Irish Historical Allusions, Curious Customs and Superstitions, County of Kerry, CorkaguinyFoley, Patrick M.
History
Irish Historical Allusions, Curious Customs and Superstitions, County of Kerry, Corkaguiny
Foley, Patrick M.
Allusions; Ireland -- History; Kerry (Ireland) -- Social life and customs
_Bodach._--This is represented by parents to children as the figure
of an old beggar-man, at night looking through windows and making
horrible faces against panes of glass, carrying a big sack and
prepared to take with him children who he might find crying without
cause or wandering out into undesirable places in the dark.
Children ought to be told the truth, namely, that faces made against
the windows are done by members of the family in order to frighten
them. These false impressions created in the minds of innocent
children at such an early age make their lives so miserable to them
in after years that they imagine every bush that shakes after dark is
a ghost or a fairy.
_Bone Fires._--The custom of lighting bone fires on St. John's Eve is
very much on the decline in this peninsula. In Castle Gregory boys
and girls used to remain awake all night, dancing around them for
amusement. Bone fire is said to be derived from the Canduaoin "baun
fire," a beacon fire. A bone fire might mean a fire of bones, a fire
of corpse, a funeral pile or a fire for destroying heretics, but
whatever be the origin of it, one thing is certain, that bone fires
existed long before the dawn of Christianity.
_Bone Setters._--These were persons who made it a practice to set
broken bones, but the dispensary doctor quickly sent them out of
business.
_Brack-an-Tobar._--All the holy wells in the country are supposed
to have enchanted fish which never grew larger or smaller, and some
believed that water containing the fish, if taken from the well,
would never heat nor boil until both water and fish were returned.
People of the present day treat this as a fish story.
_Brandon Mountain's Western Slope Held Sacred._--For a long time the
inhabitants treated the western slopes of Brandon Mountain so sacred
through reverence for St. Brandon and his monks as not to allow any
living animal to be killed thereon except fish caught in the rivulets
of Feoghanagh and Shaunakyle and given to the poor or taken by them
as charity. The fish taken from these streams had to be eaten at once
and could not be kept beyond the second night without eating. Birds
within that sacred ground were nearly tame and hares when pursued by
the hounds following in their tracks, as soon as the hares crossed
the River of Feoghanagh, the hounds were stopped by the hunters.
Cattle, wild deer, boars and all like animals therein were protected.
I believe "Park Garrive" was about the last place here wherein
hunting was strictly forbidden.
_Brendon (Saint) Feast._--This was held on the 22nd of March, but
from time immemorial is gone out of practice.
St. Brendon died on the 16th of May.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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