dianaandpansson:

Lá Bealtaine sona daoibh!
Happy Bealtaine everyone! 

I hope you have a beautiful May Eve and May Day! 

Below are some Beltine/Beltane/Bealtaine traditions:

“[Gaelic Beltane superstitions] were concerned with the safety of the familiar things which supported life, and especially the milk cows whose ‘whitemeats’ were to provide the main food-supply until harvest came round once more. It was a matter of pride to have a last formal dish of stirabout on May Day, ‘for if they can hold out so well with bread they can do well enough…for then milk becomes plenty, and butter, new cheese, and curds and shamrocks are the food of the meaner sort all this season’. It was considered mostly unlucky and unwise to give away salt, water or fire on May Day lest the luck and ‘profit’ of the farm went with the gifts. Witches and fairies were unusually active at this time, and many tales are told of the wiles they adopted to outwit the unwary and gain admission to house or byre to do their mischief. It was a wise precaution to pour milk on the threshold, or at the roots of a fairy thorn, and the many protective charms against the stealing of cattle and milk were augmented by others special to the occasion. ‘On May Eve the peasantry used to drive all their cattle into old raths and forts thought to be much frequented by the fairies, bleed them, taste their blood, and pour the remainder on the earth’(U.J.A. 3.1855, p165). It was said that the ghosts of cattle that had been lost could be seen in such places.

Portents, prognostications and protection were sought in the familiar flowers of field and hedgerow, in the weeds and shrubs his secular struggle for survival, especially in those that carried the promise of butter in their golden cups and a free flow of milk in their bounteous white blossom. May flowers, primroses and gorse gathered before sunrise were scattered on the threshold of the house and garlands of ‘Summer’, as the flowers were called, were hung on the doorposts and even tied to the cows’ tails. In the Antrim Glens the mayflowers were crushed to provide a juice with which the cows’ udders were washed, and elsewhere buttercups were used for the purpose. Cow dung, if less hygienic, had similar protective power, presumably in the belief that it contained the essence of the flowers of the fields. Sprigs of rowan were stuck in the midden, placed over the door of the byre and hung on the cows’ horns. Flowers were also put around the well, for it was supposed that a milk-thief could steal your summer’s milk and butter by skimming the water at this time, or by dragging a rope across a field to collect the dew. Boundary streams were also potent in this connexion, and I was told in Donegal that the milk churn had to be washed on May Day in ‘three landlords’ waters’, that is the meeting place of three properties.  

…

The May Day bonfires and the May Queens are now little more than children’s games and excuses for begging. The burning of bones – whence the word bonfire, which in Ireland keeps its original pronunciation- and in particular of horses’ bones, were formerly considered proper to the occasion. There were dances round the fires, performed with great dexterity and precision by youths armed with cudgels. The May-pole, however, and the May-bush observances seem to go with areas of strong English influence and do not seem to have been generally adopted by the Irish, perhaps because May-trees, which are not given this name in Ireland, are likely to be fairy thorns and therefore should not be damaged. The May Eve assemblies are thus described in eighteenth century Kilkenny: ‘Bloody battles and much confusion and uproar is the mischief that follows from the barbarous and unheeded custom of collecting May-balls among the new-married folks…The hedges and fences, in the outlets of our city, are stripped of full-grown hawthorns, whose late blooming pride and fragrancy is now miserably dying away on dunghills before cabin doors, the new-married linnet and his mate, but fastened in the ground for the vilest purpose – to hang filthy clouts upon’. The gold and white balls which were hung on maypoles have been regarded as symbols of sun and moon – or it may be of butter and milk. Another May Day custom was the license allowed young boys to run about stinging people wth nettles, a privilege which in my youth in Shropshire was permitted only on 29th May, the victims being those who did not wear on oak-apple.” 

– Irish Folkways by E. Estyn Evans

Below are some prayers for protection during Beltine:

The protection of Odhran the dun be yours,
The protection of Brigit the Nurse be yours,
The protection of Mary the Virgin be yours,
In marshes and in rocky ground,
In marshes and in rocky ground.

The keeping of Ciaran the swart be yours,
The keeping of Brianan the yellow be yours,
The keeping of Diarmaid the brown be yours,
A-sauntering the meadows,
A-sauntering the meadows.

The safeguard of Fionn mac Cumhall be yours,
The safeguard of Cormac the shapely be yours,
The safeguard of Conn and Cumhall be yours
From wolf and from bird-flock
From wolf and bird-flock.

The sanctuary of Colum Cille be yours,
The sanctuary of Maol Ruibhe be yours,
The sanctuary of the milking maid be yours,
To seek and search for you,
To seek and search for you.

The encircling of Maol Odhrain be yours,
The encircling of Maol Oighe be yours,
The encircling of Maol Domhnaich be yours,
To protect you and to herd you,
To protect you and to herd you.

The shield of the king of the Fiann be yours
The shield of the king of the sun be yours
The shield of the king of the stars be yours
In jeopardy and distress,
In jeopardy and distress.

The sheltering of the king of kings be yours,
The sheltering of Jesus Christ be yours,
The sheltering of the Spirit of healing be yours,
From evil deed and quarrel,
From evil dog and red dog.

Offering the bannocks to the Beltine fire ‘This I give to thee, preserve thou my horses; this to thee, preserve thou my sheep’ 

And throwing behind you ‘This I give to thee, O Fox! Spare thou my lambs; this to thee, O hooded Crow! this, O Eagle!’ 

For more information I recommend you visit the Tairis website and read the ceremony and festival sections on Beltine.