Intimidating, cathartic and virtuoso: cursing mingled gruesome yet poetic phrases with ostentatious rites, in the name of supernatural justice. Celtic Curses on JSTOR ), Foclir Gaeilge agus Barla (Dublin, 1904), 200. Beyond the stock villains of Irish popular culture, their targets included bankers, merchants and police informers.46 James Carey, whose testimony helped convict the men who murdered the government ministers Thomas Henry Burke (182982) and Lord Frederick Cavendish (183682) in Dublins Phoenix Park, was the object of venomous songs wishing that he be afflicted with everything from bedbugs to death.47 For wrongs past and present, the old adversary across the water was also a frequent target: Gods curse on you England, you cruel-hearted monsters.48, Jokey, angry and tuneful curses were mere horseplay, some said. Margaret Dobbs, On Tin B Flidais, riu, viii (1916), 146; Salvador Ryan, Popular Religion in Gaelic Ireland: 14451645 (National Univ. Full analysis of ancient and medieval expressions of Celtic cursing, using evidence ranging from magical charms to curse tablets. Folklorists interviewees, such as Patrick Feeney of Gurrane of Ballyhea in County Cork, said that the generations growing up from the 1960s knew little of maledictions.150. ), The Cambridge Social History of Modern Ireland (Cambridge, 2017); Bettina N. Kimpton, Blow the House Down: Coding, the Banshee, and Womans Place, Proceedings of the Harvard Celtic Colloquium, xiii (1993); Sneddon, Witchcraft and Magic in Ireland; Jenny Butler, The Sdhe and Fairy Forts, in Simon Young and Ceri Houlbrook (eds. Cursing blended lyrical and ritualistic spell casting with something like prayers to God, Mary, Jesus, the saints (and occasionally the Devil), begging these awesome entities to smite guilty parties. Such was the nasty curse pronounced, in 1829, by a Catholic priest from Tarbert, County Kerry, on discovering that one of his flock was marrying a Protestant.55 Often though, it can be difficult to uncover the exact wording employed by Irelands greatest cursers, because journalists censored horrible maledictions. II. Celtic Curses - Kindle edition by Mees, Bernard. Literature & Fiction A publican and farmer from Kilmanaheen, in County Clare, told the commissioners: a woman with child would certainly never refuse relief, meaning that a pregnant woman would not dare risk a beggars curse. Murphy, Diocese of Killaloe in the Eighteenth Century, 3840. The emphasis on justice, on curses befalling evildoers, had waned. Number III of Tracts Published by the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge and Practice in the Kingdom of Ireland (Dublin, 1787); T. C. Barnard, Reforming Irish Manners: The Religious Societies in Dublin during the 1690s, Historical Journal, xxxv (1992), 820. May you fade into nothing, like snow in summer. The first comprehensive study of early Celtic cursing, this work analyses both medieval and ancient expressions of Celtic imprecation: from the binding tablets of ancient Britain and Gaul to the saintly maledictions of the early medieval period, and other traces of . It is time we acknowledged the polish and power of the art of magic. He found out and she gave birth to blind and crippled children after the angry cleric muttered Oh God keep her its like she knows how her own children will be yet.125 Elsewhere, people remembered priests pronouncing dreadful curses on smokers who lit up near chapel.126 The tales spoke to lingering anxieties about clerical supervision and supernatural powers. Here are some prominent curses in history. Thomas Waters, Cursed Britain: A History of Witchcraft and Black Magic in Modern Times (Yale, 2019), ch. Beggars could not curse lightly, because maledictions levied without just cause were ineffective.87 In a world of canny country folk and official discourses about the undeserving poor, mendicants had to appear genuinely needy to make their curses seem potent. For interpretations of witchcraft as discourse, see: Willem de Blcourt, Keep that woman out! Notions of Space in Twentieth-Century Flemish Witchcraft Discourse, History and Theory, lii (2013), esp. Gamble, Sketches of History, Politics, and Manners, in Dublin, and the North of Ireland, 48. Some maledictions, it is true, were fairly general, calling for unspecified punishments. J. J. M. Vingerhoets, Lauren M. Bylsma and Cornelis de Vlam, Swearing: A Biopsychosocial Perspective, Psychological Topics, xxii (2013). This was how Catholic priests imprecated grievous sinners, from the altar, with an open Bible or chalice in hand, and candles flickering.63 Beggars shooed away from cottages empty-handed could curse just as ostentatiously. They received many different answers, but one thing was clear. It mattered because curses were believed to be most powerful when their victims remained silent, as if dumbstruck by the lyrical ingenuity of the dreadful utterances.52 By contrast, people who instantly countered with clever replies could turn curses back on their authors. geasa) is an idiosyncratic taboo, whether of obligation or prohibition, similar to being under a vow or curse, yet the observance of which can also bring power and blessings.It is also used to mean specifically a spell prohibiting some action. Carleton, An Essay on Irish Swearing, 3489. Lady Wilde, Ancient Legends, Mystic Charms, and Superstitions of Ireland, i, 1325; NFC, Schools Collection: vol. Roman Curse Tablets 3. Quoted in: Ignatius Murphy, The Diocese of Killaloe in the Eighteenth Century (Dublin, 1991), 129. The decline was partially compensated for by the increasing popularity of folklore books and pamphlets, where malediction stories were told and racy curses listed. Mchel Briody, The Irish Folklore Commission 19351970: History, Ideology, Methodology (Helsinki, 2016), chs. Sulis was a deity worshiped at the thermal spring of Bath. 212 (Aug. 2011); Ronald Hutton, The Witch: A History of Fear, from Ancient Times to the Present (Yale, 2018), 246. Imeacht gan teacht ort. NFC, Schools Collection: vol. Curses of Caesarea First Report from His Majestys Commissioners, 761. "May you all go to hell and not have a drop of porter to quench your eternal thirst" For some Irish people, no porter is hell so the two are. Following Holy Communion, Father Loftus stood at the altar, holding a chalice. It provides the first full overview and analyses of the ancient Celtic use of binding curses (as attested in Old Celtic and Latin inscriptions) and examines their mooted influence in later medieval expressions. May you leave without returning. The Ars Notoria - An Ancient Magical Book to Perfect Memory and Master Academia As part of a larger collection known as the Lesser Keys of Solomon , the Ars Notoria is a book that is said to allow followers a mastery of academia; giving them greater eloquence, a perfect memory, and wisdom. See The Art of Magic and the Power of Faith, in Bronislaw Malinowski, Magic, Science and Religion and Other Essays (Boston, 1948) and Owen Davies, Magic: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, 2012), 112. Bad cess on you. After that, the curse tablets were buried, placed into a well or a pool, or even hung on the wall of a temple. Dr. James Butlers Catechism: Revised, Enlarged, Approved, and Recommended by the Four R.C. Yet it is probably safe to assume that, in nineteenth-century Ireland as in the ancient world and elsewhere, special curses existed for attacking penises, breasts, vaginas and arses. Virginia Crossman, Politics, Pauperism and Power in Late Nineteenth-Century Ireland (Manchester, 2006), 915, 119222; Caitrona Clear, Homelessness, Crime, Punishment and Poor Relief in Galway 18501914: An Introduction, Journal of the Galway Archaeological and Historical Society, l (1998). Stemming from moral indignation, the virtuoso but also shocking technique required knowledge, composure, practice and wit. Case studies can be revealing and exciting, as in Angela Bourkes exploration of the 1895 killing of a fairy-ridden Irishwoman, Bridget Cleary, or Ruth Harriss account of collective possession in an Alpine village the Mal de Morzine.16 But I think a broader perspective is more suitable here, because bringing together a wide range of evidence allows us to better appreciate cursings central quality. 1967. These clever formulas were the basis for the unnerving art of real cursing, a scary but widespread occult attack that Irish folk used in their struggles over vital areas of life, from land and food to politics, religion, gender and family disputes. Cambridge Social History of Modern Ireland; Antain Mac Lochlainn, The Famine in Gaelic Tradition, Irish Review, xvii/xviii (1995). A geis or geas (pl. Jonathan Ben-Dov, The Poors Curse: Exodus XXII 2026 and Curse Literature in the Ancient World, Vetus Testamentum, lvi (2006). 1, S816. Curses were thrown at Protestant evangelists and their converts too, with notable victims being the Reverend Edward Nangle (180083) and his mission on the island of Achill.111 Their tongues would fall out, local Catholics were warned, if they failed to bellow abuse at the heretics.112. Particular thanks to Dr Crostir Mac Crthaigh and Mr Jonny Dillon of the magnificent National Folklore Collection, University College Dublin. In Northern Ireland, as sectarian violence flared during the dark days of the Troubles, curses were sporadically revived. The Curious Case of Irish Curses and the magical cursing stone Some unleashed maledictions whilst brushing the dust from their feet, as Christ told his disciples to do when they were shunned.64 Irish cursers of various types fell to their knees, in conspicuously public places like the middle of a road or marketplace.65 With locals watching including, preferably, their victims these cursers beat the floor and looked to the skies, put their hands together and besought God to blight their opponents. Heroic Epic and Saga: An Introduction to the Worlds Great Folk Epics (Bloomington, Ia, 1978), 302. For Sale In Britain: A Small Ancient Man With A Colossal Penis 1890; 24 Mar. The most dangerous malediction, Irish commentators and ordinary people agreed, was a priests.98 I mind nothing but the priests curse, one of Lady Anne Dalys tenants told her in 1872, when describing how he could endure any intimidation from his neighbours except that.99. $76.48 4 Used from $78.80 14 New from $76.48. Those nasty practices had an extensive Gaelic terminology of their own. Occasionally people gave beggars clothes or even shoes but these were not much use because they made mendicants appear wealthier than they were.88 It was better to keep to rags and swap any garments for food or a warming drink. Cormac Grda, Ireland Before and After the Famine: Explorations in Economic History, 18001925 (Manchester, 1993), 17; Mel Cousins, The Irish Parliament and Relief of the Poor: The 1772 Legislation Establishing Houses of Industry, Eighteenth-Century Ireland, xxviii (2013). King Tut's Curse (and Other 'Mummy's Curses') The burial mask of Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun. The first comprehensive study of early Celtic cursing, this work analyses both medieval and ancient expressions of Celtic imprecation: from the binding tablets . This is striking because, up to about the 1950s, cursing was probably the most valuable magic in a land where all sorts of mystic forces were treated with respect, from Marian apparitions to banshees. Fairies, rural remedies, stone circles and holy wells have made a modest comeback, in early twenty-first-century Ireland. They formed a sharp edge of the Catholic Association, a mass movement founded by the barrister Daniel OConnell to campaign against anti-Catholic discrimination and for the repeal of Irelands union with Britain. On the Traditions of the County of Kilkenny, Transactions of the Kilkenny Archaeological Society, i (1851), 365. Overall though, cursing is best conceived of as an art because of the cultivation it required and the strength of the reactions it elicited. Cursing, with its traditional resonances, was a powerful tool for conventionally demure women to loudly and forcefully object.143, Cursing dwindled, in Ireland, as its major uses disappeared and the networks that transmitted knowledge about it atrophied. But when they cursed, women literally let their hair down.67 It marked a new if temporary status, their unwillingness to be restrained by ordinary gender norms, and their intention to unleash hidden powers. 95, 1467; vol. Inspiration for a fuller, more dynamic understanding of cursing, and perhaps other forms of magic too, can be derived from the way that magicians since classical times have imagined the ars magica the art of magic.18 Although pioneering anthropologists like Bronisaw Malinowski acknowledged the art of magic, this understanding of the controversial topic has been forgotten by many recent studies in which, as one not unsympathetic critic puts it: all too often a sense of magic is lost.19. Worried its clergy were abusing the terrifying priests curse, Irelands Catholic Church periodically forbade the practice. It all came out. May you be accursed in the sight of God, and hated by your fellow man. Women and children elicited more sympathy, so husbands generally waited out of view. George Borrow, Wild Wales: Its People, Language, and Scenery, 3 vols. Maledictions were uttered across Ireland, North and South, Protestant and Catholic districts, even in towns and cities. It also reminds us that not all types of magic share the same chronology of rise and fall, growth and decline, enchantment and disenchantment. Shivas Curse Upon Brahma 4. Cursing was demanding, sophisticated, formidable and imposing. Partly this was because the church hierarchy was now firmly in control. Irish Cursing and the Art of Magic, 1750-2018 - OUP Academic Curse of the Stolen Cloak A rare Roman-era curse tablet found in England asks that the Celtic god Maglus punish a thief. Sulis - Mother Goddess, Goddess of Healing Springs - Celtic Goddess 1. Drawing on these sources, this article begins the study of modern Irish cursing. dissertation, 2012). Nineteenth-century Irish folk possessed a deep oral literacy and a high capacity for verbal sparring. Fionnuala Carson Williams, A Fire of Stones Curse, Folk Life, xxxv (1996/1997); Fionnuala Carson Williams, A Fire of Stones Curse Rekindled, Folk Life, xlii (2003). Blessings and curses: Another Celtic tradition that survived long into Christian times was the belief in blessings and curses. May the arm that is now sick, sling dead and powerless by her side before twelve months time. May Gods curse and my curse light down on her every day she rises, a mother from Ballybay cried in 1911, on the woman she blamed for spoiling her relationship with her adult son.74 Many maledictions, however, were horribly detailed and gory. Ronald Hutton, Witch-Hunting in Celtic Societies, Past and Present, no. A solemn curse was uttered with poise and determination, with a hair-raising seriousness seldom found in everyday life. ), Magical Folk: British and Irish Fairies 500 ad to the Present (London, 2018); Andrew Sneddon and John Fulton, Witchcraft, the Press and Crime in Ireland, 18221922, Historical Journal, lxii (2019).
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