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Seanrud
Member
Username: Seanrud
Post Number: 5
Registered: 06-2005
| | Posted on Wednesday, November 09, 2005 - 11:41 am: |   
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Would anybody have any ethnographic or historical data about the origins of this expression.. "in a dilemma" ?
Go raibh maith agaibh! |
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Dennis
Member
Username: Dennis
Post Number: 569
Registered: 02-2005
| | Posted on Wednesday, November 09, 2005 - 11:43 am: |
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There was a custom in some localities in the old days of driving the cattle between two bonfires on Bealtaine to "purify" them; that is, to make them safe from disease. |
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Fada
Member
Username: Fada
Post Number: 1
Registered: 11-2005
| | Posted on Saturday, November 19, 2005 - 06:34 pm: |
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you can still go there
up above Gort An Choirce
Dún na nGall/Donegal
place called Bealtaine
on left on way up the road, place they used to drive cattle through
fertility was the object |
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Lucy (Unregistered Guest)
Unregistered guest
Posted From:
| | Posted on Saturday, November 19, 2005 - 09:46 pm: |
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But the Bealtaine referred to in the saying is the month of May. The fires were held throughout Ireland and not just in Donegal. |
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Dennis
Member
Username: Dennis
Post Number: 627
Registered: 02-2005
| | Posted on Sunday, November 20, 2005 - 12:25 am: |
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Agus in Albain chomh maith. This from Dwelly's Faclair Gàidhlig, s.v. Bealltuinn:
"... On this day fires were kindled on the mountain tops for the purpose of sacrifice; and between these fires the cattle were driven, to preserve them from contagion till next Mayday. On this day it was usual to extinguish all the hearth fires, in order that they should be re-kindled from this purifying flame." |
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