Chambers, Book of Days, ii. 492; Hazlitt, 131.
860. Hazlitt, 97; Davies, Extracts from Munic. Records of York, 270.
861. See p. 237, supra; LL 16, 213.
862. Chambers, Med. Stage, i. 250 f.
863. Cormac, s.v. "Belltaine," "Bel"; Arch. Rev. i. 232.
864. D'Arbois, ii. 136.
865. Stokes, US 125, 164. See his earlier derivation, dividing the word into belt, connected with Lithuan. baltas, "white," and aine, the termination in sechtmaine, "week" (TIG xxxv.).
866. Need-fire (Gael. Teinne-eiginn, "necessity fire") was used to kindle fire in time of cattle plague. See Grimm, Teut. Myth. 608 f.; Martin, 113; Jamieson's Dictionary, s.v. "neidfyre."
867. Cormac, s.v.; Martin, 105, says that the Druids extinguished all fires until their dues were paid. This may have been a tradition in the Hebrides.
868. Joyce, PN i. 216; Hone, Everyday Book, i. 849, ii. 595.
869. Pennant, Tour in Scotland, i. 291.
870. Hazlitt, 339, 397.
871. Hone, Everyday Book, ii. 595. See p. 215, supra.
872. Sinclair, Stat. Account, xi. 620.
873. Martin, 105.
874. For these usages see Ramsay, Scotland and Scotsmen in the Eighteenth Century, ii. 439 f.; Sinclair, Stat. Account, v. 84, xi. 620, xv. 517. For the sacramental and sacrificial use of similar loaves, see Frazer, Golden Bough2, i. 94, ii. 78; Grimm, Teut. Myth. iii. 1239 f.
875. New Stat. Account, Wigtownshire, 208; Hazlitt, 38, 323, 340.
876. See Miss Owen, Folk-lore of the Musquakie Indians, 50; Frazer, Golden Bough2, ii. 205.
877. For notices of Beltane survivals see Keating, 300; Campbell, Journey from Edinburgh, i. 143; Ramsay, Scotland and Scotsmen, ii. 439 f.; Old Stat. Account, v. 84, xi. 620, xv. 517; Gregor, Folk-lore of N.E. of Scotland, 167. The paganism of the survivals is seen in the fact that Beltane fires were frequently prohibited by Scottish ecclesiastical councils.
878. Meyrac, Traditions ... des Ardennes, 68.
879. Bertrand, 119.
880. Ibid. 407; Gaidoz, 21; Mannhardt, Baumkultus, 514, 523; Brand, i. 8, 323.
881. Mannhardt, op. cit. 525 f.; Frazer, Golden Bough2, iii. 319.
882. P. 234, supra.
883. Frazer, op. cit. i. 74; Brand, i. 222, 237, 246, 318; Hone, Everyday Book, ii. 595; Mannhardt, op. cit. 177; Grimm, Teut. Myth. 621, 777 f.
884. See my Childhood of Fiction, ch. v.
885. Frazer, i. 82, ii. 247 f., 275; Mannhardt, 315 f.
886. Martin, 117. The custom of walking deiseil round an object still survives, and, as an imitation of the sun's course, it is supposed to bring good luck or ward off evil. For the same reason the right hand turn was of good augury. Medb's charioteer, as she departed for the war, made her chariot turn to the right to repel evil omens (LU 55). Curiously enough, Pliny (xxviii. 2) says that the Gauls preferred the left-hand turn in their religious rites, though Athenæus refers to the right-hand turn among them. Deiseil is from dekso-s, "right," and svel, "to turn."
887. Hone, i. 846; Hazlitt, ii. 346.
888. This account of the Midsummer ritual is based on notices found in Hone, Everyday Book; Hazlitt, ii. 347 f.; Gaidoz, Le Dieu Soleil; Bertrand; Deloche, RC ix. 435; Folk-Lore, xii. 315; Frazer, Golden Bough2, iii. 266 f.; Grimm, Teut. Myth. ii. 617 f.; Monnier, 186 f.
889. RC xvi. 51; Guiraud, Les Assemblées provinciales dans l'Empire Romain.
890. D'Arbois, i. 215, Les Celtes, 44; Loth, Annales de Bretagne, xiii. No. 2.
891. RC xvi. 51.
892. Strabo, iv. 4. 6.
893. Dion. Per. v. 570.
894. Pliny, xxii. 1.
895. Greg, de Glor. Conf. 477; Sulp. Sev. Vita S. Martini, 9; Pass. S. Symphor. Migne, Pat. Graec. v. 1463, 1466. The cult of Cybele had been introduced into Gaul, and the ritual here described resembles it, but we are evidently dealing here with the cult of a native goddess. See, however, Frazer, Adonis, 176.
896. Anwyl, Celtic Religion, 41.