petitepointplace:Lughnasa in the Outer Hebrides?“… upon Barra (an island in the Outer Hebrides) the
petitepointplace:Lughnasa in the Outer Hebrides?“… upon Barra (an island in the Outer Hebrides) the opening of the harvest was celebrated in the early nineteenth century at the Catholic feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, La-Feill Maire, on 15 August. Allowing for the calendar change of twelve days in 1752, this would put an original festival very close to Lughnasa. The rites, however, were not very similar to the Irish set. People would rise early to pick the first of the newly ripened corn and make it into the Moilean Maire, the fatling-of-Mary bannock. Each of the family would then take apiece and walk sunise around the household fire, singing Iollach Mhaire Mhathas, the paean of Mother Mary. The embers of the fire were then put in a pot and the procession was reapeated around the house and farmland, singing the Paean again:On the feast-day of Mary the fragrant,Mother of the Shepherd of the flocks, I cut me a handful of the new corn,I dried it gently in the sun,I rubbed it sharply from the husk,With mine own palms.I ground it in a quern on Friday,I baked it in a fan of sheep-skin,I toasted it to a fire of rowan,And I shared it with my people.I went sunways round my dwelling,In the name of the Mary Mother,Who promised to preserve me,Who did preserve me,And who will preserve me,In peace, in flocks,In righteousness of heart,In labour, in love,In wisdom, in mercy,For the sake of Thy Passion.Thou Christ of GraceWho till the day of my death Will never forsake me.”–Excerpted from Ronald Hutton’s “Stations of the Sun” -- source link
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