From ancient times the wakes, or funeral games, in Ireland were held
with many strange observances carried down by tradition from the
pagan era. Some of the rites, however, were so revolting and monstrous
that the priesthood used all their influence to put them down. The old
funeral customs, in consequence, have now been discontinued almost
entirely amongst the people, and the ancient traditional usages are
unknown to the new generation, though the elders of the village can yet
remember them. An old man still living thus described to an inquiring
antiquary and lover of folk-lore, his experience of the ceremonial of a
wake at which he had been present in the South of Ireland, when he was
quite a youth, some fifty years before.
“One dark winter’s night, about seven o’clock, a large party of us,” he
said, “young men and women, perhaps thirty or more, set out across the
mountain to attend a wake at the house of a rich farmer, about three
miles off. All the young men carried lighted torches, for the way was
rugged and dangerous; and by their light we guided the women as best we
could over the deep clefts and across the rapid streams, swollen by the
winter’s rain. The girls took off their shoes and stockings and walked
barefoot, but where the water was heavy and deep the men carried them
across in their arms or on their backs. In this way we all arrived at
last at the farmhouse, and found a great assemblage in the large barn,
which was hung throughout with branches of evergreen and festoons of
laurel and holly.
“At one end of the barn, on a bed decorated with branches of green
leaves, lay the corpse, an old woman of eighty, the mother of the man
of the house. He stood by the head of the dead woman, while all the
near relatives had seats round. Then the mourning women entered and sat
down on the ground in a circle, one in the centre cloaked and hooded,
who began the chant or funeral wail, all the rest joining in chorus.
After an interval there would come a deep silence; then the chant began
again, and when it was over the women rose up and went out, leaving
the place free for the next comers, who acted a play full of ancient
symbolic meaning. But, first, whisky was served round, and the pipers
played; for every village had sent their best player and singer to
honour the wake.
“When a great space was cleared in the centre of the barn, the first
set of players entered. They wore masks and fantastic garments, and
each carried a long spear and a bit of plaited straw on the arm for a
shield. At once they began to build a fort, as it were, marking out the
size with their spears, and using some rough play with the spectators.
While thus engaged a band of enemies appeared, also masked and armed.
And now a great fight began and many prisoners were taken; but to save
slaughter a horn was blown, and a fight demanded between the two best
champions of the hostile forces. Two of the finest young men were then
selected and placed at opposite ends of the barn, when they ran a tilt
against one another with their spears, uttering fierce, loud cries, and
making terrible demonstrations. At length one fell down as if mortally
wounded; then all the hooded women came in again and keened over him,
a male voice at intervals reciting his deeds, while the pipers played
martial tunes. But on its being suggested that perhaps he was not dead
at all, an herb doctor was sent for to look at him; and an aged man
with a flowing white beard was led in, carrying a huge bundle of herbs.
With these he performed sundry strange incantations, until finally the
dead man sat up and was carried off the field by his comrades, with
shouts of triumph. So ended the first play.
“Then supper was served and more whisky drunk, after which another play
was acted of a different kind. A table was set in the middle of the
barn, and two chairs, while all the people, about a hundred or more,
gathered round in a circle. Then two men, dressed as judges, took their
seats, with guards beside them, and called on another man to come forth
and address the people. On this a young man sprang on the table and
poured forth an oration in Irish, full of the most grotesque fun and
sharp allusions, at which the crowd roared with laughter. Then he gave
out a verse like a psalm, in gibberish Irish, and bade the people say
it after him. It ran like this, being translated—
“‘Yellow Macauly has come from Spain,
He brought sweet music out of a bag,
Sing _See-saw, Sulla Vick Dhau,
Sulla, Sulla Vick Dhau righ_.’
(That is, Solomon, son of David the King.)
“If any one failed to repeat this verse after him he was ordered to
prison by the judges, and the guards seized him to cut off his head;
or if any one laughed the judge sentenced him, saying in Irish, ‘Seize
that man, he is a pagan: he is mocking the Christian faith. Let him
die!’
“After this the professional story-teller was in great force, and
held the listeners enchained by the wonders of his narration and the
passionate force of his declamation. So the strange revelry went on,
and the feasting and the drinking, till sunrise, when many of the
guests returned to their homes, but others stayed with the family till
the coffin was lifted for the grave.”
* * * * *
Full details of these strange wake orgies can seldom be obtained, for
the people are afraid of the priesthood, who have vehemently denounced
them. Yet the peasants cling to them with a mysterious reverence, and
do not see the immorality of many of the wake practices. They accept
them as mysteries, ancient usages of their forefathers, to be sacredly
observed, or the vengeance of the dead would fall on them.
According to all accounts an immense amount of dramatic talent was
displayed by the actors of these fantastic and symbolic plays. An
intelligent peasant, who was brought to see the acting at the Dublin
theatre, declared on his return: “I have now seen the great English
actors, and heard plays in the English tongue, but poor and dull they
seemed to me after the acting of our own people at the wakes and fairs;
for it is a truth, the English cannot make us weep and laugh as I have
seen the crowds with us when the players played and the poets recited
their stories.”
The Celts certainly have a strong dramatic tendency, and there are many
peasant families in Ireland who have been distinguished for generations
as bards and actors, and have a natural and hereditary gift for music
and song.
On the subject of wake orgies, a clever writer observes that they are
evidently a remnant of paganism, and formed part of those Druidic rites
meant to propitiate the evil spirits and the demons of darkness and
doom; for the influence of Druidism lasted long after the establishment
of Christianity. The Druid priests took shelter with the people, and
exercised a powerful and mysterious sway over them by their magic
spells. Druid practices were known to exist down to the time of
the Norman invasion in the twelfth century, and even for centuries
after; and to this Druidic influence may be traced the sarcasms on
Christianity which are occasionally introduced into the mystery plays
of the wake ceremonial. As in the one called “Hold the Light,” where
the passion of the Lord Christ is travestied with grotesque imitation.
The same writer describes the play acted at wakes called “The Building
of the Ship,” a symbolic rite still older than Druidism, and probably
a remnant of the primitive Arkite worship. This was followed by a
scene called “Drawing the Ship out of the Mud.” It was against these
two plays that the anathemas of the Church were chiefly directed, in
consequence of their gross immorality, and they have now entirely
ceased to form any portion of the wake ceremonial of Ireland. Hindu
priests would recognize some of the ceremonies as the same which are
still practised in their own temples; and travellers have traced a
similarity also in these ancient usages to the “big canoe games” of the
Mandan Indians.
In the next play, the Hierophant, or teacher of the games, orders all
the men out of the room; a young girl is then dressed with a hide
thrown over her, and horns on her head, to simulate a cow, while her
maidens form a circle and slowly dance round her to music, on which
a loud knocking is heard at the door. “Who wants to enter?” asks the
Hierophant. He is answered, “The guards demand admittance for the bull
who is without.” Admittance is refused, and the maidens and the cow
affect great alarm. Still the knocking goes on, and finally the door
is burst open and the bull enters. He also is robed with a hide and
wears horns, and is surrounded by a band of young men as his guards. He
endeavours to seize the cow, who is defended by her maidens, forming
the dramatic incidents of the play. A general mock fight now takes
place between the guards and the maidens, and the scene ends with
uproarious hilarity and the capture of the cow.
There are other practices mentioned by writers on the subject, who
trace in the Irish observances a tradition of the Cabyric rites, and
also a striking similarity to the idolatrous practices of Hindustan as
described in the “Asiatic Researches,” and in Moore’s “Hindu Pantheon.”
It is remarkable also that in the Polynesian Islands the funeral rites
were accompanied by somewhat similar ceremonies. These the early
missionaries viewed with horror, and finally succeeded in extirpating
them.
These ancient funeral rites have now disappeared in Ireland; still
the subject remains one of intense interest to the ethnologist and
antiquary, who will find in the details indications of the oldest
idolatries of the world, especially of that primitive religion called
Arkite, as in the dramatic performance called “The Building of the
Ship,” where one man prostrates himself on the ground as the ship,
while two others sit head and foot to represent the prow and stern.
This ship drama is, perhaps, a fragment of the earliest tradition of
humanity represented by a visible symbol to illustrate the legend of
the Deluge.