Lughnasa & Puck Fair

Lughnasa
Around August 1st
The Beginning of the Harvest

Lughnasa falls exactly opposite Imbolc, and halfway between Beltane and Samhain. It marks the halfway point in the light side of the year. This was a celebration of the beginning of the harvest, and a celebration of Lugh, an Irish sun god.

One of the old Irish mythological tales says that at the beginning of the harvest season, the trickster god, Lugh, wins control of the fruits of the soil from the earth giants and turns them over to the human community. He is associated with lightning and with storms that cool the air after the worst for the season’s heat.

Lughnasa is celebrated with traditional festival falling on the Sunday closest to August 1st. Patterns at blessed wells and fairs are held in late July or early August including Puck Fair in Killorglin, Co. Kerry, the Old Lammas Fair at Ballycastle, Co. Antrim, the Croagh Patrick pilgrimage and Pattern Day in Ardmore in Waterford.


Puck Fair

The coronation of a wild male goat by a young girl is the most striking feature of the Puck fair, a three day event held at Killorglin in the County of Kerry on August 10-12. The original date of the fair was at Lammastide was on the first of August. The change in date was brought about by the calendar alteration of 1752.

The three days of Puck Fair are known as Gathering Day, Middle Day and Scattering Day. The Puck Fair takes its name from the male goat who presides over the festival, a wild creature caught solely for this purpose. He is proclaimed "The Puck King of Ireland" on Gathering Day and is released back into the wild on Scattering Day.

The Market Square is the centre of attraction at all times. Late in the afternoon but before sunset the Procession of the Goat begins. This consists of a Pipe band, followed by a lorry, on which the goat is securely roped to a small platform. The goat is decorated with wreaths round his nick and is attended by four young boys dressed in green. After parading round the town for an hour the band and the lorry return to the Square, where a light scaffolding, 35 feet high has been erected. A little girl dressed as a queen with a crown on her head, crowns the goat with a tinsel crown and cast a wreath of flowers round his neck. Then the goat, still securely lashed to its platform is hoisted with ropes and pulleys to the top of the scaffolding, where it remains till the close of the Fair. When the goat has reached its elevated position, a man proclaims through a megaphone, "The Puck King of Ireland". At all other times the goat is referred to as "The Puck King of the Fair". Food of the kind beloved of goats is hoisted up at intervals, so that the animal is overfed during his captivity.
Puck Fair is also a horse and cattle fair, on Middle Day most of the buying and selling of livestock is done. Scattering Day is comprised of the general breaking up of and the release of the Puck King.

Puck Fair is the most ancient and pagan of Ireland’s festivals. Margaret Murray, controversial author of The God of the Witches, believe it is "the only known survival of the deification and crowning of a king" from the animal world.


Sources: The Red-Haired Girl from the Bog by Patricia Monaghan
Ancient Celtic Festivals by Clare Walker Leslie & Frank E. Gezace
The Year in Ireland-Irish Calendar Customs by Kevin Danaher
Puck Fair web site


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