Show Notes
While rooted in the earth, trees ascend towards the firmament of the Heavens. They likewise renew themselves through the eternal rhythms that govern all living things (those cycles of growth, maturation, decay and rebirth) as they blossom, flower, give fruit and eventually shed their leaves before being reborn anew each spring. Certain of these proud intermediaries between heaven and earth were treated with great veneration by our forebears, and echoes of the worship of sacred trees survives in folk tradition to this day.
For this 19th edition of Blúiríní Béaloidis, hosts Jonny Dillon and Claire Doohan consider their culture born of nature. From sacred trees under which kings of Ireland were inaugurated in times long ago, to the holy woods inhabited by both madmen and saints, and from votive offerings left hanging on the branches of trees growing beside holy wells, to those trees treated with fear and trepidation, understood as they were, as dwellings of the otherworld spirits which live alongside us in the natural landscape. Stay with us for an hour then, as we shelter beneath the branches of tradition, which gift to us the fruits of memory and meaning.
Jonny and Claire would like to send their thanks to Landless for permission to include the song 'The Trees Grow Tall' from their 2018 LP Bleaching Bones (played at 38 minutes, 12 seconds into the podcast). For more information about the group, and to support their work go to:
https://landless.bandcamp.com https://www.facebook.com/landlessmusic/ https://www.instagram.com/landless_music_dublin/
We likewise send thanks to Richard Moult, for allowing us permission to include a beautiful piece of his piano music titled 'Star Filled Tree, Blacksburg' to close the podcast (the piece is played at 58 minutes, 48 seconds). If you would like to learn more about Richard's art, and to support his work, please go to:
More from Blúiríní Béaloidis Folklore Podcast
Ailbe van der Heide is Collections Curator at the National Folklore Collection, having joined the staff in 2020, shortly after graduating from the MA in Irish Folklore in 2020. For several years now, Ailbe has managed the National Folklore Collection’s reading room service, along with fielding an array of queries from members of the public keen to explore our collections. Throughout her work, and in response to enquiries made regarding our collections, Ailbe noticed an at times stark difference between the material found as part of our fieldwork collections, and that which can be found online regarding supernatural figures in Irish tradition. Researchers looking for information on supernatural lore would often cite specific terminology which was indicative of literary forms, rather than expressions of folk culture. On the interplay between literature and folk tradition, Anne O’Connor has noted that:
Steve Roud is a Librarian, folklore scholar and creator of the Roud Folk Song Index, which contains upwards of 750,000 entries to around 45,000 English language folk songs, as found in books, recordings, manuscripts and other sources the world over. His index, and ‘Roud Numbers’ (a numbering system employed to identify the same song across many different titles) are widely acclaimed for the scope, breadth, depth and impact. Steve worked as a local studies Librarian in the London Borough of Croydon, and also served as Honorary Librarian for the Folklore Society for eighteen years. He has published books on calendar custom, popular tradition, folk belief, London lore, children’s games, and folk drama. In 2004, he was the winner of the Folklore Society’s Katharine Briggs Folklore Award for The Penguin Guide to the Superstitions of Britain and Ireland. In 2009, he was one of five people to be awarded the Gold Badge of the English Folk Dance and Song Society. This award recognises "those who have made unique or outstanding contributions to the art or science of folk dance, music or song, and/or those who have given exceptional support in furthering the aims of the Society”. For four years now, Steve has been visiting the NFC, parsing through our manuscript and book, broadside and pamphlet collections for entries to add to his index. He is an incredibly gifted, meticulous and generous scholar, who is always glad to share his expertise with us, particularly in discussion around the inherent problems in the description, cataloguing and indexing of folklore materials. It was an honour, and a great pleasure to host Steve at the NFC recently, and during his visit (for our collective benefit) I subjected him to a 75 minute interview, in which we discussed his index, the problems inherent in describing folk song, approaches to the cataloguing of folklore, conducting research in folklore archives, and the problems inherent in the digitisation of folklore records and some scholarly critique of the NFC’s online platform Dúchas.ie.
Video recording of this episode is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OcxwmDuUeU&ab_channel=UCD-UniversityCollegeDublin
Regarding food in Irish tradition, Kevin Danaher, writing in 1964, noted that "Sometimes we get the impression that Ireland, in ancient times, was a land of plenty, and again we get quite the opposite impression - that our forebears lived out their lives on the very edge of starvation. In reality both these impressions are wrong." As an expression of culture that permeates every aspect of life, food holds a central place in Irish folk tradition, and for episode 41 of Blúiríní Béaloidis, I am delighted to be joined by Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire, Senior Lecturer in the School of Culinary Arts and Food Technology at Technological University Dublin to discuss food in Irish folk tradition. Máirtín, along with Dorothy Cashman, was co-editor of the recent "Irish Food History: A Companion", published by the Royal Irish Academy in hardcopy in 2024, and available freely online via EUT+ at the following link: https://arrow.tudublin.ie/irishfoodhist/1/
Hello a chairde, and welcome to episode 40 of Blúiríní Béaloidis, the podcast from the National Folklore Collection.