Objects in Focus: Stone Font

In the National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh a handful of objects collected by Carmicahel are on display: a baptismal font, a stone font and a Pictish stone. Carmichael's own notes explain where the stone font was found and the particular curing beliefs associated with it.  

Stone font

The small primitive porous looking font is from Christ's Burying Ground (Cladh Chriost) in the Island of Pabbay, Barra. 

Like the other islands of Barra, Pabbay is extremely rugged and precipitous and except during settled weather inapproachable on account of the Atlantic surf. On the south east side of the island there is an open bay. Behind this surf-beaten bay and in front of this glaciated hill beyond is a semicircular valley the bottom of which on the north side is composed of deep accumulated sand drift. 

This was formerly covered with bent (muran) and other grasses but the surface breaks caused by the winter storms have been inattended to of late years, the winter winds have swept away the sand to a great depth leaving studded over the valley high cone-like mounds as monuments of neglect. Cladh Chriost is one of these cone-like mounds. It is about thirty feet high and composed or built up of many successive and distinctive layers of sand, like so many different pieces of bleached and unbleached cotton on a drapers shelf and pointing to different periods of formation. 

Its base has already become considerably hard and solid thus affording us the late and interesting opportunity of examining the slow and silent yet sure and inevitable process by which Time converts the flying particles of sand into hard and solid rock. Had no fortuitous circumstances prevented this sand mound would be converted into sand stone rock, in which would be embedded at various distances from the surface well preserved human remains, some of them surrounded by rows of carefully selected polished pebbles from the strand, and others by irregularly coarse common moor stones from the hill; innumerable bits of cinerary urns, of different manufactures and evidently of different periods with pins and needles, of bone, bronze and brass.

Stone font

And in the event of these hard memorials of man surviving like the tender lady from the process of petrefaction, perchance some future Hugh Miller might arise in the distant ages to draw therefrom lessons of utility instruction and wisdom.

A stream flows from the scariated hill behind which strikes during spates with considerable force against the rear of Cladh Chriost after which it skirts round the base thereof undermining and carrying in its sacrilegious course, the crumbling mound of sand, human remains, and human memorials, in one confused mass, into the continuous and tumbling, toiling, troubles sea below.

Embedded in the grassy sandy summit of this disused and neglected burying ground, this simple font rested for ages. But having been lost to sight of late, a search was made for it two years ago, at my request which resulted in finding it in the bed of the stream beneath, upon which it was obligingly transmitted to me to Lochmaddy.

This font was for centuries an object of credulous belief to the inhabitants of Pabbay and the other southern Isles of Barra. These simple people implicitly believed that the touch of this font like that of another stone in S. Mary’s burying ground (Cladh Naomh Moire) in the neighbouring island of Bearnaray (Barra-Head) was efficacious in preventing and removing many mental and physical disorders incident to themselves and their flocks. The lixivium found in the font was considered doubly consecrated, firstly through contact with the already consecrated font, and secondly through the friendly agency of some invisible and mysterious power that presided over the scene. The virtues of this salinated water were deemed secondary only to those of the water consecrated by the priest. 

The people rubbed their bodies and their cattle with the font and sprinkled themselves and their flocks with the water contained therein, for the cure of certain bodily ailments and for the prevention of specific acts of witchcraft. And when this ceremony was duly performed with the necessary amount of formality and with the necessary admixture of pagan and christian rites, the people firmly believed that creative spirits of the air, nor the witches of the earth, nor the mermaids of the deep surrounding sea could infuse or molest them. 

Pabbay, Barra

A charm so potent could not be otherwise than an object of deep awe and interest among the hardy, simple and kind hearted people possessing it nor do I doubt but an attempt to remove it eighty or a hundred years ago would have been stoutly resisted and would probably result in serious consequences. But – “Old times are changed, old manners gone, A stranger fills the Stewarts’ throne; The bigots of an iron time, Had called these harmless acts a crime.” 

For a number of years past the belief in the virtues of this charm has been falling into abeyance and now only two old men as far as I know can give an intelligible account of the faded glories of the primitive little font. 

Now, the next time you visit the museum on Chambers Street keep an eye out for this font!

Reference
GB 237 Coll-97 CW457
Images
Font: © National Museums of Scotland
Pabbay: © RCAHMS

A Cure for Syphilis

Fr. George Rigg

Folk cures taken down by Alexander Carmichael form not an inconsiderable part of his fieldwork notebooks. Book-ended between a song and a note about North Rona, a cure for syphilis is related, whereby the healing power of ‘Sugh brist lus-nan-laogh and the Meacal’ [the sap from bruised golden saxifrage and its root] is noted as ‘ordered by’ Fr. James MacGregor (c. 1790–1867) who was a priest in Iochdar, South Uist, for many years.

Sugh brist Lus-nan laogh

and the Meacal ordered

by Rev. Father MacGrigor

Ioc[hd]ar the man in S[outh] Uist

for cure of syphilis.

Irrespective of whether such a cure was effective or not, it reflects the fact that such cures were known about and perhaps even used in the absence of a qualified practitioner. Medical assistance in South Uist even in Carmichael’s own day would have been difficult to come by and there are eyewitness accounts of disease wiping out many of the poor. One such outbreak of typhus, similar to the one mentioned recently regarding Lismore, carried away Fr. Alan McDonald’s close friend (and successor at Daliburgh) Fr. George Rigg who died from the disease in 1897:

News has been received of the death of the Rev. George Rigg, priest at St. Peter’s, Dalibrog, in South Uist, one of the Outer Hebrides, in the diocese of Argyll and the Isles. Father Rigg met his death owing to a devotion not less that that of Pere Damien. The family of one of his parishioners, a Hebridean cottar, consisting of a man, his wife and child, were all attacked by typhus fever at one and the same time. The neighbours were loathe to approach the cottage in which the stricken family lay ill, and for weeks, with the exception of the doctor, who paid his daily visit, the priests unassisted nursed the sick household, cooking for them, and performing all the necessary and unpleasant menial offices attached to this self-imposed task. As a result he contracted the fever in its worst form, and died, after terrible sufferings, a few days ago, in the presence of his sister and the priest of the other South Uist parish, who had nursed him devotedly.

Such was impact of such a loss that not only did Fr. Allan compose a Gaelic elegy for him but so did Donald MacCormick and Donald Patterson.

During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries syphilis was common throughout Europe but with the advent of modern antibiotics such as penicillin has subsequently seen the rate decline rapidly. If left untreated syphilis in its tertiary stage of development is severe and may result in syphilitic insanity as well as death.

References:

CW120/303, ff. 84 v–85r.

Laments composed for George Rigg can be heard here:

http://www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/fullrecord/93108/1.

http://www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/fullrecord/26582/1.

http://www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/fullrecord/79600/1.

Image: Fr. George Rigg (1860–1897).

How to Cure a Cow: Silver Water

Silver Water

A well-known cure for any ailing cow was picked up by Alexander Carmichael from John Cameron (1805–1889) in Borve, Barra. This practice, it seems, would have been widespread throughout the Highlands and Islands as well as in other parts of Scotland. Such a method was usually referred to traditionally as uisge-airgid and the silver agent was used for its apotropaic qualities in order to avert the evil-eye or droch-shùil (usually the agency to have caused the cow to fall into ill-health in the first place):

Cattle Cure – An old dairy
maid request[ed] John Cameron
Borve to go to a tobar fior
uisg nach tra'adh [traghadh] or to a
stream forming a march &
to take home water from that –
To go ere sun rise or sun
set with an eye of man
or woman to see Place
silver in the dish & sprinkle
this 3 times on the cow.

The remarkable ability of people to remember such folk-cures is demonstrated by the following example which was taken down in Easter Ross by Prof. Seosamh Watson some three decades ago:

Bha bobhla mor fiodh aca agus bhitheadh leth-chrun anns am bobhla agus, reist, bhitheadh sia sgilling anns am bobhla agus bonnan tì sgilling anns am bobhla. Bheireadh iad sin dut a dh'ol agus nan fhastadh an t-airgead ri toin am bobhla se buidsidheachd a bha ann, buidsidheachd. Nan fhastadh an t-airgead gu toin am bobhla bhitheadh fhios aca, reist, gur buidsidheachd bha deis dut. A bheil thu tuigeil? Agus nis, rachadh e tron aite.

This above narrative is given in translation as follows:

They had a big wooden bowl and there would be a half-crown in the bowl and then there would be sixpence in the bowl and a little threepenny piece in the bowl. They would give you that to drink and if the money stuck to the bottom of the bowl it would be witchcraft, witchcraft. If the money stuck to the bottom of the bowl then that witchcraft had been done on you. Do you see? Now that news would go trough the locality.

References:

CW90, f. 59v.

Watson, Seosamh, ‘Saoghal Bana-Mharaiche: Oral Accounts of Life in an Easter Ross Community’ (Part II), Béaloideas, vol. 72 (2004), pp. 99–218.

Image: Silver Water.

St John’s Wort or St Columba’s Plant

Another short anecdote from Archibald Currie (1821–1896) from Iochdar, South Uist, collected at the same time, was one which concerns St John’s wort or, as it is sometimes referred to, St Columba’s plant. This plant is, in any case, known under many other names in Gaelic such as achlasan Chaluim Chille, which Carmichael literally translates as ‘armpit package of Columba’ and has many medical properties that were well-known to herbalists who practiced folk medicine. The first recorded use of this plant for medicinal purposes stems from ancient Greece. Since then St John’s wort has been used over the centuries for mental conditions as well as for other health problems and it was (and still is) used as a remedy for the debilitating effects of mild to moderate depression:

Achlasan C[aluim]-chille gun sire[adh]
gun iar[raidh] is scraped ag[ainst] its bark & a crosgag
(a ring) is made & place[d] in the
bottom of the milk boyne
Cneapag is the first worsted put
on the fearsaid the round ball
before the crosgag is made
C[alum] Cille the best herd that ev[e]r
lived & this he [presid[e]s?] ov[e]r sprei[dh]

Introducing a piece about St John’s wort in Carmina Gadelica, Carmichael adds that the plant has other very useful properties aside from those which may be termed medicinal. Indeed, St John’s wort could claim to be a panacea for all ills, whether physical or otherwise:

Saint John’s wort is one of the few plants still cherished by people to ward away second-sight, enchantment, witchcraft, evil eye, and death, and to ensure peace and plenty in the house, increase and prosperity in the fold, and growth and fruition in the field. The plant is secretly secured in the bodices of the women and in the vests of men, under the left armpit. Saint John’s wort, however, is effective only when the plant is accidentally found.

Echoing the first phrase to be met with in the above fragment, a fuller version of the incantation was provided by Carmichael:

‘Achlasan Chaluim-chille,
Gun sireadh, gun iarraidh!
Dheoin Dhia agus Chriosda
Am bliadhna chan fhaigheas bas.’


Saint John’s wort, Saint John’s wort,
Without search, without seeking!
Please God and Christ Jesu
This year I shall not die.

It is specially prized when found in the fold of the flocks, auguring peace and prosperity to the herd through the year. The person who discovers it says:–


‘Alla bhi, alla bhi,
Mo niarach a neach dh’ am bi,
An ti a gheobh an cro an ail,
Cha bhi gu brath gun ni.’


Saint John’s wort, Saint John’s wort,
Happy those who have thee,
Whoso gets thee in the herd’s fold,
Shall never be without kine.

References:
CW 106, fo. 33r.
Carmina Gadelica ii, pp. 96–101.
Image:
St John’s wort (Hypericum perforatum) or achlasan Chaluim Chille.

Cures for Black Warts

Curious folk cures were also one of the genres which greatly interested Alexander Carmichael. The following cure for black warts or foinneachan dubha was probably noted down from Archibald Currie (1821–1896), a shoemaker who was aged around 46 at the time, and who belonged to Iochdar, South Uist, on 28 October 1872:

Foineachun du[bha] old wom[an]
at Bornish had warts. She set
to get straws with 9 uilt on
each sop & 81 for each wart.
Then to dig a pit & put 81 of these
in each for each wart. They were
to be left in the pits till they crione[adh]
& the warts were gone.

Elsewhere in Carmina Gadelica, Carmichael adds the following, presumably stemming from the same source:

A woman of Upper Bornish, who had many warts on hands and feet, procured with time and trouble ‘naoi naoi glùinean’, nine nine knees, i.e. nine stalks with nine joints on each stem. These she buried in the ground, and as the knots of the straws decayed, the warts disappeared.

Mar a chrìon a sìos na stràilleanan,

Chrìon gu bràth na foinneachan.

As withered down the straws,

Withered till doom the warts.

Other perhaps more scientific cures are then suggested by way of rubbing dry dust upon a wart, or to apply moist rust to it. Another method was to apply a poultice of broad-leaved tangle, a type of seaweed, to the wart which may result in getting rid of it due to the beneficial effect of the constituent iodine. Perhaps the most unlikely cures that were said to work are between these two methods: either to go to a cemetery and to ‘dip the wart in water lying on a gravestone’ or to rub ‘the wart against the clothes of one who has committed fornication.’

References:
CW 106/102.
Carmina Gadelica ii, p. 334.
Carmina Gadelica iv, p. 221.
Image: Barley Straw.

A Charm for a Cataract

In one of his very last fieldwork notebooks that are known to survive, Alexander Carmichael was still noting down charms, a genre that is rightly famous for and also one that had fascinated him since he began to collect them in earnest around thirty years previously. One such example, Eòlas a’ Ghulmain (‘Cataract Charm’) was taken down, on 8 September 1909, from the recitation of Isabell[a] Chisholm née MacKenzie (c. 1845–1932) from Melvaig in Ross and Cromarty:

The Gulmum grows like
a scale of herring.
An t-Eolas Gulmain
I take up water draw[n] the
fiar over the eye thee times
after dipping in the water
uisg as a chaochain stream
let I place this in a bottle
and dip the grass in it and
then draw the grass over the
eyeball three times


A white Glob[e] comes upon the
eye.

Carmichael also provides a text along with a translation of the charm said to have been used while the above process was being conducted:

Togam boiseag burn
An ainm nùmh Athar,
An ainm nùmh Mic,
An ainn nùmh Sprioraid,
An ainm nùmh Tiùra
Shuthain chùmha ghlic.


Cinnteach gun dean rium
An rud is dùth domh iarraidh,
An rud ta riair an ruin,
An rud ta dèanamh pianaidh,
An rud is fiù a dhèanamh
Dh’an Triana chùmha cheart.


I am lifting a palmful of water
In the holy name of Father,
In the holy name of Son,
In the holy name of Spirit,
In the holy name of the Three
Everlasting, kindly, wise.

Certain that They will do to me
The thing that it becomes me to ask,
The thing that accords with Their mind,
The thing that is causing pain,
The thing that is worthy to de done
Of the Trinity kindly and just:


References:
CW117, fol. 21v.
Carmina Gadelica iv, pp. 223–25.
Image: Cataract

A Hot Poker as a Cure for Jaundice!

Folk medicine and cures are important genres for any collector and Alexander Carmichael was no exception to this general observation as is quite evident for an item, Eòlas na Buidheach (‘Charm for Jaundice’), taken down from the recitation of Angus MacEachen (c. 1810–1890) from Stoneybridge in South Uist. The story come directly from the informant and relates to a time when he was called upon to treat the daughter of a farmer, Roderick MacMillan (c. 1815–1900, in nearby Peninerine, also in South Uist.

Angus, from whom
I had the story and who told it to me with
much quiet humour, came
and solemnly examined the girl.
He then requested more peats
to be put on the fire which was
promptly done. He then put the
poker in the fire and every now
and then made much show
before the girl of seeing that it was
getting hot. When the poker was
red hot and the humurous Angus
took good care that the sick girl
could see that it was red hot
he requested them to turn her back
towards the front of the bed – stoc
na leapa – “stock of the bed” and
asked her mother to turn up her night
dress and lay her back bare and then
to clear out of the room immediately.
Angus then exhorted the girl to be brave
to bear up and fear not, that although
the pain of the operation would be ex-
cruciating for a time yet that it would
not last long. Angus then with much
ceremony and show rushed at the
girl’s bare back with the red hot poker –
na’m b fhior – “as if it were true – ”.
But instead of placing the red hot poker
on the girl’s bare back he placed thereon
a cold piece of iron which he had
in hiding till now. When the un-
sophisticated girl felt the cold iron
clapped against her bare back
she thought it was the red hot poker
of which Angus had been making so
much solemn show and ceremony
and she roared and roared and
screamed causing her mother and
all the people in the house to rush
into the room. Gu de tha agaibh
air a ghraidhean said
Angus ach gun deach i am
feothas sa liun agus an ceann
seacuin gu’n robh an nighean
mhor ruadh a mach feadh nan
cnocaibh??!

Apparently Angus took all the credit for the girl was cured of her ailment as she was out and about by the end of week. Carmichael then adds that the ‘fame of old Angus as an expert in the cure of jaundice was confirmed if that were needed.’ Such a 'cure' would not look out of place of some kind of torture scenario and it was in all probablity a mere coincidence that the girl recovered her health rather than as the result of a cure of doubtful medicinal benefit. In the second volume of Carmina Gadelica Carmichael later printed the above narrative, based upon his fieldwork notebooks, and where the actual charm was printed along with his translation:

Air bhuidhe, air dhuibhe, air arnach,
Air a ghalar-dhearg, air a ghalar-shearg,
Air a ghalar-tholl, air a ghalar-lom,
Air a ghalar-dhonn, air a ghalar-bhonn,
'S air gach galar a dh' fhaodadh
A bhi an aorabh ba
No an sgath gamhna.

For the jaundice, for the spaul, for the bloody flux,
Fro the red disease, for the withernig disease,
For the bot disease, for the skine disease,
For the brown disease, for the foot disease,
And for every disease that might be
In the constitution of the cow
Or adhering to stirk.

References:
CW87, fos. 9v–10r
Carmina Gadelica, ii, pp. 12–13.
Image: Red hot iron poker