Monaghan Patricia. The Encyclopedia of Celtic Mythology and Folklore

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Heathrow British archaeological site. Now

the name of an airport near London, Heathrow

was originally a pre-Roman Celtic settlement

from the fourth century B.C.E., which included

an impressive square earthworks originally

topped by a timber TEMPLE and surrounded by a

colonnade of posts. Such a square-within-a-

square design has also been noted in temple

buildings in other Romano-Celtic regions, sug-

gesting that the design has roots in Celtic reli-

gious views.

heaven Cosmological concept. The Celts

generally did not imagine heaven and earth as

opposed to each other; nor did they describe

them as a complementary pair. There is, for

example, no myth of the marriage of heaven and

earth, nor of their forced separation, as occurs in

some other cultures. Instead, fragmentary myths

suggest that the Celtic worldview was similar to

that found in shamanic cultures (see CELTIC

SHAMANISM). While in Judeo-Christian cosmol-

ogy heaven is usually seen as the abode of the

dead and of the divine forces, the Celts located

both in the OTHERWORLD, which could be found

out to sea, under a hill, or in an invisible universe

parallel to ours, but never in the sky.

Hedessa British folkloric figure. This spirit of

the small SPRING in the Peaklands that bears her

name (Hedess Spring) may derive from an

ancient water goddess.

Hefydd Hen (Hefaidd Hen, Heveidd Henn)

Welsh hero or god. Hefydd the Ancient or Old

Hefydd was the father of RHIANNON, the mytho-

logical horsewoman who appears to be a dimin-

ished goddess. Thus Hefydd himself may have

been an ancestral Welsh divinity, although no

recorded story explains his mythical function.

Heilyn Minor Welsh hero. When BRÂN THE

BLESSED waged his fierce war on Ireland in the

Welsh epic MABINOGION, only a few warriors

survived the battles. Heilyn was one; he opened

the magic door through which the survivors

escaped.

Hellawes Arthurian heroine. A sorceress,

Hellawes attempted unsuccessfully to seduce the

great knight LANCELOT.

Hellyas Arthurian hero. This minor figure in

Arthurian legend was an ancestor of the ROUND

TABLE knight LANCELOT.

Hengroen (Llamrei) Arthurian figure. This

name is given in the Welsh TRIADS to king

ARTHUR’s horse in the final battle at CAMLAN.

Henky Scottish folkloric figure. In the islands

off Scotland, Orkney and the Shetlands, FAIRY

people could be detected because they limped

(“henked”) when they danced, although the rea-

son for this handicap is not explained in folklore.

Thus Henky was a common name for a fairy

person in that region.

Henwen British goddess of abundance. In

British mythology this magical sow-goddess

(“old white one”) came forth early in creation to

give life to the world. As she roamed the hilly

countryside, she gave birth to litter after litter.

Instead of piglets, however, Henwen produced a

grain of wheat and a BEE; a grain of barley and a

bee; a WOLF cub, an eaglet, and a kitten, each

strange litter in a different part of the country.

Hen Wife (Cailleach nan Cearac) Scottish

folkloric character. On farms in the Scottish

Highlands, a woman who kept chickens was

believed to have magical powers and thus to be

associated with WITCHCRAFT. The same was not

true of a man who operated the same business.

The character of the Hen Wife appears in a

number of folktales and may be connected with

the CAILLEACH as goddess of animals, or it may

244 Heathrow

simply derive from the perceived power of

women who earned their own living through the

sale of EGGS and meat.

herbs See HEALING.

Hercules Romano-Celtic god. Celtic artists

did not typically depict gods in human form;

with the arrival of the invading Romans around

200 B.C.E., however, they adapted their style to

reflect classical figure modeling. In addition, the

INTERPRETATIO ROMANA—the renaming of

Celtic gods and goddesses with the names of

Roman divinities—encouraged artists to carve

deities with classical as well as Celtic attributes

and to label them with Roman names. Thus the

Greco-Roman hero Hercules appears frequently

in Celtic art, particularly on the Continent, as an

altered version of Celtic gods, some of whose

names are known, while others are lost. SEGOMO,

BORVO, and SMERTRIUS are all shown as brawny,

powerful gods bearing Herculean clubs, but

what these gods meant to their people is not

entirely clear; Borvo’s connection with the heal-

ing springs at Aix-les-Bains suggests that he may

have fought disease rather than other gods.

According to the second century C.E. Greek

writer Lucian, the god of eloquence, OGMIOS,

was depicted as Hercules because verbal talent

was a kind of strength among the Celtic people.

Herla British folkloric or mythological being.

In Herefordshire it was believed that a king of

ancient times, Herla, still haunted the land in the

form of a tiny half-animal man astride a large

GOAT. Trapped in the OTHERWORLD centuries

ago, Herla was doomed to lead the WILD HUNT,

called Herla’s Rade, on moonlit nights—

although some sources say that he transferred

this duty to the English king and thereafter

rested in the Otherworld.

Hermes See MERCURY.

Herne British folkloric figure. In The Merry

Wives of Windsor, Shakespeare speaks of Herne as

a hunter who hanged himself from an oak tree and

was thereafter forced to haunt the woods where he

died. Herne the Hunter appears in various legends

as a horned spirit, suggesting that he may have

originated as a woodland deity like CERNUNNOS.

One tale from Windsor Forest describes Herne in

language typical of FAIRIES, for he was said to shoot

his victims with invisible darts if they intruded

upon magical places. (See GWYNN AP NUDD.)

heron Symbolic animal. Several BIRD species

had specific symbolic value in Celtic tradition.

One of these was the heron, which as a waterbird

existed in several elements (air, land, water), thus

becoming an emblem of OTHERWORLD power.

Herons appear in contexts similar to that of

CRANES, typically representing the feminine

force. An exception is the story of the bitter

satirist AITHIRNE who sought to steal the herons

of the FAIRY MOUND of BRÍ LÉITH. These herons

represented the sinful quality of inhospitality.

hero’s portion See CHAMPION’S PORTION.

Herzeloyde Arthurian heroine. This princess

of Wales did not want to marry just anyone; she

demanded a man who was truly heroic. And so

she let it be known that whoever won a tourna-

ment would win her hand as well. After years of

adventuring in the east, the warrior GAHMURET

arrived on the scene just in time to claim the

prize. Gahmuret was rather footloose and, after

impregnating his bride, left for the east once

again, where his luck ran out and he was slain.

Heartbroken, Herzeloyde moved to a small

woodland cottage, where she gave birth to her

son, PERCIVAL, whom she intended to keep from

all knowledge of his heritage. His heroic blood

found its way out when Percival was old enough

to join king ARTHUR at CAMELOT.

Hibernia Celtic land. This ancient name,

which meant “winter country,” was used by Greek

Hibernia 245

and Roman writers to refer to both Ireland and,

occasionally, Britain. To Mediterranean peoples,

the rainy chill of Ireland apparently seemed a per-

petual winter.

high king (ard rí, ard ri, ard righe) Irish social

role. The question of what power the king of

TARA had over other Irish kings is far from set-

tled. Because a king’s power came from the

TUATH (his people and their land) and from his

union with the goddess of the land, there seems

little likelihood that Tara’s king held centralized

political authority. While it is easy today to

imagine a group of lesser kings who reported to

the high king, that was not the case. The high

king held a ceremonial and religious office

rather than a political one. He could not demand

that other kings follow his orders, but he had the

responsibility of keeping Ireland fertile and

blooming by following his BUADA and geasa (see

GEIS), his sacred vows and taboos. Many high

kings figure prominently in mythology, includ-

ing NIALL of the Nine Hostages, CONN of the

Hundred Battles, and CONAIRE.

hill See FAIRY MOUND.

hillfort (rath, ráth, dun, dún, lis, cashel)

Celtic archaeological site. Across Ireland, and to

some extent in Britain as well, remains of Celtic

settlements still stand, their various names all

describing a high wall of earth, usually atop a

hill, and usually circular. Some archaeological

evidence suggests that over these permanent

foundation walls, buildings of wood were

erected; some archaeological evidence has been

found supporting that theory. Built from

approximately 700 B.C.E. through the early

Middle Ages, the hillforts are connected to

Celtic settlement and seem to have been loca-

tions for trade, government, and ceremony.

That Ireland was a populous land in the first

century of the common era is suggested by more

than 30,000 surviving hillforts, each of which

would have housed from several dozen to several

score residents. Many towns today still carry the

name of the hillfort of the area: Rathangan,

Lisdoonvarna, Lisadell, Dunmore. Cashels are

somewhat larger than other hillforts and, like

the town that bears that name in Tipperary, were

usually built on high, easily defensible ground.

In all cases, the earthen walls of the hillforts

appear to have been constructed to simplify

defense of the site. Some hillforts important in

myth include GRIANÁN AILEACH, EMAIN MACHA,

TARA, and CRUACHAN.

Sources: Aalen, F. H. A. Man and the Landscape in

Ireland. London: Academic Press, 1978, pp. 81

ff; Raftery, Brian. Pagan Celtic Ireland: The

Enigma of the Irish Iron Age. London: Thames

and Hudson, 1994, pp. 38 ff.

Hill of Allen See ALMU.

Hill of Tara See TARA.

Hill of Uisneach See UISNEACH.

Hill of Ward See TLACHTGA.

Historical Cycle (Cycle of the Kings) Irish

mythological texts. Several sequences of Irish

myths appear in ancient manuscripts, generally

divided, in roughly chronological order of the

supposed occurrences, into the MYTHOLOGICAL

CYCLE, the ULSTER CYCLE, the FENIAN CYCLE,

and the Historical Cycle. The last includes sto-

ries whose events would have occurred between

late Celtic and early Christian times (third to

11th century C.E.). Many tales appear based in

historical reality, but they have been embellished

with mythological motifs and descriptions of

supernatural happenings. The stories often

revolve around the important ritual and political

center at TARA and concern the Celtic concept of

SOVEREIGNTY or right rulership. Among the

kings who appear in the Historical Cycle are

246 high king

CONN of the Hundred Battles, CORMAC MAC

AIRT, MONGÁN, and GUAIRE.

hoard Archaeological site. Celtic hoards,

found in BOGS and similar hiding places, include

gold TORCS, embellished CAULDRONS, and lunae

or moon-collars. Scholars believe that the treas-

ures were deposited in the bogs to protect them

against theft by invaders, perhaps Vikings.

Hoards were also intended as

SACRIFICE, perhaps

in cases of epidemics or other disasters, either

threatened or actual.

hob (Hobtrust, hobtrush, hobgoblin) British

and Scottish folkloric figure. The syllable hob,

frequently found in words related to FAIRIES, is

believed to be a diminutive for Robert, a name

given to English BROWNIES or helpful household

spirits; the flattering name ROBIN GOODFELLOW

comes from the same stem. In northern Britain

the hob was a kindly spirit, helpful to local peo-

ple when they needed HEALING or farm work. As

with similar beings, it was important never to

reward the hob in any way, for that would scare

him off (see LAYING THE FAIRIES).

Less kindly hobs were also known in folklore,

such as Hob Headless, a scary being who haunted

a road near the River Kent. Confined under a

rock for 99 years, Hob Headless trapped

passersby who rested upon his rock, gluing them

down so that they could not rise and escape. Hob

Headless is typical of the hobgoblin, a generic

name for malicious spirits. In Scotland hobgob-

lins caused distress and mischief just for their

own sake. They took on ominous forms to terrify

people walking at night; even a haystack could

become a threatening apparition, coming alive in

the night and frightening the traveler into an

exhausting run or a useless fight against the invis-

ible foe. Variant legends say that to encounter

such an apparition indicated coming death.

Sources: Campbell, John Grigorson. Witchcraft and

Second Sight in the Highlands and Islands of

Scotland. Detroit: Singing Tree Press, 1970,

p. 131; Clarke, David. Ghosts and Legends of the

Peak District. Norwich: Jarrold Publishing, n.d.,

p. 36; Spence, Lewis. The Minor Traditions of

British Mythology. New York: Benjamin Blom,

Inc., 1972, p. 90.

hobbyhorse British folkloric figure. Many

folkloric events are believed to be remnants of

early religious ceremonies, degraded by the pas-

sage of years. One of these is the hobbyhorse, a

puppet of a horse worn by a man in parades at

British festivals. As the syllable hob usually indi-

cates a connection with the

OTHERWORLD, the

hobbyhorse is thought to derive from Celtic prac-

tice, perhaps related to the horse goddess EPONA.

Hogmany (Hagmany) Scottish festival. The

last day of the year in Scotland (sometimes called

“the night of the candles” or “the night of the

pelting”) was celebrated with many traditional

activities, some of which have roots in the Celtic

worldview. Candles were kept lit all night.

Houses were decorated with HOLLY, branches of

which were used to whip boys for their own pro-

tection, with each drop of blood drawn assuring

them of a year of good health.

A man dressed in a cowhide bellowed

through the streets, followed by men and boys

throwing snowballs and striking him with a

switch to create a loud boom. This rowdy pro-

cession followed the sun’s course (see DIREC-

TIONS) THREE times around the village, striking

each house for good luck, demanding treats or

money or both, and repeating a nonsense rhyme.

Upon being admitted to a home, the Hogmany

party offered the caisein-uchd—a sheep’s breast-

bone on a stick—to the household, to be placed

in the fire and held to the noses. Such peculiar

traditions have their roots in protective rituals

intended to keep the participants healthy

through the new year and may earlier have been

used for DIVINATION.

Sources: Campbell, John Grigorson. Witchcraft and

Second Sight in the Highlands and Islands of

Hogmany 247

Scotland. Detroit: Singing Tree Press, 1970, p.

230; Carmichael, Alexander. Carmina Gadelica:

Hymns and Incantations. Hudson, N.Y.:

Lindisfarne Press, 1992, pp. 76–78, 579; Ross,

Anne. Folklore of the Scottish Highlands. London:

B. T

. Batsford, Ltd., 1976, p. 122.

holed stones Symbolic object. In addition to

their uses for healing (see HEALING STONES),

large rocks with holes in them were used in all

the Celtic lands to seal marriage vows. Loving

couples clasped hands through the natural holes

while pledging their troth. In some regions a

church wedding was not considered valid unless

vows were also spoken at the holed stone. In

Britain the term DOBIE Stone is applied to these

natural formations, connecting them with the

FAIRIES of that name.

hollow hill Irish folkloric site. The idea that

some hills are hollow, the better to accommo-

date the FAIRY palaces within them, is typical of

Irish images of the OTHERWORLD as a region

close to our world yet not part of it.

holly Symbolic plant. Its red berries and shiny

evergreen leaves made the common holly (genus

Ilex), a small TREE or shrub, especially visible in

snowy woodlands, and thus it became associated

with the Christian midwinter feast of Christmas.

The name comes from Middle English and is

associated with the word holy. Before

Christianization, however, the tree had been

sacred to the Celts as the emblem of the ruler of

winter, the Holly King, whose opponent was the

OAK King; a vestige of this seasonal combat may

be found in the Welsh myth of combat between

the kings HAFGAN and ARAWN. The holly is sym-

bolically paired with the IVY, the first represent-

ing the masculine force, the second symbolizing

the feminine; the connection remains familiar

through the holiday song, “The Holly and the

Ivy,” whose melody and lyrics date to the

medieval period.

holy wells See WELL.

honor-price See ÉRIC.

hooper (hooter) Cornish folkloric figure. A

helpful but sometimes vindictive Cornish

weather spirit like the Scottish GRAY MAN, the

hooper was a dense fog that blocked out all

vision, or a cloudy curtain from which a central

light shone. Anyone who saw the hooper stayed

ashore, for its appearance was invariably fol-

lowed by fierce storms. One legend tells of a

sailor who jeered at the hooper and took out his

crew despite the warning; his boat passed into

the gloom and was never seen again.

horn (antlers, horned god, horned goddess)

Symbolic object. One of the primary symbols of

the god of male potency, horns or ANTLERS are

frequently found on Celtic divinities. Two major

forms of the horned god have been cataloged.

The first wears the antlers of a STAG and sits

cross-legged, staring forward. This Gaulish god

is usually dubbed CERNUNNOS, “the horned one,”

after an inscription found on a sculpture of this

type in Paris; he is thought to represent a force of

prosperity. Occasionally this figure is depicted as

having

THREE HEADS, although it is possible that

such sculptures indicate the connection of

Cernunnos with other gods. Gaulish MERCURY

and COCIDIUS are also occasionally shown wear-

ing horns, although the symbol is not always

associated with these divinities of wealth.

The second type of horned god showed

horns of domestic animals, usually those of

BULLS, attached to the heads of male deities.

Although many such divinities have been found,

they have no distinctive symbols save the horns

to tell us what they represent. As horned helmets

have been found, presumably originally worn by

warriors or leaders, the horns may represent

leadership and power.

Goddesses are also found with horns,

although less often than gods. Usually the god-

248 holed stones

dess wears antlers, which are found on the heads

of some female DEER, although occasionally

bulls’ or goats’ horns crown a goddess’s head.

Such goddesses are believed to indicate a force

of animal nature and a link between female

fecundity and the animal world.

A peculiarly Celtic religious symbol was the

RAM-HEADED SNAKE, which was translated in

Christian times to an image of evil rather than

of power. The Christian

DEVIL with its ram’s

horns is a direct descendant of this powerful

Celtic divinity.

Some folkloric celebrations seem to encode

ancient rituals of the horned god; see ABBOTS

BROMLEY.

Sources: Green, Miranda. The Gods of Roman

Britain. Aylesbury: Shire Publications Ltd.,

1983, pp. 64 ff; Green, Miranda. Symbol and

Image in Celtic Religious Art. London:

Routledge, 1989, pp. 27, 87, 96; Ross, Anne.

Pagan Celtic Britain: Studies in Iconography and

Tradition. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul,

1967, pp. 18, 127, 132.

horse Symbolic animal. One of the most

important animals to the Celts was the horse,

not only for religious and symbolic reasons but

also for practical ones. The Celts were known

throughout ancient Europe for their horseman-

ship, especially in warfare. Horses were central

to the Celtic way of life as a means of trans-

portation and as an indication of nobility. Celtic

nobles rode in chariots instead of on horse back,

while less honored warriors formed the mounted

cavalry. Nobles were often buried with their

horses and gear, indicating a connection in life

that was not ended by death.

The funerary use of horses in Celtic lands

may derive from their association with the solar

power; the SUN is seen in many cultures as bear-

ing the dead away at sunset and into rebirth at

dawn. Celtic COINS with solar and equine

emblems suggest a connection between horses

and the sun, the spoked wheel, a double image of

sun and horse-drawn chariot, was especially

linked to the goddess EPONA, champion of the

Celtic cavalry under Roman occupation, whose

cult spread into Rome itself. Some have found in

the nursery rhyme “Ride a cock horse to

Banbury Cross, to see a fine lady upon a white

horse” a faint folkloric echo of Epona; similar

connections have been drawn to the quasi-

historical figure of Lady GODIVA, who rode

naked on horseback to protest her husband’s

oppressive taxation policies.

On the Continent the widespread cult of the

goddess Epona (whose name means “horse” or,

because it is feminine in gender, “mare”), passed

from the Celts to the Roman legionnaires, for

whom she became the cavalry goddess. Many

Romano-Celtic sculptures and reliefs show

Epona seated on a horse, surrounded by horses

or foals, or offering feed to horses. Because of the

reverence due the horse and to Epona, the Celts

did not eat horseflesh, a taboo that has passed

into contemporary European cuisine. The taboo

was lifted on sacramental occasions when horses

were sacrificed, as at the midsummer festival.

In Ireland the horse was connected with the

goddess of SOVEREIGNTY through the banais ríghe,

the sacred marriage of king and land goddess that

the early geographer Geraldus Cambrensis claims

included the sacramental mating of the king with

a white mare; the mare was then killed and

cooked into a broth that the king drank. This

curious ritual, recorded in no other text, has

corollaries in other parts of the Indo-European

world, most notably in India, but there is schol-

arly debate over whether the HORSE SACRIFICE

was indeed part of Irish royal INAUGURATION.

An Irish corollary to Epona is found in

MACHA, who proved herself faster than the king’s

team in a horse race that ended in her death.

Also in Ireland, connection between horses and

humans appears in the post-Christian folktale

that Noah brought animals two by two into the

ark, except for the horse; he accidentally brought

only a mare, which was impregnated by one of

Noah’s sons, so that all horses today have a dis-

tant human ancestor. This peculiar tale seems to

horse 249

dimly reflect the same alleged kingship ritual

mentioned above.

Irish folklore credited horses with SECOND

SIGHT, especially with the ability to see GHOSTS

of the dead—possibly a connection to the ani-

mal’s ancient funerary symbolism. According to

legend, a rider who looked between the ears of a

mount shared the horse’s ability to see ghosts.

Horses were sometimes stolen and ridden by

FAIRIES; in the early morning the animals were

lathered with sweat as though they had spent the

night galloping despite being confined to their

stalls. Only one horse could not be stolen by the

fairies, and that was the fiorláir or true mare, the

seventh consecutive filly born of a mare. Where

the true mare was born, a four-leafed CLOVER

called Mary’s Clover sprang up, imbued with

curative powers. Such a rare horse protected her

rider from any harm, of this world or another,

and could never be beaten in a race. Other

superstitions also emphasized the protective

power of horses; burying a horse’s head in a

building’s foundation kept its occupants safe.

In Wales the horse is associated with the figure

of RHIANNON, a goddess who appears in the first

branch of the MABINOGION riding an impressively

speedy white horse and surrounded by endlessly

singing birds. After she married king PWYLL,

Rhiannon gave birth to a son who was kidnapped

under mysterious circumstances; she bore the

blame, and until her name was cleared, she had to

carry all visitors to the palace on her back, thus

reinforcing her connection to the horse.

In England horse figures are found carved

into the turf of chalky lands such as Berkshire

and Wiltshire. Eleven white horses are cut into

the sides of hills, dated according to their style to

the late 18th or early 19th century and inter-

preted as regimental emblems. However, some

of these horses may have been carved over ear-

lier, possibly Celtic, horse figures. Apparently

unchanged for many centuries is the renowned

WHITE HORSE OF UFFINGTON, whose slender,

graceful body stylistically resembles horses from

Celtic coins. Archaeologists are hesitant to pro-

vide a date for the Uffington horse, although

excavations measuring the rate of slippage down

the hillside have calculated its age as consistent

with Celtic occupation of the region.

“Scouring” the horses—removing the turf

that would have grown over them if not regularly

weeded—was a community affair that often coin-

cided with a fair or market; the seven-year cycle of

scouring the Uffington horse continued into

recent centuries, with more than 30,000 people

recorded as having attended the ceremonies and

festival in 1780. The English novelist Thomas

Hughes set his 1889 book, The Scouring of the

White Horse, at the festival; the book is considered

an adequate source for folklore of the region.

Sources: Dexter, Miriam Robbins. Whence the

Goddesses: A Sourcebook. New York: Pergamon

Press, 1990, pp. 92–93; Green, Miranda. The

Gods of Roman Britain. Aylesbury: Shire

Publications Ltd., 1983, p. 23; Green, Miranda.

Symbol and Image in Celtic Religious Art. London:

Routledge, 1989, pp. 146; Ross, Anne. Pagan

Celtic Britain: Studies in Iconography and T

radition.

London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1967, p. 321.

horse sacrifice Irish ritual. The early traveler

to Ireland, Giraldus Cambrensis, wrote an

account in the early sixth century C.E. of a ritual

HORSE sacrifice that many scholars have

accepted as accurate, despite the absence of any

similar accounts. According to Giraldus, the

INAUGURATION of the Irish HIGH KING at TARA,

the banais ríghe, required that the candidate have

intercourse with a white mare, who was then

killed, cooked up into broth, and devoured by

the king. Often described as a “barbaric” rite,

this unusual ritual might be disregarded as

unlikely, save that it echoes another Indo-

European inauguration, in which the queen was

to wear the hide of a newly slaughtered mare for

ritual coition with the king.

Source: Dexter, Miriam Robbins. Whence the

Goddesses: A Sourcebook. New York: Pergamon

Press, 1990, pp. 92–93.

250 horse sacrifice

hospitality Symbolic ritual. In Celtic Ireland

the king’s duty included the redistribution of

wealth through endless feasting and open-door

hospitality. Should a king fail to provide for guests,

he could lose the throne, as happened when the

beautiful half-FORMORIAN king BRES fed a BARD

poorly and was forced from power as a result.

Hospitality was not only required of kings.

Other members of society were expected to

open their doors to the needy and to travelers.

Those who set up households at crossroads

thereby showed their willingness to feed and

house the passerby. Largesse was equal to the

person’s means; thus an impoverished person

could offer meager food, while a wealthy one

was expected to spread an impressive table. Cuts

of meat and other foods were offered according

to the caller’s social rank; only a few visitors

could expect honey wherever they went. Thus

Celtic expectations of hospitality were a form of

resource reallocation.

hot water Irish folkloric motif. Irish lore

warned against throwing hot water outside at

night, for fear that it might strike and harm the

FAIRY folk who lingered in the farmyards after

hours. In the days before drains were installed in

cottage kitchens, the housewife threw the cook-

ing and cleaning water onto the stones of the

haggard or courtyard, thus cleaning the yard

with the used water. Cries warning the fairies

against the coming boiling splash (“Towards ye!

Towards ye!”) would also have been useful in

keeping any unobserved humans safe from

inconvenient drenching.

Hu (Hu Gadarn, Hu the Mighty) Neo-pagan

god. The prime deity of some cults of contem-

porary NEO-PAGANS who claim to be practicing

DRUIDS, this agricultural divinity appears to date

to the Middle Ages, although he may be a ves-

tige of an earlier god.

Hulac Warren (Hector Warren) British folk-

loric site. A great rock called the Warren Stone

near Buxton was once a GIANT of this name. When

he tried to rape the maiden HEDESSA, she turned

into a spring, while he was petrified into stone.

The story, which recalls tales of the Greek Apollo’s

attempts on innumerable nymphs, may be a com-

bination of classical and indigenous stories.

human sacrifice Celtic ritual. According to

Roman sources, both the continental and the

insular Celts practiced human sacrifice. Julius

Caesar described a ritual in which victims were

trapped, together with scores of animals, in a

gigantic human form made from wicker, then

burned alive; Diodorus Siculus, Strabo, and

Tacitus agree that the Celts sacrificed human

beings to their gods. The latter claimed that the

Celtic priesthood of DRUIDS “deemed it a duty to

cover their altars with the blood of captives and

to consult their deities through human entrails.”

The murderous assault on the Celtic sanctuary

at ANGLESEY was explained as necessary to exter-

minate a priestly class that Tacitus said wor-

shiped at altars “soaked with human blood.”

Later writers, friendlier to the Celts, argued

that the Romans slandered their most powerful

European enemies. Contemporary evidence

suggests that human sacrifice may indeed have

been practiced, although probably not regularly,

by the druids. Such sacrifices may have been an

ancient form of capital punishment, reserved for

criminals and other prisoners. Because the Celts

are thought to have believed in REINCARNATION,

the taking of a human life would have had a dif-

ferent meaning for them than for those who

believed in a single lifetime.

Sacrificed humans may not have suffered a tor-

tuous death in Caesar’s WICKER MAN. Bodies found

in BOGS in circumstances that suggest sacrifice of

people with fine nails and skin and full stomachs,

perhaps individuals of a high, perhaps even royal,

class who were well treated before death. Some,

such as the LINDOW MAN, appear to have suffered

the THREEFOLD DEATH of strangling, cutting, and

drowning. Some myths, such as that of the HIGH

KING CONAIRE, who was burned to death in the

human sacrifice 251

hostel of DA DERGA, support the idea of human

sacrifice as a Celtic practice.

Sources: Lonigan; Paul R. The Druids: Priests of the

Ancient Celts. Contributions to the Study of

Religion, No. 45. Westport, Conn.:

Greenwood Press, 1996, pp. 100 f

f; Piggot,

Stuart. The Druids. London: Thames and

Hudson, 1968, pp. 110 ff.

hungry grass Irish folkloric site. Folklore is

never static; significant historical moments find

their way into folktales. This was the case with the

Irish Famine, called in Irish An Gorta Mór, The

Great Hunger. English occupation of the island

denied Irish farmers the right to own land, so most

lived as impoverished tenants of often absent land-

lords. What made this possible was an agricultural

import from South America: the potato, which

thrived in the rainy Irish climate. A small patch of

land, even one measuring less than an acre, when

planted with potatoes could provide enough suste-

nance to support a farming family.

Combined with limited access to other food,

such monoculture provides the conditions for

famine when disease or poor weather strike.

Such was the case in 1848–50, when an airborne

fungus caused the potatoes to turn into black

slime immediately after harvesting. There was

still ample food available, in the form of CATTLE

being readied for market, but most livestock

belonged to the landlords, and so millions of

tenant farmers starved. That Ireland continued

to export food throughout the Famine years led

to continuing bitterness and political strife.

Although the blight passed within the

decade, the effects of the Famine were felt for

years thereafter; Ireland’s population today is

still only half what it was before the Famine

struck. Actual morbidity figures are unknown,

especially given the poor records kept during the

disaster, but it is generally agreed that between

one and one-and-a-half million people died

from starvation and disease, while approximately

the same number were forced to emigrate.

From this tragic sequence of events came the

legend of the hungry grass, patches of soil that

are so infected with memories of the Great

Famine that anyone who steps on them is

instantly stricken with insatiable hunger, and

soon dies even though well fed. Sometimes it is

said that hungry grass grows over the unmarked

graves of Famine victims, other times that it

springs up wherever people died—by the road-

side or in hovels—of hunger. Animals are less

affected by hungry grass than humans, although

there are stories of cattle that died mysteriously

after eating it.

hungry man (féar gortach, far gorta) Irish

folkloric figure. A variant of the legends of the

HUNGRY GRASS that causes insatiable hunger in

anyone who treads upon it, the hungry man is an

insistent vision of a starving beggar who stands

by the roadside with his hand silently out for

alms; giving the hungry man food brings good

luck. Like the hungry grass, this figure is

assumed to have arisen after the Famine of the

1840s, although it may have tapped into earlier

folkloric traditions.

Hy-Brâzil (Hy-Brazil, Hy-breasal, Hy-brasil, I

Breasil) Irish mythological site. Somewhere in

the ocean, the Celts believed, was a magical

island of peace and plenty ruled over by a king,

BRES, or a FAIRY QUEEN, NIAMH of the Golden

Hair, or occasionally MANANNÁN MAC LIR, the sea

god. The ISLAND appeared every seven years,

usually in a different place, always in the west.

Several islands off the west coast of Ireland laid

claim to be Hy-Brâzil, including Inisbofin off the

Galway coast. In 1908 many people claimed they

had spotted Hy-Brâzil in the Atlantic off the west

coast of Ireland, floating in an area of the ocean

where no island had previously been seen.

Belief in the existence of Hy-Brâzil was

strong and long-lasting; the land appears on

medieval European maps as a real island, usually

located off Ireland. When European sailors

reached South America, they believed the rich

252 hungry grass

lands there to be the mythological land of plenty;

thus one of that continent’s major countries still

bears the name of the Celtic magical island.

Hy-Brâzil is sometimes confounded or con-

flated with Otherworldly sites like TIR NA NOG

(“the land of youth”) and MAG MELL (“the plain

of delights”), but each has its own distinctive

qualities.

Source: Löffler, Christa Maria. The Voyage to the

Otherworld Island in Early Irish Literature.

Salzburg Studies in English Literature. Salzburg,

Institut Für Anglistik und Amerikanistik,

Universität Salzburg, 1983, pp. 306 ff.

Hyperboreans Celtic people. The ancient

Greeks recorded the existence of a people they

called the Hyperboreans, a name meaning

“beyond the north wind,” a semi-mythological

people with magical powers. These peaceful veg-

etarians worshiped APOLLO, it was said, in a huge

stone circular TEMPLE associated by some with

STONEHENGE, although most ancient geogra-

phers placed the Hyperborean homeland in

Europe rather than on the island of Britain. By

the fourth century B.C.E., Greek authors were say-

ing that the alleged Hyperborean homeland was

populated by the people they called Celts, adopt-

ing one of the names the Celts themselves used,

which meant “the lofty ones” or “the warriors.”

Hywel Dda (Howel Dda) Welsh hero. In the

southwestern Welsh kingdom of DYFED in the

10th century (ca. 910 to 950 C.E.), king Hywel

Dda (Hywel the Good) created an impressive

body of law codified in the late 12th (some

sources say 13th) century as Cyfraith Hywell or

the Laws of Hywel, the first unified body of law

in the land. This legal code is often described as

the Welsh parallel to the Irish BREHON laws.

Hywel Dda 253