Lughnasadh
The first grain is cut. The first loaf is baked from it, and taken to the altar, and broken, and eaten. The year has given its first proof that there will be food, and that proof has cost the grain its life.
What it is
Lughnasadh is named for Lugh, the bright, many-skilled god of the Irish, who established the festival as funeral games for his foster-mother Tailtiu, who died clearing the plains of Ireland for farming. It was a time of fairs, horse races, trial marriages, and the climbing of hills. The English name, Lammas, is "loaf-mass," the day the first bread of the new wheat was blessed. For witches it is the first of three harvest festivals and the one where the God, as John Barleycorn, the spirit of the grain, is cut down so that the people may live. He goes willingly. We eat him with butter.
How we keep it at the Hearth
- The loaf. One of us bakes it, ideally from grain they have grown, more usually from the best flour we can find. It is shaped like a man, or a sun, or a sheaf, and it is broken in circle and shared with the words I am the bread, and the bread is in me.
- The games. Lugh's festival was a festival of skill. We hold contests: archery with a child's bow, storytelling, a bake-off, a very serious three-legged race. The winner is crowned with wheat.
- The corn dolly. Woven from the last of the first cutting and kept on the altar until Imbolc, when it is ploughed back or burned.
- The sacrifice. We name what we are ready to cut down in ourselves so that something else may be fed. Then we cut it, in words, and give it to the fire.
- The hill. Lughnasadh is a hill-climbing festival. We climb one and eat blueberries at the top.
Correspondences
| Colours | Gold, bronze, orange, green, brown |
|---|---|
| Foods | Bread above all; also berries, early apples, corn, barley, beer, honey |
| Herbs and plants | Wheat, barley, oats, blackberry, blueberry, meadowsweet, sunflower, heather |
| Symbols | The sheaf, the sickle, the loaf, the corn dolly, the spear of Lugh |
| Deities honoured | Lugh, Tailtiu, John Barleycorn, Ceres, Demeter, the Mother as provider |
Small things to do
- Bake bread. Any bread. Eat the first slice standing up, outside, with thanks.
- Pick blackberries. Leave the lowest ones for the badgers and the highest for the birds.
- Learn one new skill this month, however small. Lugh would approve.
- Climb a hill. Look at the fields from the top.
- Write down what you planted at Ostara and what has come of it. One of us did.
A Lughnasadh blessing
Lord of the grain, you have gone down under the sickle so that we may eat. Bright Lugh, lend us your skill. Tailtiu, who died for the fields, we remember you. For the first loaf, for the first proof, for the promise of the harvest: we give thanks, and we share the bread.
Next on the wheel: Mabon