Taghairm
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Taghairm was a historical Scottish Gaelic mode of divination. Several kinds of taghairm are described; each seemed to involve summoning spirits through animal sacrifice and entering altered states of consciousness.
In A Description of the Western Islands of Scotland (1703 and 1716), Scottish writer Màrtainn MacGille Mhàrtainn describes the ways of consulting spirits in the Hebrides during the 17th century. All involved a man being wrapped in a bull hide and asked a question about the future. One way was to leave the man in the bullhide in a wild lonely spot overnight. Another was to swing the man in the bullhide against a riverbank. He wrote that they sometimes roasted a cat alive as part of the ceremony, believing this would summon another large cat who would confirm the man's answer.[1]
An 1825 text described the taghairm: Template:Quote
There is a similar description of the taghairm being carried out in Trotternish in a 1772 account,[2] and a number of closely matching accounts with hides and waterfalls can also be found, with some additionally including the diviner being beaten for a while with a pole or a staff after being covered by the animal skin.[3][4]
According to the London Literary Gazette of March 1824, one form of the taghairm involved a group of people spending four days roasting cats alive, one cat after another, without eating. This was meant to summon a legion of demons in the shape of screeching black cats, with their master at their head, who would grant them two wishes. The last ceremony of this kind was said to have been performed on the Isle of Mull at the beginning of the 17th century.[5][6][7] The ritual is described in Gustav Meyrink’s book on John Dee, The Angel of the West Window.[8][9]
Scottish historical novelist Sir Walter Scott scornfully described a third method in a footnote to his influential poem Lady of the Lake. He further adds that it could involve another situation "where the scenery around him suggested nothing but objects of horror." However, Scott could not speak Scottish Gaelic and his concepts of Gaelic culture were sometimes distorted.
Other regions
The animal skin and waterfall method of divination was also known in Wales.[10]
See also
References
Template:Reflist This article incorporates text from Dwelly's [Scottish] Gaelic Dictionary (1911). Template:Sister project
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- ↑ Briggs, Katharine (1976). An Encyclopedia of Fairies. Pantheon Books. pp. 23 ("Big Ears"), 388-9 ("Taghairm"). Template:ISBN.
- ↑ The London Literary Gazette March 1824, p. 172.
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- ↑ Meyrink links the ritual to perhaps a fictional goddess, “the Black Mother, Isaïs.” Meyrink, p. 70.
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