allforms may ultimately derive from Teutonic-Scandinavian

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models. The Teutonic root is hug, and Hugin was t he namegiven one of Odin's war-ravens. The name corresponds mostclosely with that of the Teutonic war-god Tyrr whose namemay be an early form of Thor .Confers with the G. ig, ON.vik, a nook or cove, t he English words wit ch and wizardf rom t he god Woden. Hence G. igean, a f oreigner, a fugit ive,a wanderer. Note also uigheil, pleasant , which relates t oaoigh, a guest, one doomed to die, a hostage. Commonlymisspelt aoidh and t hus t he patro nymic mac Aoidh, t he sonof Kay, i.e. t he son of t he day-god Lugh. His connect ionswith the fire-god Lokki are discussed elsewhere. Aoibh, ofpleasant aspect, of good manners, relating to ibheall, al ive coal, t he shining one, p leasant .

UGH-CHAISG, " East er-egg ," mor e lit erally, ugh- chaoidh, Eggof Forever, Egg of Et ernit y, t he Immort al Egg. Seeabove entry. Referred to in Anglo-Saxon parts as the "Pasch"(Passion) egg, or " Pace" egg. Not ice t hat Ygg (egg) was oneof t he t hree hundred, or so, names favoured by Odin. M.M.Boulton of Rochdale, writing for the Scots Magazine said:" We have the Pace Egg (a Miracle Play) in England Thecharacters and the doggerel are almost identical, althoughwe have no Galoshans. There are supposed t o be about f ift yversions of the play which is still performed in the North of

England each year. " Pace" is derived f rom "Pasch", t heJewish " Passover. The egg is a pre-Christ ian symbol ofspring and in 1554 there is a reference to the hallowing oft he Pascal Lamb eggs and herbs on Easter days, and a book in1579 refers t o Easter eggs as Holy pace eggs. The Rochdaleversion (of t he mummer's play appropriate t o t his t ime) waspublished in 1930 and printed by Munro & Scot , Pert h. Itwas a mummer's play associated with gifts of eggs."((Scots Magazine, p. 458).

UIBE, from ud-bio, an out-being, a foreigner, a mass, a lump(of dough etc.) Cf. Lat. offa, a ball. Anglo-Saxon, wic, adwelling or encampment on a bay; a male or female living ina costal locat ion. Confers wit h wicing (t he Norse wordviking) , a cost al pirate. The same word as wicca (m.) andwicce (f.), a witch, and the English words white, weather

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and witch. + woman, the female of our species.

In the mythology of the sea the white women may beidentified with the Old Norse waeg, or wave-women,somet imes referred t o as t he billow-maidens. Nine innumber, they were the children of Hler and Rann, the chiefdeities of t he ocean. They also confer wit h t he Celt icmhorga (which, see). In Gaelic myt hology t hey are said t obe the befind, or runners, of women killed on or near thesea.

As we have not ed t he Cailleach was t he hunt ress ofIreland and Scotland, her season, from November first toMay first, being termed the geamhradh, or winter.

Remarkably, she was t ransformed into a virginal womanentitled the Samh at the time of the fires of Beltane (April30), and event which marked the beginning of the samhradhor summer. In t his new form, t he goddess wore t he whitelinen unisexual, long-sleeved, high-necked Celtic garmentwhich t he ancient Romans called t he albus. Alba is t heGaelic name for Scotland, while alb or alp still describesanyt hing t hat is white in colour.

Frau Gode, or Wode, was known as Brechta, Bertha, or

t he Whit e Woman of Germany. She t oo was rumoured t o bea great huntress and lead the Wild Hunt f rom t he back of awhite stallion, her usual attendants being changed intobeasts for this Yulet ide happening. Unlike t he arrival of t heCailleach, the coming of this goddess was taken as aharbinger of prosperity.

In parts of Cape Bret on, t he gathering of humancailleachs (old women) is still considered to predict storm,

and this is particularly true if they gather on a beach.Seeing a mermaid on a beach also indicates an imminentst orm as does t he mat erializat ion of a woman in whit e.

One of these spirits of the river haunted the Reed'sPoint ferry on the Saint John River in southern NewBrunswick. The cable-ferry operat ors, Frank and Dyna Pit t

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periodically halted the ferry on the water to let passengershave a better view of the resident fay, "a woman all inwhite, carrying a light, crossing an open space at dusk."

The Reverend Noel Wilcox was out shooting atEvangeline Beach when he encountered a woman in a whitedress walking ahead of him on t he sand. Af raid she might beaccidentally shot by his hunting companion, Wilcox hurriedto warn her but she disassembled into a fog and vanished.

In the waters near Shippigan, New Brunswick, afather-son fishing team were lost in the darkness andstorm of f Tracadie LIght . " We looked and t here was awoman in white, torch in hand, her two feet dragging canted

against t he wind. My fat her t ook t he wheel and fo llowed herfor twenty minutes and as she went out of sight the Lightcame into view...I don't know who she was but I guess shesaved our lives."

The white woman have been described as shape-changing crones who frequent ravines near the seaside,blocking the path of travellers and entreating young men todance wit h t hem. Those who t ried t o by-pass t hese" favours" were somet imes t ransformed into animals. Like

the sea, she was quixotic but could appear in an attractiveform when of fering sexual favours. She somet imes guidedlost travellers, changed flowers into powerful amulets,aided women in childbirth, showed men where to find goldand silver and abat ed t he fury of st orms.

On the other hand. the woman in white who hauntsPartridge Island at the mouth of the Saint John River in NewBrunswick has no particular occupation except that of

carrying a head under her arm. She was spot t ed by a guardposted t o that island during World War I. In an agit atedstate he fired three times at her but when he was revivedfrom his faint, there was no sign of additional blood-shed.According to legend, this sea-witch was generated at thedeat h of an elderly lady who fell of f t he cliff whileresident at the old marine hospital which used to be located

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on the island.

A noteworthy phantom was supposed to have been thewife of Dr. Copeland, the surgeon to the Seventh Regiment,which was stat ioned at Halifax. She and her husband werelost at sea when the ship "Francis" went aground on SableIsland in 1799. Not hing more might have been t old of herexcept that the brig "Hariot" came to the same end in 1801.Captain Torrens of the Twenty-Ninth Regiment staggeredashore with the remnants of his troops and made bivouac ont he beach. On a preliminary t our of t he island Torrens cameupon a shore building which had once been the haunt ofmoon-cussers and wrackers ( see ent ries above) . Ent ering henoticed that his dog was seized with an uncontrollable

shaking mot ion stood barking at a darkened corner. In thegloom from his firebrand the captain spotted "a lady sittingby a f ire, wit h long dripping hair hanging over her shoulders,her face pale as death, and having no clothes on but a loosesoiled white dress, weta as if it had come out of the seawith sand sticking to it..."

This is the classic white woman, befind or mermaidcast ashore, but Torrens recognized her as the counterpartof Mrs. Dr. Copeland. He could get no conversat ion f rom her

but she did hold up a ring finger, cut away at the root." Murdered for the sake of a ring?" enquired Torrens. Thewraith nodded and the man promised, "Then, I'll find yourmurderer t o t he deat h." At t hat , t he ghost smiled, its firefaded and it slipped out the doorway past him, vanishing atlast int o t he sea. Torrens did as he had promised, andrestored a 136.9 carat ring to the Copeland family.Afterwards it was sold in France and mounted in Napoleon'ssceptre and is now located in the Louvre, Paris, France.

Anot her case involved t he appearance of women inwhite who represented a much larger loss of life at sea.Early on the morning of October 7, 1859, a man livingclosest the church of St. James, at Charlottetown on PrinceEdward Island heard t he bells t olling. A curious person, hewent to investigate, and as he walked from home was joined

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by a neighbour. St anding in t he churchyard, t he t wo heardt he bell t oll eight more t imes. Aft er t hat t he doors werethrown open by a uncommon burst of wind, and within, themen saw t hree women all dressed in whit e.

As the curiosity-seekers stood dumbfounded, the bellsounded one more time and then the doors closed on theladies. The duo rushed t o the door but f ound it locked.Peering in a window they could see one of the womenascending t he stairs t o t he belfry. Now, t he minister andthe sexton arrived, and being told that there were strangersin t he church, t hey moved t o unlock t he doors. When t hefour entered there was absolutely nothing to be seen, sot hey approached t he belfry on a narrow set of stairs. At t he

bell room, the leader had to lift a trap door, and as hepaused t o do t his, t he bell rang again. Expect ing t o seethree women pulling the bell rope, the men went up throughthe hatch and found the bell-pull tied firmly to a beam.Nothing more was seen of the women in white although thefour men searched all of the church from the bell-tower tot he basement.

This strange affair was quickly the subject of generalconversation but no one could offer an explanation for this

supernat ural sight ing unt i l t he st eamer " Fairie Queen f ailedto make port on her journey from Pictou, Nova Scotia. Thisship was new to the Northumberland Strait and was berthedthat morning at Pictou taking on mail, cargo and passengers.When she had sailed out of her mainland port the weatherhad been clear of storm clouds. The next day search-vessels went out looking for the "Fairie Queen" but nothingwas sighted of her and no wreckage ever drifted ashore.

Recalling the women in white, Charlottetownresidents began to guess that these were the fetches, orforerunners, of some of those lost at sea, who had come toshore t o announce a disaster at sea. Ot hers recalled t hatthe pagan sea-spirits were said to be offended bymisrepresentations of their names, and suspected that the"Fairie Queen" had been a jonah.

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Remember that the faeries were named after the fee,the Celtic witch-women who originally lived on an islandof f t he coast of Brest, France. They can be shown as t headherents of Mhorrigan, the sea-goddess who was thedaught er of Dagda. Like t he Norse goddess Rann, she was avain-glorious individual, who would not easily accept thepresence of a competitive fairy-queen on her waters.Recalling this, it was noted that the "Fairie Queen" hadsucceeded another vessel bearing the same name, and shehad also gone down six years earlier.

Not all white women represented unemployed runnersof t he dead. Some were simply sea-spirit s given t he chore

of informing men of serious storms expected on their coast.One of these was seen by the Reverend Noel Wilcox when hewas out shooting birds on Evangeline Beach, on the Fundyshore of Nova Scot ia. The minister had a companion wit hhim, but the two had separated and Wilcox was playing therole of "beater", hoping to flush game birds from hiding.Seeing a woman dressed in white walking through the beachgrasses, Wilcox set out after her, afraid that his friendmight shoot her by accident . As he hurried t oward her shekept her distance, and when it seemed he was outpacing her

she simply vanished like fog in sunlight . The ministerthought this was quite uncanny, but when he bent to the wetsand where he had last seen her he was even more puzzledas t here were no foot print s. He hailed his companion andtold him what had happened, but his hunting-mate was notespecially surprised. " That was t he lady who walks t hestorm, "he was advised, "Come on were getting out of here.There'll be wind coming up from behind."

UI CORRA. Lochlan, Emne and Silvest er were heroes of ClannUi Corra who voyaged in the Atlantic. Their story, repletewi th Chr ist ian morali ty , dates f rom t he sixt h century.

UIDH, desire, a wish, way, journey. Too much attention tomatters at a distance was believed to result in psychicdisplacement of the soul leaving the body behin, possibly at

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hazard.

IG, a nook, a retired or solitary location, cave, den. A steepcone-shaped rock. Gaelic uigean, a wanderer, lonely, afugitive. a cove, same as the Anglo-Saxon wic, an

embayment on salt water, from which the word wicce,witch. The AS wic. Also means a dwelling, camp, a place fordropping anchor; AS wicing, a pirate. from the Norse vik, anembayment , a creek. The English-wick, t heir ending -wich(As in Norwich). The word also confers with wood, weather,and Woden. Thus, also, the Gaelic place-name Uig (in Skyeand Lewis) . Hence, uisgean or Huisdean t he Eng. Hugh, awanderer f rom afar, a fugit ive. See above ent ry. Conferswith Bui, a nick-name for the proto=witch known as The

Morgan. This word is also embedded in buitseach, a witch orwizard. Go t here f or a longer exposit ion.

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IGAN, IGEAN, IGDAN, A.S. Wden, akin t o OS. Wdan, OHG.Wuotan, ON Othinn, the Scand. Odin, the Eng. equivalent of uiis vi or wi, low + ME. dan, master. See above entry foradditional forms and attachments. Related words in Gaelicinclude: uibe, a mass or lump, cf. iob or faob from ui-bio anout-being, i.e. a stranger or wanderer. ubagean, acharmer, a sorcerer, ubath, a magical token, uigneach,

secret, lonesome, matching the obs. uath, horror, dread anduaigh, a grave, also ubh, egg, t he ON. Ygg, Eng. egg, a side-name for the god. Thus the Gaelic island of Eigg. Resemblinguidh, a journey, the Eng. foot. Also uigheil, pleasant, careful,related to aoigh and the god Aod in the first meaning and toidh in t he second. Also note uspan, a shapeless mass, aform of uibe. The Gaelic gean, good humoured, affect ionat e,

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the Eng. kin, kind. Dan, bold, fate, destiny.

Notice that Odin was often referred to in his homecount ries as t he Wayfarer. On occasion Odin wandered t oearth, and was absent so long that the gods began to thinkthey would not see him in Asgard again. This encouraged hisbrothers Vili and Ve (in some versions Hler and Lokki or thewinter god Uller), who some mythologists consider as otherpersonifications of himself, to usurp his power and histhrone and even, we are told, to espouse his wife Frigga. Theold May-Day festivities were entirely centred on the returnof Odin as the lover and spouse of the earth.

In addition to Frigga Odin carried on affairs with Saga

or Laga, the goddess of history, with Grid, the mother ofVidar, Gunlod, the mother of Bragi, and Skadi, not tomention the nine goddess who simultaneously bore Heimdall.Skadi eventually moved westward to become the patronessof Skadiland or Scotland. The roots of Thor and Tyrr arehistorically uncertain but there was a king named Odin, whosupposedly invaded Europe from Asia Minor in 70 B.C. Odinsnumerous sons were the patriarchs of the Saxon kingsnamed Hengist and Horsa who invaded England in 44 9 .

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles says that they were thesons of Whitgils and that he was the son of Witta, Wittabeing of Wecta and Wecta of Odin. From this Woden sprangall our royal families. Hengsit and Horsa who were threegenerations removed from this mortal-god came to Britainas mercenaries hired by Wyrtgeone, the Celtic king of theBritons. served He gave them land in the southeast of thecountry on condition that they drive back the Picts. Aftertheir military successes they told their kinfolk, the Angles,

descendants of Ingvi-Frey of the excellence of the land andthe relative powerlessness of the natives. There eventuallyfollowed the overthrown of most of present day England,and the containment of the Celtic populations in the northand west.

The character of Odin is very well represented in the

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Heimskringla f rom which we quote: The land in Asia t o t heeast of Tankavisl was called Asaland (see Asduin) and t hechief t own t here was Asagarth and t he chief t here wasOdin... Odin had two brothers, one Vili, the other Ve whoruled the kingdom in his absence. Once the brotherspreempted his succession while he travelled, and took towife his spouse Frigga. But he came home and regained hisplace. Odin went against the Vans (sea-giants) but notsuccessfully. Each in turn was winner and they did oneanother great scathe. They therefore exchangedhostages...thus the Vans people got Mimir, the wisest ofmen, along wit h anot her named Hoenir. Hoenir gave lit t leadvice to his new friends but Mimir gave too much, and thesuspicious Vans beheaded him and sent the head back to

Odin. The king smeared the head with magical oils and herbsso that it not rot, and he worked charms with it so that ittalked with him and told him many hidden secrets (of thesea-folk). Odin got in exchange Niord and his son Frey and hesent them to the temple to become priests. Niords daughterFreya became the consummate priestess and taught theAsaland people wizardry as it was used by the Vans. WhileNiord was with the Vans he espoused his own sister (whichwas lawful wit h t hem) and by t hem had t hese t wo chi ldren.

In Asaland, such cohabit at ion was forbidden...Odin hadgreat possessions in the lands of the Turks but the Romanemperors were going far and wide over the land, and hispeople were being beaten in battle. When Odin looked intothe future he saw that his offspring would find theirdestiny in the northwest...He therefore set his brothers overhis kingdom and taking the priests and of his folk went toGardarik (Russia) and from there to Saxland (Germany). Fromthere he fared north to the sea and found the island-city of

Odenso in Fyn, Then he sent Gefion north to spy out newland, and she came upon King Gylfi (of Sweden) who grantedt hem plough lands. At a giant s home she begot f our sons andshaped them in the likenesses of oxen and with them shetilled all the lands westward from Odenso and called thisplace Selun (Zealand in Denmark)...

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Hearing of Gylfis country Odin went there and theking had to come to terms with him although those folkwere nearly as versed in magic as the Asalanders. But Odinwon out and made his dwelling at Logrinn (Lake Malar,Sweden) and called the place Gamla-Sigtun. There heinst alled his t emple-priest s... and t o all gave good lands.

It is said that Odin and his diar (druids) brought to thenorthern lands all the sports and crafts, and the cleverestof all at these things was Odin himself. When he sat amongfriends he was joyful to look at, but with his army he wasthe terror of his foes. He understood all tricks of cunningand could change himself into what form he would...all hesaid was in the rhyme in the manner now called scaldcraft

( aft er Scaldi or Skadi)

In bat t le, Odin could make his enemies deaf or blindor so terrified that their weapons were of no more use tothem than sticks; but his own warriors needed no armourand fought as mad wolves, and bit their shields and were asstrong as bulls or bears. They slew men, but neither fire norsteel would bring them down and this was because theywere in the berserker rage (see the Gaelic cromagan). WhenOdin shape-changed his body lay seemingly asleep and he

prowled the far-off lands on what errands he wished. Withwords alone he slaked fire, stilled the sea or raised wind.He had the ship called Skedbladnir which traversed theocean but could be rolled up like a table-cloth...All thecrafts he taught and the songs he sung were called galdrar(enchantments) and the Asa folk were thus known as thegaldra-smiths.

Odin practised the greatest magic of all which was

termed seid (The Gaelic sed or weathercraft, (a blast ofenergy). He knew much of mens fate and the future, of howto kill through illness, or to take the wits from people andgive them to others. But he knew that such trickery was notmanful and therefore taught the priestesses the mostvirulent magic. By all this Odin was renowned andfeared...(so that) men sacrificed to Odin and his twelve

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chiefs and called them their gods and afterwards believedthem to be so. From Odins name Adun is formed (the GaelicAsduin) and by this men call their sons as others have takenThor and got Tor-e and Tor-aren or joined it to other namesas in Steintor or Havtor. Odin set the laws that the deadshould be burned and that rich men should come to Valhalla(the poor went to Thors retreat) ...for these the standingstones were raised as remembrance.

Near wint ers day (mid Oct ober), t hey were t old t osacrifice for a good crop, and at summers day (mid April)they were advised to sacrifice for victory in battle. InSweden Odin received scot (taxes) for every nose (hencepoll-tax) and in return he agreed to protect their land. Niord

took himself for wife the one called Skadi but she would notlive with him and afterward mated with Odin. They hadmany sons and one of these was Sming, from whom theGodheims. Odin died in bed in Sweden, but when near deathmarked himself with his own spear saying that he now wentto the Godheims to prepare a way for the virtuous dead.

The Swedes were sure he had gone back to oldAsagarth and would live there eternally. Then began godbelief in Odin and fresh prayers arose to him. Odins fire

was most glorious and it was afterwards said that thegreater the reek of the fire the higher the place that herowould find in heaven, and the more goods that were burnedwit h a man t he r icher he would be in t he af t er- li fe.

There are many parallels between Odin and the Celticdeities: Note that Aod, the Celtic day-god, also called Lugh,has almost all of the above characteristics and history.Lugh, the Bright-one, is often confounded with the

southern hero called Fionn, whose name indicates White.The Fionn of Gaelic legend appears as Gywn ap Nudd in Welshmyth (Gwyn confers exactly). A mighty warrior andhuntsman he gloried in warfare and like Odin, wasresponsible for the assembly of the souls of the dead,leading t hem at last t o his shadowy kingdom.

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In Christ ian myt hology, it was insist ed t hat t his hostrode instead in endless, self-defeating left-handed circlesawait ing t he end of t ime. Alt hough Gwyn was t he kindred ofthe gods of light, Hades was his special resting place and hehad relatives amidst the house of Dn. Each year there wascombat bet ween Lugh and Cromm, and Gwyn and Gwyt hur apGreidawl, and Odin and Uller. In each case, it was for t hevirgin-favour of a maiden variously known as Mhorrigan,Frigga, or Creudylad. It was said that t his combat had t o berenewed each May-day till time shall end, and it wasunderstood to represent the thrust-and-parry of male godsof winter and summer for the possession of the fertileearth-goddess. The Welsh Gwyn was eventually demoted tokingship of the Tylwyth Teg, the Welsh fay-folk, and his

name is not yet dead in his last known haunt, the vale ofNeath. He was the Wild Huntsman of Wales and westernEngland just as Cromm was that of Ireland and Scotland, andas Odin f illed t he post in Scandinavia and Germany. SeeAod, Lugh, Uig. Cromm, Cailleach bheurr.

UIGE, a precious gem, a web, carded wool, the spinning ofa tale, less often knowledge, skil l , ingenuity, understanding,a poem.

UIGHEAN SITHEIN, uighean, the plural of ugh, above; fairy-eggs. Seeds and nuts transported to the old world from thenew by the Gulf St ream wit hin loose ocean-wrack. Thesewere considered to be gifts from the gods and to haveprophylactic use against evil. Uigheagan, the ovary,uighealachd, t he capacit y f or giving pleasure or benefit .

UILBH, ULOH, a wolf (Sutherland) . See ent ry under secondspell ing.

UILE BHEIST, uile, entirely, wholly a beast. a sea-serpent,a land monster, a wild beast, the lamprey eel, a madmonster.

UILIOC, the mistletoe, said held scared by the druids. Stillused as a potion against bareness in animals and systemic

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poisonings. The druids referred t o this plant as t he all-heal.

UI NILL, ONeill, aft er Niall ard-righ who came t o t hethrone and ruled Ireland between the years 379 and 405 A.D.He raided Britain and Gaul during the time of Theodosius theGreat being forced to retreat by the Roman general Stilicho.He was assassinated in Gaul by some of his own peoplewhich he was distracted by some of the local women.This king was the progenitor of the very successful Ui Nill,or O Neill dynast y.

He was Eochaids youngest son, and probably wouldnot have come to power except by way of a powerful omen:

Once the five sons of Eochaid hunted and while they diddeveloped a t hirst . In a clearing they came upon an old hagwith grey hair, black skin and green teeth (a reflection oft he sea-habit at ). She of f ered t hem wat er in exchange fo r akiss. The t hree elder boys refused, but Fiacht ra pecked hermodest ly on t he cheek. At t his she predict ed t hat he wouldreign brief ly at Tara. Hearing t his Niall must havesuspected her identity and gave her a full fledged buss ont he lips. She demanded int ercourse and t hey ret ired int o t hewoods where she shape-changed into a beautiful raven-

haired beauty who identified herself as Flaithius, the Chief t ainess. Af t er a successful romp in t he moss, t hismhorrigan t old Niall t hat his line of kings would be themost successful in t he hist ory of Eiru.

UIDH, a ford in a stream, an isthmus, said from Norse eith,an eye, a neck of land. From it we have Eye or Ui nearStornoway, Scotland. The older form of this was Ey, Huy orEie showing a connection with the Gaelic god Aod, also

known as Ubh or Lugh. Note that the word also means a journey, a distance, suggesting a travelling god (hence thesun). EIr. ude, rooted in ped, to go by foot. Eng. foot, Skr.padya. Uidheam, accoutrements of travel or war, apparatus.

UILE, whole, pol, many, full, similar to prefix iol, many, Eng.all, Germ.. all, Goth. alls, Cy. oll, Corn. hol, Bry. holl, Eng.

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hole, hell, Hel.

UILE-LOC, uile, the equivalent of ool, ale, all or whole + loc, all made whole, af t er t he god Lugh, a healer. Also a namegiven his t ot em-t ree: t he rowan. See Oolat hir, t heAllfat her. Not e also t he ON. god Lokki.

UILLIN. UILLENN FACHARDEARG, of t he Red Edge. Agrandson of Nuada he killed Manann mac Ler by drowning himin an Irish lake. His name is preserved in Moycullin, CountyGalway. After the battle, which was fought near MaghCuilenn (Moy Cullin, Ireland), Manann was buried in astanding position. He was no sooner buried than a great lakewelled up from under his feet, and the place has been a

great red bog ever since. And the lake got the name Orbson,or Orbison, one of t he names of Manann.

UILM. coffer, a sacred bag used to collect alms at Quarter-Day celebrat ions. It was made of two st rips of Casein-uchd, a strip taken from the breast of a sheep killed at thelast sacred fest ival. The st rips were oval and no knife wasused in taking it from the flesh. A ritual scrotum, the grab-bag of f er t i l it y .

UINDE, INE, time, opportunity, leisure, the act of beholding.Also the name given the Dagdas Cauldron in which allhonest men found food and fortune in proportion to theirmeri t as individuals.

UINNEAG, a window, from the Norse windage, Sc. winnock,AS. windage. Literally an eye for wind. Also a kit chen-wall recess for a collection of miscellaneous utilities.Notice that the Cauldron of Regeneration was so named,

from the root uine, time, suggesting that all openings hadthe potential for bridging time and space. The earliestwindows were not glazed. Thus t his word indicat es anyholed stone or opening, natural or otherwise, a windowbetween the worlds.

UIPEAR, an unhandy person, an inept workman, a bungler. A

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victim at the Quarter Days.

UIPINN, a treasure, a valuable horde, cf. uibe, a mass, acol lect ion of t hings. Lughs t hings.

UIR, mould, dust , eart h, uircean, a young pig, MIr. orc, Eng.pork, porker.

UIREAGAL, dread, terror, spirit of the dust.

UIRIDH, a monst er, same as next .

UIRISG, somet imes URUSIG, (pronounced ooru-shay) ,offspring of a sithe (shay) and a human. A changeling. An

earth spirit, see previous entry. uruisg, from air + uisge,literally a supernatural of the wat er. Macbain def ines t hiscreature as "a Brownie" but this is, rather, one of the bocs,or he-goats, having a female counterpart in the glaistig,who is also human from the waist up and a goat from theredown. A creature reminiscent of pan and t he sat yrs. Theword confers with the English word water, the lowlandwhisky and t he Lat in unda, a wave. All allied wit h t heEnglish word wash.

The water bucks were field and wood spirits,representative of the old earth gods such as Dagda, Lugh,and kernow. Their spirits were overwintered in t he lastsheaf of the season which was kept in the croft kitchen tobe returned t o t he soil at t he f irst plant ing. This infusionwas thought necessary for the growth of the corn, or grain,whose height always paralleled that of the animal thoughtpresent in t he crop. In watching the wind bend t he graincrofters would say, the goats run through the field.

Children were warned against wandering there on penalty ofbeing kidnapped, molested or killed. When a harvester fellill or lagged behind the others it would be guessed that hewas under psychic at t ack from the bucks. The last sheafcut in the harvest was frequently called "the horned goat",and the person who cut it was sometimes similarly named.The position of harvest goat was not sought -aft er since it

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was an omen of failure, burdening the recipient with theduty of "boarding the old man" (i.e the Devil) through thewint er. The urisk was a solitary member of this clan, acreature who preferred a small but deep pool to the summerfields.

UIRSGEUL, a fable, an untruthful story, a romance. Blarney,spreading dung to dry. Uirsgeuladh, a spreader of manure,bull-shit t er, a fabulist . As opposed t o folk-lore and fo lk-history, these latter being the senachies of the Gaelic race.

UIRT, ob., uird, chants.

UISDEAN. HISDEAN, in Argyle; EGHAN, elsewhere. Bot h

from MG. Huisduinn, literally Hughs man, the Norse Eysteinnor Old Hugh, a god hero corresponding wit h t he cont inent alCelt ic Hesus or Esus. See Ugh, above. See Aod for a fullaccount. A day-god, the first wood-cutter and landdeveloper, who led his people westward from SummerCountry. Esus was said to signify Master in France, Spainand Italy. This is also the god Tartaresus, ThunderingHugh, t hus at t achment s wit h Norse god Thor, t he Gaelic Toror Tar. He may have come t o Brit ain by way ofsouthwestern Spain for this was the ancient site of

Tartessos, an island city and adjacent kingdom (near modernCadiz) which mysteriously disappeared sometime between533 and 500 B.C. This city is sometimes taken as the modelfor Atlantis since it was notoriously busy, wealthy andcorrupt and met the physical description given by Plato. Inaddit ion, t he remains of t his place are currently t oo farbelow sea-level t o be ret r ieved.

This being t he case, t his god may confer wit h

Herakles, who set his pillars at Tartessos after returningfrom t he west ern ocean aft er he pirat ed t he kine of Gereyon.Hercules is associated with the Greeks but they admittedborrowing his cycle of tales from the Phoenicians at Tyre.In an earlier incarnation this god-hero was Melqart, who onhis return home had a temple erected to him which featuredtwo columns before the portal, one of gold and the other of

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emerald. When the Tyrian architects and builders went downthe coast to work for King Solomon, the Hebrew temple wasalso constructed with entrance pillars which remembered apagan god better than Jehovah. In classical times it wasclaimed that the Pillars of Hercules still stood on eitherside of the Straits of Gibraltar, both escribed ne plus ultra,nothing lies beyond. Something did lie out there in theOcean, and the mythology of the Canary Islands insists thatthirteen similar bronze pillars used to stand within theislands,one of which may have been ancient Gereyon.Int erest ingly, t hese Celto-iberian symbols are st ill seenpreserved in t he $ sign.

UISG, UISGE, wat er, shower, rain, billowing wave, r iver,

stream.Lat in unda, a wave, English wash. " It is not right t hat aperson should sleep in a house without water (in thesleeping room) , especially a young child. In a house leftwithout water, ""the young slender one of the green coat(the Daoine sidh) was seen washing the infant in a basin ofmilk." (Celt ic Mont hly, p. 163). This process dedicat ed t hechild t o t he Daoine sidh or " cow-people." " In preparing wat erfor boiling clothes, after it has once been boiled, it shouldnot be boiled again...because this would bring evil to the

house." (Celt ic Mont hly, p. 1 63)

Of the things which the public magician hoped to dot he cont rol of rain was formost . Wat er hasd always beenessential to life hence in all simpler communities the rain-maker was a very import ant person. Most of t heperformances of witchcraft could be classed as imitativemagic. The sprinkling of wat er on a small scale wasthoughht to be useful in stimulating the clouds to follow

t he example. If one wished t o limit the rain heat would beapplied to water causing it to dry up. This act againstnature in miniature was expected to influence nature on thelarger scale.

The simplest approach to making rain was to cut awillow wand, dip it in a vessel of water, and cast it on the

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ground, uttering any oaths, curses or incantations whichseemed appropriate. A f irst -rate demonst rat ion ofsympathetic magic might also demand that the witch strikefire from a flint to emulate lightning and hammer on a tinpot t o imit at e thunder.

Frogs and toads, which seemed to appear with rain,were sometimes placed beneath a pot which was hammeredwit h " t hunder" hoping t o encourage a downpour. Our wit chesbelieved that stones were as useful as sticks in stimulatingrain, and these were sometimes dipped in water, orsprinkled with it, or treated in some other appropriatemanner. Sir James Fraser caut ions t hat one should neverassume that ritual "of this sort was confined to the wilds

of Af rica and Asia". In Europe he ment ions t he " wild woodsof Broceliande, where if legend be true, the wizard Merlinst ill sleeps in t he hawt horne shade. Thit her t he Bretonpeasant s used t o resort when t hey needed rain. They caughtsome water ina tankard and threw it on a slab near thespring." On Snowdon in Wales lies a similar Red Alt ar, outin a lake, approached by a series of st epping st ones. If oneapproached this far stone and spattered it with water thenit became "a remote chance that you do not get rain beforedusk, even when it is hot weather."

Rain magic was never the sole business of paganwat er-wit ches. " At various places in France it is, or was,the practice to dip the image of a saint in water as a meansof procuring rain." One sacred well in t hat count ry waslocated at Barenton, and here a cross was dipped in waterfor t he same purpose.

In Atlantic Canada there is a saying that people do a

lot of talking about weather but rarely do anything about it,and this may be because there is usually ample rainfall.Local lore seems, certainly, to concentrate on weatherprediction as opposed t o altering the weather. Sages havesaid: " If you don't like t he weat her, wait a spell!" No otherregion of North America is likely to see a seventy degreedrop in temperature, sunshine, rain, hail and snow within

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one t en hour period, as we observed at one out door auct ion.

If you do insist on having rain this can be obtained bycrushing a spider. The cry of t he loon, which we used tosuspect indicated his arthritis was kicking up, was knownto suggest that the charm of wetting or crushing had beeneff ect ive. It is also a local superst it ion t hat when pot atoesboil dry, rain is in t he works. Of course, t his is nowgenerally accepted as a true case of cause-and-effect,since water boils away more readily at low atmosphericpressure, and low pressure indicates that a storm may beexpected. If a span of dry weat her was expected mygrandmother Mackay noted that the soot remained on theinside of her woodst ove covers. Before a storm she would

call attention to the "British soldiers", troops of red sparkswhich seemed to move upward away from the draft.

I have already mentioned how my Grand Mananrelatives looked to Mother Carey's chickens to forecastweather. My great -grandfather, who sailed t he wind-

jammers, used to recite this l i t t le poem as a teaching aid:

If t he wind comes aft t he rain,Set t he t opsails back again;

But i f t he rain comes fore t he wind,Then you topsail halliards mind.

The first situation, of course, suggests that clearingand good sailing weather will follow, the latter that thatt he sails should be gat hered pending a bad st orm at sea.

There is much more of this individual witchcraft insea-side communit ies. My island relat ives also suggested

that winds from the east carry rain, but that if they backedoff, clockwise, through north, to south to west, it wouldclear. If t he st orm winds moved count er-clockwise it washeld t hat one st ood " in line" for t he other half of t he rain.

At Victoria Beach, N.S., Helen Creighton found a beliefthat "if it rained on the fifteenth of July it would rain for

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forty days. We dry fish at that time, and that's the way italways happens."

Ot her weather poems I' ve heard:

Sout hern glin,Wet skin.

(A glin is a glint, a momentary appearance of the sun.)

Rain on t he f loodCreat es only scud;But rain on t he ebb,Means better in bed.

(Scud is low fast-moving clouds, which quickly "blowthemselves out.")

Weather superstitions, presumably at the base ofweathercraft, were never restricted to mariners; hence, onthe mainland I was told that piles of leaves blown "wrong-side" up denoted rain. Everyone knows t hat night -crawlingworms come to the surface just before rain, and that "therooster crows for rain" . Cats bend down t heir ears f rom

sleeping on them just before a storm, and the clear sound ofa train-whist le looks to bad weather.

Certain traditions were time linked, thus: "Rain beforeseven, clear by eleven." It was also suggest ed t hat if t heweather cleared on an even hour (e.g. two, four or sixo'clock) fine weather would continue for a few days; but ifon a uneven hour (one, three or seven) then more rain couldbe expect ed in a few hours. Less precise was t he old idea

that a sky that cleared "in the late afternoon" presaged arun of dry weather. We have already ment ioned St .Swithin's Day (July 15) when dry weather was hoped for toavoid fort y days and nights of rain. Less specifically it wasagreed that if the sun set in a clear sky on Friday night rainwas probable by Sunday night . It was also said t hat if rainwas seen during the first week in June then the month

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would be wet.

The herdsman had many of his own superstitions, forexample the idea that drinking pools showed especiallyclear reflections just before a storm, and that grains ofsand would f loat on wat er if a wet spell lay ahead. InCharlotte County they used to say that darkening skiesfollowed after cattle licked one another about the neck andthat animals who huddled together in the fields wereanother indicator.

There is too much of this sort to be comprehensive, soI'll conclude with a collection of couplets, which my motherl iked t o recit e:

Fog on the hillWat er at t he mil l;But fog in t he hol lowA f ine day wi ll f o l low.

Sunshine with showerWon't last half an hour.

Red sun at night , sailor's delight ;

Red sun in the morning, sailors takewarning.

Wet and cold May,Means a barn full of hay.

A leaky June,Makes farmers sing a merry tune.

Mare's t ail and mackerel sky,Means t he sun wil l surely die.

These are traditional memory joggers, many centuriesold, particularly favoured by witches and others whoseilliteracy forced them to carry large chunks of informationin their heads.

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UISG AN EASAIN AIR A DHOS. A spoken charm used t o assureprotection at sea.

UISGE-BAOGHAL, alcohol.

UISGE-COISREACHD, a holy wat er drunk by t he Gael at t heYule, a protective against evil for the coming year.

UISGE DE, water-goddess. De is the feminine genitive of dia,a god; Oir. Dea or dia, God or a god; dee, a pagan divinity.Thus the River Deva in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, Dee, inGalloway and Dee in North Wales. In Ireland the Avondale

used to be called Inber Dee. Again, in Scotland, note thereference by Adamnan to the stream which in Latin iscalled Nigra Dia. ( Black Goddess) . See Cailleach bheur r.

UISGEBEATHA, (oorusku-bey-a) the water of life, whisky.Ale and beer were continental inventions but this drinkoriginate in Ireland and Scot land. Eng. wat er, Lat . unda, awave, thus suggesting that the recipe was borrowed fromthe Famhairean or undersea folk as mythology suggests. Itsorigins are decidedly unknown, although Saint Pat rick has

been credit ed with i t s invention.

Mircea Eliade guesses that the magic power of the Cauldronof the Deep lay in it s cont ents: " ...cauldrons, ket t les,chalices, are all receptacles of this magic force which isoften symolized by some divine liquor such as ambrosia or"living water"... (Water has the capacity) to conferimmortality or eternal youth, or they change whoever ownsthem into a hero, god, etc." 1 It is tempting to suppose that

"usquebaugh", or whisky, literally the "water of life" mighthave been the alcoholic beverage which "stirred itself"within The Cauldron.

Certainly it is true that "The origin of Whisky iswrapped in mystery... Usquebaugh was reserved for festiveoccasions, and even then was used sparingly, for unlike the

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Saxons, the Celt was temperate in both eating anddrinking." 2 Irish or Scots whisky still contains sufficient"spirit" of the Oolaithir, or Brew-master, to reviveseverly wounded men if not place the dead upon their feet.The manufacture of whisky, the preferred ritual drink ofpagan times, was well established in the Highlands by thefifteenth century when it was noted that James IV had hisaquae vit ae dist illed for him by a Scot t ish friar. During t hegreater part of the eighteenth century this was anunfashionable drink in the lowlands where claret and brandywas preferred and less expensive. Later the continentaldrinks were subjected to import duties and this home-brewed product came into its own. See ol and biere.

UISGEUL, a fable, a fantasy, blarney; as opposed to myths,legends and history.

UISLIG, sn obj ect of t error.

UISLINN, want oness, sport , diver sion

UISNEACH, Hughs Nest . See ent ry under Huisdean. t henavel of Ireland, where the great Stone of Divisions (aillna Mirenn) stands, marking the bounds of the five provinces.

t he sit e is near Rathconrat h, Count y Westmeat h. The highfest ivals were all held here, t he Belt ane being t he mostsignificant . According t o Geoff rey of Monmout h, t he druidnamed Merlin took some of the stones from this place tobuild St onehenge in England. Pat rick cursed t hose t hatremained so that they could no longer be heated by fire orcooled wit h water. Claimed as t he f irst place where evera fire was kindled in Ireland. Also known as the placewhere Lugh went out of Ireland, and some say he died

there.

It is a matter of record that the confiscatedCauldron of the Deep was buried here at the time of theTuathan-Fomorian wars. It represented the spirit of Don,the creator-god whose first people were those of theundersea kingdom known as An Domhain. When the cauldron

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was first borrowed it was used by the Tuatha daoine torevive their dead kil led in battle. A Fomorian warrior soughtout t h is ar t i fact and f i l led it w i th s t one.

The shamanistic theme of the Great Centre alsoappears in the case of the Welsh king Lludd, who is the IrishLugh. His country was plagued by oppressions, and seekingthe advice of his druid, he was told to seek the geographic(and psychic) centre of his country. There he found adragons lair, and by overcoming it, was able to make thisshrine his own. This corresponds with the killing of Don bythe Dagda..

Note that the Irish ring of Killaraus is identified as

having stood on the Hill of Uisneach. When he came toIreland, Saint Patrick is said to have cursed the remainingstones and when men tried to use them as building material,the structures in which they were placed always provedunstable. The central standing stone in this structure wassaid to be confiscated from the Otherworld and was, for at ime, t he symbolic navel of Ireland.

ULAID, dative ULAIDH, Ulster, the northern most province ofancient Ireland. Anciently, the men of this place. Ulaidh, a

treasure; Irish Gaelic uladh, a charnel or burial house; EIr.ulad, st one; root ul, cover. The prov ince was so called f romthe number of burial chambers erected there; treasure beingassociat ed wit h dead nobi li t y.

The ancient centree of Ulster was Emain Macha named aftert he t win sons of t he goddess Macha. Ruadraidhe, son ofPartholn, supposedly founded the royal house at Ulster,t hus Ulst ermen were known as Clan Rudhraidhe. Ulst er lost

the support of Macha but had the support of the sun-godLugh and thus mounted notable heroes all through the RedBranch cycle. Their power ended wit h t he conquest s of t hesouthern king Niall of the Nine Hostages (379 AD). Note rathUlad, t he rath of t he Ulst ermen, in Fife, Scot land. Thisname became Rathulit and then Rathhillet. A late name forthe Ulstermen was Ultach from which Dun nan Ultach,

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Downanult ich (1 53 9) , The Ulst ermens fort in Kint yre.

ULAIDH, (ooly), treasure, Ir. uladh, a charnel-house,suggest ing t he presence of spirit -guardians. EIr. ulad, astone t omb, root , ul, cover. Allied to Lat in alvus, a belly, acont ainer. ON. ulfr, a wolf . The prov ince of Ulster has it sname from this word which honours the goddess Ula. Thename is quite appropriate considering that the province hasmore souterrains and natural underground than any otherplace in Brit ain. It was here t hat t he Tuatha daoine f ledwhen t hey were forced t o go t o eart h.

Present day Northern Ireland is not old Ulster,which also included Counties Cavan, Monaghan and Donegal

in addition to the six which were partitioned away in 1921.Ruadraidhe, son of Partholn is sometimes credited withfounding the royal house of Ulster, and therefore the peoplewere termed Clan Rudhraidhe or Rudricans. It s capit al wasEmain Macha (Navan) two miles west of Armagh. It s pat ronwas originally the goddess Macha, who offended by theUlstermen t ook herself to Connacht . This kingdom declinedin historic times after the inhabitants lost battles againstt he sout hern king, Niall of t he Nine Host ages ( ca. 37 9 AD).

The burial mound was yet another focal point for cultrites. Any tree observed growing in the vicinity of a gravemound was held sacred and shrines of wood or wicker weresometimes built near or upon them. Interaction between theliving and t he dead is observed in t he t ale of Len, t he smit hyt o the gods. He lived in Sidh Buidb where he made brightvessels f or Fland , a dught er of Flidais, t he goddess ofwi ld t hings. Aft er a days work i t was his custo m t o have hisanvil as far east as the grave mounds. On striking it threw

up a shower of water, another of fire, and created a rain ofpurple gems. Nemannach went through these same motionswhen he was preparing Conchobhar Mac Nessas cup.

ULLABHEIST, entirely beastial. Same as the uile-bheist.

ULLAGONE, UILEACAN, t he " deat h wail" . The call of t he

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banshee and other weregilds, as well as that of hiredwailers in f uneral processions.

ULLDAICH, ULTACH, solitary, the Night-Stalker of NorthernScotland, uile, all; daich, well-appointed in outwardappearance (but a dangerous fabricat ion). This word is alsoused to indicate a burden carried in the arms over a longdist ance, a burden on t he back. Pronounced as ool-dach.

ULMHACH. wolf.

ULOH, a brute, a wolf; from Sc. ulfr, a wolf, Cy. Blaidd, ME.wulf which has Anglo-Saxon roots. This is the Dan. ulv andthe Sw. ulf, the Icelandic ulfr., Lat. lupis, from a verbmeaning to pluck out or tear. The chief-travelling formof t he goddess Mhorrigan and her kin. Cernu, in his role asLord of the Animals appears in stone and bronze as ahorned god, flanked on one side by an otter on the other by awolf. An interest ing horned f igure depicted on t he nort hernface of the market cross at Kells, is that of a mustachedman grasping the tails of two wolves which stand on eitherside of him.

This reminds one of the death-god Cromm who wasalways accompanied by two dogs. At least one clan inIreland claimed descent from these animals and Cormac

was suckled by a female wolf as an infant. When this fellowbecame high-king of ireland we note that his wolvescontinued at his side. In the lives of the early Christiansaints wolves frequently appear as helpful animals. It ispossible that the Celts once venerated a god in wolf form,and Lughs mother frequently assumed the aspect of adog/ wolf and died in this form.

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UMAH. umah, a cave. The souterrains are even morenumerous than the megalithis tombs and are found all overIreland. They occur in Scot land where t hey are t ermedearth-houses or weems (from umah) and as wags(f rom uaigh, a grave or vault ). One of t hese at Jarlshof,Shetland, has been dated to the Early Iron Age, but others inScotland have incorporated Roman rubble into their walls.In Cornwall they are termed fogous, and here most are oft he early Iron Age. They are even found in Iceland, wheret hey exist as rock-cut t unnels. There is an early Iron Ageexample in Jutland, otherwise they are not known on thecontinent excepting the somewhat similar souterrain-refuges of France. Obviously, not all of t hese st ruct ures

were created by the retreating Daoine sidh, but many areearly enough to have seen use by these bronze-age peoples.

UMAN-SRUTH, the copper stream, a metaphor for the spearof Cletine, possessed by Cchullain, but coveted by QueenMebd. She sent a poet t o ask for it knowing t hat even heroescould not refuse a bard. When t he poet asked for t heweapon, Cchullain t hrew it int o his eye. In doing so hebroke the metal and in fell into the stream which bears thatname.

UPADH, UPTHA, a sorcerer , OIr. up t a, a charmer; Manx, obbee,sorcery (od-bat-t), from ba, to speak, similar to G. ob, torefuse, refers to the antique ud-bad, out-speak, to drownout other speakers.

UR, Gaelic name f or t he let t er U.

UR-BHEIST, a monst er, a humanoid; ur , having a t ail, novel,

newly created, obs. Fire, mould, beginning. A newly-formedbeast . See next . Ur confers with bhur, as seen in Cailleachbheurr.

URC, whale, sow, enclosure, f old. The Lat in orca.

URCHASG, physic, medicine, preservative, antidote for

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poison. From cosg, t o st op.

URCHOID, hurt , m ischief , OIr. er choit , Eng. scat he.

UR-DHUBHADH, unusual-darkenening; an eclipse of the sun.

UR-GHLAINE, maidenhead.URNUIGH, a prayer, OIr. irnigle, I st rive for help. The root -word is igh, desire, st rive aft er (help fro m God or t he gods).

UR-SGEOIL, SGEUL, an account of recent times, a moderntale. Ur-sgeulaiche, composer of romatic, entirelyunrel iable st or ies.

URSACH, full of the spirit of ursa, a bear.

URSTAN, feast at the birth of a child.

URUISG, URUSIG, URISK, (ooru shay) , a wat er-creat ure,kelpy, tangy, nuckalavee, a diviner of fortunes, a bear, anugly looking human, a slut , a sloven, et c. f rom air + uisg,super + wat er, a supernatural water creat ure. Completelyhuman in appearance or humanoid from the waist up, goat-like or horse-like f rom t here down; a shape-changing

nature spirit similar t o t he Grecian pan. Also, a humanmonster, a changeling, a bodach. The banshee to certainGaelic clans. See uirisg.

The bucks were or iginal ly f ield spir i ts, representat iveof t he old eart h gods such as Dagda, Lugh, and Cernow. Theirspirits were overwintered in the last sheaf of the seasonwhich was kept in the croft kitchen to be returned to thesoil at the first plant ing. This infusion was t hought

necessary for the growth of the corn, or grain, whose heightalways paralleled that of the animal thought present in thecrop. In watching the wind bend t he grain crof t ers wouldsay, the goat s run t hrough t he f ield. Children were warnedagainst wandering there on penalty of being kidnapped,molested or killed. When a harvester fell ill or laggedbehind the others it would be guessed that he was under

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psychic at t ack f rom t he bucks. The last sheaf cut in t heharvest was frequently called "the horned goat", and theperson who cut it was somet imes similarly named. Theposition of harvest goat was not sought-after since it wasan omen of failure, burdening the recipient with the duty of"boarding the old man" (i.e the Devil) through the winter.The urisk was a solitary member of this clan, a creaturewho preferred a small but deep pool to the summer fields.Identified by having long yellow hair, a blue bonnet, awalking staff and a jolly disposit ion (except when annoyed).

US. a presumption, obs. news, a story.

USAIN, w isdom, philosophy , usaid, quarrelsome.

USGA, USGAR, holy, sacred, a jewel.

USPAIR, an ugly or lumpish fellow, from Ir. uspan, anyshapeless mass, chaos, a clumsy individual, one thought outof favour wit h t he gods. G. uspairn, st rife.

USPAN, a shapeless mass, also seen as usp, cf. uibe.

USNA, UISLIU, UISNEACH, USNAGH. The husband of Ebhla, who

was the daughter of the druid named Cathbad. Her motherwas Maga, a daughter of the love-god Aonghas Og. Usna andMaga had t hree sons, t he Red Branch heroes Naoise, Ainlieand Ardan. See Deirdru.

UTH, an udder, EIr. uth, the root (p)utu, swollen, Lat. uberand uter, a skin-bag. Udder has been said to compare butMacbain says the consanant in the Gaelic is against this.

UTHACHD, murder, suicide.

UTHAR, a six week period embracing time between thesecond week of July and the end of the third week in August.This interval commenced on a Friday and ended on aTuesdasy. This t ime corresponded wit h t hat of t helugnasad. Not surprisingly, t he word is relat ed t o ut hard,

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above, up, yonder, on high, and uthachd, murder. Check theearlier entries under lunastain, etc.

UTHARD, above, on high, Ir. os, ard, high, Rooted in for + ard,on high, the ON. Utgardr, the dwelling place of the frost-giant known as Utgard-loki, Ut is the Eng. out, thus Out-garden-Loki, suggest ing t his gods fall from grace. Thisresident of Jotunnheim, a place located in the northernreaches of the nort h, was credited wit h generat ing t hefreezing blasts of air which hindered the growth of crops.To chast ise t his being some of t he gods went t here but wereunable to overcome him in contests which he set for them.In t he end, Thor angrily brandished his hammer, and wouldhave destroyed Utgardr itself but a magical mist enveloped

this land and the thunder god was obliged to return toThrud-vang wit hout having administ ered his proposedsalutary lesson to the race of giants.1.Eliade, Mircea, Pat t erns In Comparat ive Religion (NewYork) 195 8, p. 20 7.

2.McNeill, F. Marion, The Scot s Kit chen (London) 1920, p.234.