The knowledge and wisdom of so many generations. My mothers and grandmothers, and theirs before them. We were hefted* to Blackie Knowe and the glen where the Blackie Burn flows into the river. It was fine country. Rocks provided hiding places and markers when the snow came. We knew which side of the hill to graze on, depending on the wind and on whether the day was fine. Our mothers led us to the best things to eat in each separate and singular week of the year. We watched our mothers and aunts, and learned everything. The sorrel and the thistle, the joys of yarrow and wild thyme, the different grasses, and the tasty water mint. We learned not to fear the shepherd and his dogs too much, even though we didn't like them.

In my second year I was wild and fleet of foot and often caused trouble by breaking away from the flock when the men moved us about for one of their yearly rituals. I learned to be dipped and dosed and shorn. I learned the rollicking time of the tupping paddock, and the long, tiresome winter that followed.

In alarm I panted in the lambing pens, and endured the prodding of a human, while I longed to be out on the clean hill, hidden by a gorse bush, keeping my lambs safe, keeping them all to myself. I could see the patient acceptance of the others as they experienced these indignities. I could see that some ewes and lambs needed the help the shepherds gave them. I felt my milk run and followed the course of its stream back through my mother and grandmother, and outward and forward through myself, my daughters, and sisters, and I felt good.

Then suddenly every gate was opened and we were out! I was calling loudly to my lambs to stay close. Every other ewe was doing the same. Soon we were back under the sky and eating the grass. It tasted so sweet! It was hard at first, not to be anxious about my lambs. I stayed close to ewes I knew well, and for a few weeks we spent as much time calling our lambs as we did eating grass. Summer settled in and we ate our fill of every good thing. I was very proud of my two lambs, they were growing fat on my milk, and learned whatever I showed them with ease.

In late autumn, with new lambs just starting inside us, many of us were driven into a moving box and taken to a frightening place. We were herded into pens and could see and hear many strange sheep and people. We couldn't understand what was happening. My daughter was with me, and I followed my mother and the other friends I had always looked to for guidance, but they were also afraid and lost. Soon we were driven into another box that smelled very strange. In the evening we were put into an unfamiliar  paddock with long, rank grass. We have not seen Glen Blackie since then.

We are confused and fearful in the new place. There are many fences. Some that you can run through, and some you can't. We don't know where to go and where not to go. Nothing makes sense. When we see this new shepherd and his dogs, he is usually fast and angry with us. There doesn't seem to be a way to get back to Glen Blackie. Winter has been mild; my lambs will be born soon. Here, in this new place, my milk will run for them.

What I understand from the Blackface Sheep is the value of native knowledge of one's environment. If you are a city dweller, you know how useful it is to be a bit streetwise. If you are a country person, it's helpful to understand the rhythms of the agricultural year, and the tasks that are going on around you, even though you might not be a farmer yourself. We need points of reference: where to find the things we need, how things work in our world and who our friends are. Some of us know our environment well, but many of us are struggling with new environments or unfamiliar cultures. Sometimes we need to pause and recognise that such changes may be unsettling us more that we think, and to look for sources of knowledge both within ourselves and without, that can help us to re-orient.

This animal also speaks to me of the importance of recognising and honouring intelligence, in ourselves and others. Intelligence isn't just formal education. It isn't as simple as an IQ test. It is also being able to read situations, knowing what is appropriate in the moment, knowing how the world works. Sometimes intelligence is knowing when to patiently put up with things because tomorrow will be another day.

Maybe you're surprised that I see all this in a sheep, but give it a try. Pick something that you understand and see what it has to show you. I'd love to hear about your revelations in the comments!


*Hefted flocks of sheep know the boundaries of the grazing rights of their owners without being fenced in.


If  you enjoyed this post, you might also like The Garron's Musings.

In a recent piece on getting started with Celtic mythology, I touched briefly on how to approach reading myths. In that post there are a few suggestions about finding accessible, inexpensive translations of the Mabinogi and the Irish cycles. Let's now talk more about looking for meaning in the myths.

If you are the kind of person who puts a book down in mid-chapter and picks it up again when you have time, I suggest you take a different approach with myths. Try to read a whole story, or at least a clearly defined episode, in a single sitting. For example, we could divide the first branch of The Mabinogi into two stories. There is the story of Pwyll's adventures in the otherworld, and there is the story of Pwyll and Rhiannon. The second story could be divided further as: 1) Pwyll and Rhiannon's courtship; 2) the two wedding feasts; 3) the loss of Rhainnon's child and her punishment; and 4) Teyrnon's story.  These four episodes can't stand alone in the same way that the two overarching tales do, but they might provide you with reasonable landmarks. If you do get interrupted while reading, it is worth going back to a point that feels like the beginning of an episode, and starting there.

As you read mythology you will probably encounter events, statements or ideas that cause a strong response. Your response might be awe or aversion, an epiphany or downright puzzlement. A good storyteller knows these points in a tale, and will pause, perhaps even repeat a phrase, or explain something. When we read myth, we act as both teller and listener, so please show honour to both yourself and the story by sitting for a moment to feel or think, or even going back over something that stands out.

Over time, some myths will probably feel more important to you than others. Remember that in a storytelling culture, an individual will hear the same stories many times in their life. Allow the tales that are important to you to get under your skin. Allow yourself to live and eat with them, to dream them. As well as reading my favourites often, maybe in different translations, I sometimes try to repeat them in my mind, as if I was telling them to a group of friends. This allows me to see how well I know the story. Can I get all the events in the right order? Am I clear on any causes and effects? This is a great way to make the story part of your life, and maybe one day you will find yourself telling it.

I often hear people encouraging those new to the Celtic path to read various books about mythology "for starters". While they often suggest very good books, I feel that you should let the myths themselves have their say first. Keep an open mind. At some point you may want to read commentary on the myths that interest you. You may be questioning your own interpretation, or just want to learn more about them. There is much depth to be found this way, but the depth you find on your own is real, too. It can be both magical and fragile. Don't let a more scholarly interpretation crush the wisdom you've found. Maybe your wisdom will evolve, and maybe the scholars' wisdom is not the only wisdom.

I love learning. I love good sources of information, and I consider academic work to be invaluable. I just wanted to say that at the start, so as to leave no doubt. If only it were that simple, though.

As Pagans, many of us are trying to recreate, revive or reconstruct elements of ancient practices or ideas. We take an interest in history, mythology, folklore, archaeology and anthropology in ways the general public rarely does. These things inform and inspire each one of us a little differently, and I believe that's as it should be. I want my fellow Pagans to have access to the best quality information about whatever they need to know. I like to share things that will help them get there, including directing them toward the things that helped me.

So why do I think there is trouble? Perhaps a list is the easiest way to cover this.

The trouble with terrible information: There is no doubt that many Pagan and "esoteric" books have been published which are full of bad information. This also goes for blogs, documentaries, and things being taught in workshops. To call the bad stuff scholarship, though, is probably stretching a point, and there are also great documentaries, blogs and workshops. Bad information is nothing new. The Greeks, Romans and medieval Europeans have plenty of BS to offer us. Old isn't always better. Well informed Pagans see the bad stuff for what it is, and like to warn newcomers, which is fine, but it often leads to ...

The trouble with posturing: This is popular on the internet. People with a little knowledge like to lord it over people with a little less, and people with even more knowledge sometimes behave very badly, indeed. A lot of name-calling ensues, but even when it doesn't come to that, we find people speaking in absolute terms about things which any true academic would agree have not been proven. A little knowledge probably isn't that dangerous, but an overabundance can sometimes be the worst weapon, as in...

However, removing the bad manners and bad information only fixes part of the problem ...

The trouble with academia, itself: Academic jobs that provide a decent living are getting harder and harder to come by, especially in the US. This can make career academics wary of questioning the established consensus, or pursuing novel lines of research. It's safer to gently push the edges of whatever is currently accepted, or just keep digging in the middle. This means that little progress gets made in some of the most interesting areas.

There are also issues with "tainted" areas of inquiry. Some of the most brilliant theories and discoveries are made by individuals whose work is patchy. Innovators and lateral thinkers often go down a few wrong roads before they find their answers. They may get overenthusiastic and publish their findings before they have checked all their conclusions, or simply carry their theories too far. They may even fudge things a little, because they are so sure of something that they might as well create an extra margin of proof so people will listen.

Sadly, the posturers of this world rarely consider this. They may have an impressive level of amateur scholarship, but because they love to position themselves as having superior knowledge, they are easily drawn into discrediting things that are academically unfashionable. Granted, there are plenty of dodgy ideas around, and if someone tells me "Oh, nobody listens to her theories, anymore" or "Current research suggests that never happened" I try to follow that up with a bit of research. For example, are various people all quoting one writer's attack on something? Does that attack seem warranted?

One final problem is fame. Academics who get contracts to make documentaries, or who write popular books that actually sell, sometimes come in for a special kind of backstabbing. It's occasionally deserved, and there's no doubt that personal image is as strong a selling point as brains, especially for television, but sometimes, people are just jealous.

The trouble with over-emphasis: Neo-Paganism is a set of spiritual or religious ideas. We may seek the best information about the past as a way of finding our way forward, but it can only take us so far. We all have different ideas about the woo-woo part. "Whatever I feel like" works for some, while others will insist on shared or "verified" gnosis. It's a personal choice. There is an awful lot about deity and spirituality that we can never be sure about, and everyone has a right to choose their own level of filtration. Ultimately, keeping religion/spirituality on a purely academic level cuts its heart out, especially when it comes to ...

The trouble with proof: This one is especially problematic in Celtic studies, because the Celts didn't write about their own culture until comparatively recently. There is a well-known maxim: Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. In other words, if you can't prove that something happened, then maybe it didn't, but without evidence, you also can't be sure that it didn't happen. We have to accept that we can't look into the distant past with accuracy. As much as we'd like to know all about our ancestors' beliefs and customs, we never will. So sometimes we have to trust our hearts, or go with our best guess, or try to channel it, because the only alternative is ...

The trouble with overthinking: I consider myself to be intuitive. Plenty of people are. Most definitions of intuition focus on the ability to reach conclusions without consciously thinking about the knowledge you are drawing on. That's not the same thing as clairvoyance or seeing a holy vision or any of the woo-woo stuff. It's just the mind's ability to connect up ideas without us telling it how. I don't believe that intuition should always be trusted, but I do know that it is only as good as what you feed it. I've never studied calculus, so I'm unlikely to ever have an intuitive breakthrough there. I'm going to have my best intuitive thoughts where my knowledge already runs deepest, and if that knowledge is faulty, my intuition might be, too. That's why I like my little scholarly pursuits, because they feed me. They feed me best if choose my intake wisely, and consume in moderation.

Every time I read this passage I mourn.

However, let's finish the tale:
Naturally, at this point in the story Matholwch is offended and angry, but Bran manages to patch things up with gifts and apologies. However, as the story unfolds we find that the repercussions from Efnisien's actions have barely begun.

Back in Ireland, Branwen bears a son, called Gwern, but resentment against the Welsh over the mutilation of the horses resurfaces, and in retaliation Matholwch forces Branwen to live as a mistreated kitchen slave. When she manages to send to Wales for help, Bran raises a huge army and invades Ireland.

Seeing himself greatly outnumbered, Matholwch swears to give Gwern sovereignty over Ireland in order to make peace. Bran says this isn't enough, so the Irish offer to build a giant feasting hall, large enough to accommodate him. This is accepted, but turns out to be a trap. The Irish warriors are lying in wait, hiding in supposed flour sacks. Efnisien systematically crushes their skulls with his bare hands, unknown to Matholwch.

At the feast, Efnisien throws Branwen's child, Gwern, into the fire, killing him. More fighting ensues, with great losses on both sides. Efnisien dies by breaking a magical cauldron, Branwen dies of a broken heart, and Bran is mortally wounded by a poisoned spear. In the end, only seven of Bran's army return alive, including Manawydan, Taliesin, and Pryderi - the son of Rhiannon.

This is a very brief synopsis, but I have tried to mention everything, and add nothing. Whether one looks at my short re-telling, or the story as it stands in the second branch, every event, every nuance is open to many interpretations. That is the nature of myth, and I can only tell you what I am thinking at the moment.

Horses, the land. queens and sovereignty are closely bound together in the Mabinogi, and to some extent in Irish texts, too. Exactly how this thinking evolved through time is impossible to say. I suspect that it runs all the way back to a time when humans developed some kind of spiritual or magical relationship with horses as prey. This evolved as horses were gradually domesticated first for meat, and then were both ennobled and enslaved for warfare and heavy work.

Humans are adaptable and innovate, but paradoxically their societies are remarkably resistant to change. If the wild, swift and free horses who were hunted for food were venerated in some meaningful way, how did people feel about taking that freedom away? What stories did they create to make this acceptable, and who within these societies was driving these changes? Was the mare already a kind of earth mother deity? Did the changing status of the domesticated mare mirror, or alter the balance of power between male and female in human society?

I can't help feeling that Celtic stories carry some coded message for us. A distant echo, if you like, of how humans came to terms with or even excused, their changing relationship to nature. Did we change an association between the horse and the earth mother into an association between the horse and our new ideas about owning them, and holding territory for them to graze on?

These gradual adaptations must have brought spiritual or religious adjustments with them. Perhaps during times of change there was a sense that humans might be transgressing natural/sacred laws, or at least that they must be careful to continue to show respect for what had been sacred under the old system. The need to conflate the sacred earth and the sacred feminine (equine and human) and with the holding of territory would have been a philosophical balancing act. One which introduced the need for a more concrete idea of sovereignty.

So how is this echoed in the Mabinogi? In the first branch we have the well-known story of Rhiannon, who is more insulted than abused. Pwyll, although rather inept, makes some attempt to show respect for her, and things are resolved to bring about a happy ending to the story.  

When we come to the second branch things shift. While there is a similar tale of the mistreatment of a woman who should be an honoured bringer of sovereignty, she is no longer directly associated with horses. The suffering of these divine queens following their marriages is bad enough, but pales in comparison to Efnisien's mutilation of the horses and the catastrophic events that follow. In the first branch, the insults to the sovereignty bringer, Rhiannon,  are the result of Pwyll's foolishness, and while painful for her, impact only her. Efnisien's actions, however, are cruel and show a deep disregard for the sovereign earth mother in the form of Matholwch's horses. It is no wonder that the destruction which follows is also on a different scale.

Although the narration of the Mabinogi concentrates on the insult to Matholwch, and the rendering useless of his horses, this emphasis probably has its roots in  legal preoccupations and  Christian theology. However, the visceral and highly specific description of Efnisien's crime carries a deep sense of wrongdoing against nature and beauty. Perhaps this hearkens back to an atavistic taboo from our earliest beliefs. The pain and terror inflicted on these horses is an immediate shock to anyone who hears the story. Perhaps we should look into this wound, rather than turning away to focus on the romantic tragedy of Branwen.

It's as if the second branch is saying to us, "Listen. I don't think you fully comprehend the importance of the lesson of the first branch. Let me show you again, more vividly. Let me remind you that there are limits." Efnisien has overstepped the limits of both intention and severity. In the first branch, Rhiannon upbraids Pwyll for unfairly spurring his horse, a crime that shrinks in comparison to Efnisien's bloody rampage.

It is no wonder that none of the characters in this story are able to fix things. Neither sweet Branwen with her tame starling, nor two kings alternating between war and placation, nor Efnision's last minute attempts at heroism can alter the outcome. Men, horses, kings, heirs and kingdoms, the precious cauldron of rebirth and the divine queen herself are lost. At this time in history when those in power seem to have lost all sense of the sacredness of nature, but are leading us to destruction while they squabble over riches and insults, this is a story we need to revisit.

As most Pagans know, both Lammas and Lughnasadh are associated with grain. Lammas comes from the Anglo-Saxon "loaf mass" - a time when the first loaves made from the new wheat crop were taken to the church and blessed. The season of Lammastide had, and still has, all sorts of grain harvest customs associated with it. I remember when I moved to Scotland in the 1980s being amazed to see "Lammas (Scottish quarter day)" printed on the appropriate date, in the appointment diary I bought. The Lammas fairs of Scotland were once major points in the agricultural calendar. With the grain harvest in, it was a good time for agricultural workers who didn't like their current positions to look to "fee" with a different farmer, and Lammas fairs became important hiring fairs. It's not unusual, even now, to hear older people say "It's like a Lammas fair!" when a place is unusually crowded or busy.

If you enjoyed this post, you might also like Reading the Wren

Celtic mythology can be fun and exciting to read, or it can be daunting and difficult. Newcomers to Celtic studies or Celtic Paganism often don't know where to start. I hope this post will help you to get started well and show you how to deepen your engagement. I'll stick to the main bodies of Irish and Welsh myths for this post, just to keep things simple.

Here's a working definition of mythology, to get us started: Stories people have believed for many generations, which cannot be fully confirmed, usually concerning their own origins, culture and gods. These stories have a fairly high degree of stability over time.

There are many medieval books, usually created by monastic scribes, that contain bits of Irish and Welsh myth. Sometimes these are fragmentary because a book got damaged, or because whoever created the book only had access to bits and pieces of a longer tale. Sometimes we find the same thing word-for-word in several manuscripts, sometimes we find quite different versions of the same story in two different books. Fortunately, there are scholars who dedicate themselves to sorting this all out for the rest of us. They don't always get it right, but as time passes they are getting better at it.

Not many of us are ever going to be able to read these things in their original. Even if you speak fluent Irish or Welsh, it wouldn't be easy, because the language has changed so much. I speak English fluently, but I can't read Old English at all, nor Middle English very well. So unless you are a scholar of early forms of Irish and Welsh, you're going to need a translation or something. So let's talk about that.

Translations vary. Extremely literal word-by-word translations can be harder to understand than you'd think. They don't explain things like idioms, except maybe in footnotes, and don't always deal well with poetry, or the many grammatical differences between languages. On the other hand, they may give insights that other translations don't. Good examples of this are R. A. S. MacAlister's Lebor Gabála Érenn or Morgan Daimler's The Treasure of the Tuatha De Danann.

Most translations are more "faithful" than literal. The translator tries their best to convey the exact meaning of each phrase, in a way that allows the reader to easily digest it. (Like Patrick Ford's translation of the Mabinogi.) You may also find it helpful to choose a fairly recent translation. Translations from the 19th and early 20th centuries are often available to read free online. Some of them are good, but if you don't enjoy reading Victorian prose, you may give up. (For example Whitley Stokes' The Voyage of Mael Duin's Boat or Lady Charlotte Guest's Mabinogion.)

Next in line for reading choice might be a "faithful re-telling". This is where the author has read the material, either in translation or through their own scholarship, but put it into their own words more than a translator would. A faithful re-telling might simplify the language for children, or condense the action a little for a story collection or encyclopedia, or the author might simply prefer to put it in their own words. However, it shouldn't remove or add anything important. The question here is always "How faithful?", and if you haven't read the myth from a good translation beforehand, how will you know? The fact that I don't recommend any here doesn't mean that none exist. Although I can't think of a major work of this sort, I have seen authors make a good job of individual stories.

Finally there are looser renderings of myths. You may see these in collections in discounted book bins, read them on websites, or find them in literary forms like novels. Some of them are good from a literary standpoint but a long way from the original. Others may have been passed around the internet without anyone bothering to check their accuracy. I generally find the ones written by authors who are members of the relevant culture (James Stephens' Irish Fairy Tales, or Ella Young's Celtic Wonder Tales) preferable to those writing from an alien culture who are just mining mythology for a good story with supernatural elements. (Evangeline Walton's Mabinogion Tetralogy for example.) Authors may also appropriate deities and other characters from myths and put them into their own stories, but don't expect to learn much about mythology by reading them.

For anyone wishing to really absorb and engage with Celtic mythology, I would suggest that they read translations first, rather than think they will work their way up via a fantasy novel or a bad synopsis. It's human nature that the first version of a story we hear sticks in our mind as the most true version, in spite of us trying to override that with logic later.

Irish mythology is messier. There are more manuscripts, and the material is fragmented and scattered between many manuscripts. This makes it harder to piece together a narrative structure, but it is generally agreed that there are four "cycles": The Mythological Cycle concerns Ireland's origins and the doings of the Tuatha De Danann; The Ulster Cycle is about Conchobar, Cu Chulainn and the cattle raiding culture of the north; The Fenian Cycle concerns the doings of Fionn MacCumhaill and the Fenian warriors; and The Historical Cycle is a pseudo-history of Irish kings from the 5th-11th centuries.

One author/translator deserves very special attention for her treatment of the Irish material: Lady Augusta Gregory, who made a bold attempt to put the jigsaw of fragments together into a cohesive, chrolological narrative for the first three cycles. Certainly scholarship and attitudes have moved on considerably since Lady Gregory published her translations, and a hundred years later the language is becoming dated. However, I still recommend the collection of her work, called Complete Irish Mythology, as the best way to read the Irish myths for the first time. After you've done that, you will probably want to find newer and better translations of various stories, or delve into early Irish texts that aren't included by Lady Gregory, but you will have a much better grasp of the big picture. No contemporary translator has attempted to tackle all three cycles, as far as I know.

The Mabinogion is not that long. Even with some notes and all the extra tales it makes a manageable sized book. Complete Irish Mythology is heftier (around 550 pages), but not enormous if you think of it as a trilogy in one volume. It's helpful to read the four branches of the Mabinogi or Complete Irish Mythology in order the first time, but don't devour them too quickly. There is a great deal of action within just a few pages in these stories, and not much exposition. Give yourself time to let each little story sink in. Give yourself time to ask questions, even though you may have no answers. Live with these stories and savour them. There are many scholarly interpretations of these tales, but what is your interpretation? What are your instincts telling you? Take the time to go back over things that don't make sense, or that haunt you. Remember that people once grew up hearing these stories regularly, and continued to hear them throughout their lives. It is only by living with them, that you will find their true depth.

If you enjoyed this post, you might like to read some of my posts on individual myths, such as The Beach and Of Oracles, Wonder and Inspiration.

If you enjoyed this review, you might also like my recent reviews of two other books about horse goddesses: Epona Revealed? and New Book About Rhiannon...

So many people seem to be creating fabulous things these days, and I'm an incurable share-a-holic. I know many of my friends and readers would enjoy this film.

My friends who live in Cumbria are reminding me, via facebook, that it's Appleby Fair week -- this being a great traditional horse fair and gathering of Gypsies and Travellers from far and wide, in a small Cumbrian town. With impeccable timing, award winning film maker Tom Lloyd, who pretty much grew up attending the fair with his father, Walter, has just released a wonderful new film about the fair. I knew Tom's work from a heartbreakingly beautiful series of short films about traditional Fell Pony breeders, Endangered Species - referring not to the ponies, but the breeders, themselves, and their way of life. (Those films are free to watch, by the way.)

Entitled Romany Rai (Romany Gentleman), the film features footage shot at the fair over quite a long period of years, much of it of horses and horsemen, but also featuring some interviews about the travelling life. Being both frank and non-judgemental, the film strikes a tone which mostly sidesteps the usual pitfalls of films about Travellers. We see good, bad and indifferent horsemanship, which is exactly what you would see if you filmed the non-traveller community at a show or out riding. There are some nice interviews, mostly with older members of the community, some of whom express themselves quite eloquently, as well as footage of Walter Lloyd giving his take on Gypsy/Traveller history and his own family's background of generational mutual acceptance with them. If this film occasionally strays into a slightly romantic view of Travelling People, that is probably out of respect for Walter, who died just a few months ago at 93.

Walter Lloyd was well known around Cumbria and among Fell Pony people. The Lloyd family breed ponies under the Hades Hill (Hades rhymes with fades) prefix, and Walter was considered a bit of an eccentric and something of a hippie, locally - both of which were deserved, in the best possible way. What a lot of people didn't realise was just what a renaissance man he was. He held an MA in agriculture from Cambridge, fought in WWII, farmed in Cornwall, Lancashire and Cumbria, worked in civil defense for Rochdale and emergency planning for Manchester, helped organise the safety and emergency side of rock festivals like Glastonbury and The Isle of Wight, taught coppicing and charcoal burning, built bow top living wagons .... well, you get the picture.

During the years I lived in Scotland I met many Scottish Travellers, both through my traditional music work and my time with horses in East Lothian. Speaking of traditional music, there are some nice musical moments in this film, too. I was attracted to it more for the horses than anything, and there are certainly plenty of horses here. I suppose that like Walter Lloyd, there is a side of me which intuitively (or perhaps only romantically) connects Traveller horse-culture to ancient Celtic horse-culture. That connection may or may not be on solid ground, historically. I've read attempts to unravel the question, but not deeply enough to feel satisfied. Also, like Walter, I am simply fascinated by alternative ways of life. During one of the early scenes of the film, we see directly into one gentleman's living wagon while he is being interviewed, and I found myself thinking how nice it would be to move into that, and just melt into the countryside. The truth is, I know that year-round life travelling in a bow top is almost impossible in Britain now, even for people who like cold, wet weather as much as I do.

Romany Rai is available to rent or buy  on Vimeo.

If you enjoyed this post, you might like The Garron's Musings.

It occurs to me, before I review a book about Border morris dancing, that some readers may be left wondering what that even is. So, before I start, allow me to offer you a video, in case you need some context, or just like watching videos of morris dancers, like I do.

What fascinates me about morris is its matter-of-fact public-ness, and the way that the public, and many of the dancers, think of it as an "ancient (Pagan) fertility rite", and are perfectly happy with it taking place in front of the pub on a Saturday afternoon. The extent to which it actually is any of that in the historical sense, has long ago ceased to be the point. And perhaps, if it looks like a duck....

This book tells the story of the first revival Border morris side, Silurian Border Morris, and how it evolved from a white-clad group of hanky wavers, into a blacked-up, tail coated, bunch of hellions. As is always the case when a group is breaking new ground within a tradition, Silurean enjoyed the shock and occasional outrage they inspired, and this aspect adds to the hilarity of some parts of the book. The author does a good job of telling these tales in a way that makes them funny without the reader needing to have been there to get it. If there is a certain amount of self-congratulation involved in some of this, it's not that hard to forgive.

Some of the funniest stories in the book, for my money, are the ones recounting the sheer absurdity of walking around in public in Border morris kit. From punks idling in town squares to German tourists at motorway rest stops, this is likely to get a reaction.

Punk: Why are you dressed like that?
Silurian: Why are you dressed like that?
Punk: I like dressing like this!
Silurean: Well, I like dressing like this!
Punk goes back to friends: He likes dressing like that!

Elliott is very particular to talk about blacking the face as a ritual disguise in this book, and I hope people are listening. Blacked up morris dancers have come in for some flack from people who think that this tradition is somehow racist or relates in some way to black and white minstrel shows. This simply isn't the case. Blacking up is a form of ritual disguise, not of racial impersonation. It has always been a cheap and available way to hide one's identity, using soot from the fire, and to turn the known person into an unknown and potent entity.

Interspersed among the tales of lost morris weekends and moments of Silurean triumph, Elliott weaves an interesting thread of the social history of the British folk scene of the late 20th century. If you happen to have been a part of that, you will recognise the draughtsman-like accuracy of his sketches of that time and place. Some of which might evoke a self-directed cringe or two, if you really were there in your corduroy trousers or floral frock.

This is a really good book, and a much funnier book than I have really let on in this review. If you are interested in what public ritual, with a small r, really means, what tradition means, and why it's worth rewilding it, rather than preserving it, you will enjoy this.

I'm writing a book. You have no idea what it feels like for me to even say that. I am enjoying it so far, even though it can be very frustrating at times, but it can bring out all the feelings of being a fraud, of not being good enough, educated enough, well connected enough, to have the audacity to attempt such a thing. I "should" be doing other, more responsible things, like figuring out what I'm going to survive on in my declining years. Or putting up curtains. Like I said, though, I'm enjoying it. Creative people rarely make decisions to do creative things based on logic. I never have. The results have been mixed. One time I got a 25 year career. Other times...crickets, as they say.

Earlier in the year I taught a little Celtic Studies series for some friends. As with the book, the research for that was surprisingly time-consuming, but also very enjoyable. It's exciting finding out things I didn't know that I didn't know. Following up on things I remember hearing about and discovering that some of them are actually useful, and knowing that I've got my facts right and ready to share with others. Sometimes it's frustrating. I don't have ready access to a big city library, and most of the books I need are British, but I'm in the US. I'm constantly banging my head against the paywall behind which so much academic research lies. I suspect I may be single-handedly keeping Amazon afloat.

Like with the Celtic Studies class, I get joy from helping people make sense of history or mythology, of the facts behind things which allows them make informed choices about their spiritual ideas. Celtic Studies is a tough area. It's an area which is defined as much by what we don't know as what we do. Even helping people to understand why there are things that aren't known, probably can never be known in many cases, is important. I like to think it might protect them, at least a little, from all the dodgy information that gets copied and recopied from cheap book to bad blog -- well, you know! I hope I can even do that in a way that feels friendly and accessible, rather than formidable.

My emotional life, my mood, isn't great a lot of the time. My usual spiritual practice is a bit patchy, too, and yet I feel incredibly close to the goddesses I most closely serve. And why wouldn't I? I'm writing about them. I'm writing for them. What a privilege! How exciting to immerse myself in topics I love! I was thinking the other day about an interview I heard, or read once, with Pagan historian Ronald Hutton. The interviewer was pressing him about his personal beliefs and practices, and his response was that, for him, study and writing, doing his best to set the record straight for his readers, was a kind of spiritual practice in itself. At the time, I thought that all sounded very dry, but it's beginning to make sense.

I am no Ronald Hutton. I wouldn't compare my level of scholarship to his, and anyway, my approach to my subject is different, but I see now how both research and writing can be deep work on a devotional level.

Oh, yes, I'm supposed to tell you what the book is about. I'm sure my friends and regular readers won't be all that surprised to hear that it's about the Celtic horse goddesses - Epona, Rhiannon and Macha. I'm attempting to draw together quite a few threads, including my personal experiences both with horses and goddesses, the "scholarly" information on them, and some bits of folklore, folk practice and philosophy that I believe are relevant. So that's a pretty tall order, I know, but I'll give it my best shot.