366 Celt: A Year and A Day of Celtic Wisdom and Lore. Carl McColman
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with his brothers, and they stumbled across a sacred well attended by an ugly old hag. Thirsty, the oldest brother approached the water, but the crone blocked his way. “You can drink all you desire, young man, but first you must give me a kiss.” Revolted at the mere thought, he backed away. The second oldest stepped forward, but received a similar challenge from the hideous woman. Each brother in turn declined the request for a kiss, until the youngest, Niall, stepped forward and offered the hag a full embrace. Their lips locked, and magic happened. When Niall stepped back, he found that the old crone had transformed herself into a radiant, lovely lady. “I am Sovereignty,” she said, “and since you alone of your brothers has accepted me in my dark aspect, now I accept you as the king.” And so it was that Niall became the king of the land.
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Why was it important for Niall—or for any king, actually—to accept the ugly side of Sovereignty as a prerequisite to enjoying her beauty? Perhaps this story contains an ancient truth. Sunlight only shines for half of a day. Light emerges out of darkness, and so to reject darkness means to reject the original state of all things. Niall’s brothers made the mistake of passing judgment on someone they deemed as ugly, repulsive, unattractive. Only the youngest brother could see that a kiss was a small price to pay for the nourishing waters. So what if the old woman wasn’t so much to look at? And of course, by accepting her, he proved himself worthy to see that her decay is only part of her story.
There’s a phrase for you: “only part of her story.” Each one of us is a magnificent story, filled with heart, emotion, dreams, and desires. We also have our share of loss, disappointment, and sorrow. Think of when you encounter someone: an angry person standing in line at the post office; a harried mother with rude, bawling children; a government employee who’s not interested in all the reasons why your taxes were paid late. When we encounter such people, we only encounter part of their stories. Sometimes, the parts we see are not to our liking. Perhaps we can take a lesson from Niall, and remember that there’s more to them than meets the eye.
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Irish myth tells how when the first Celts came to Ireland with the intention of settling, they met three goddesses—Banba, Fódla, and Ériu—each of whom offered to help the Celts in their quest to conquer the land, if only they would name the land after her. Ériu was the last of the three that they encountered, and they met her at the spiritual center of the land, and she offered the greatest amount of help to the invaders. So they promised her primacy in terms of the land bearing her name. And indeed, to this day Ireland (in Irish, Éire) takes its name from this goddess. The suggestion is clear: the land is divine, and the land is not only named for a goddess, but in a very real way the land embodies the spirit of the goddess. It’s the spirit of Sovereignty, encoded in the very land.
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The crone whom Niall kissed may be the most obvious example of a mythological figure in the Celtic tradition linked with the concept of Sovereignty—after all, she described herself as such. But she is hardly the only figure in the tradition who embodies this powerful spirit. Indeed, many goddesses in Celtic lore have a profound connection with the land, or with the king, or with the relationship between the two. Meadbh, who appears in Irish literature as a mythic queen, may have originally been a goddess linked with Tara, the traditional seat of the high king of the land. Meadbh’s name means “she who intoxicates” and she may be linked with ancient rituals that conferred kingship onto a new leader through ritualized marriage with the goddess. Other Irish goddesses are associated with traditional seats for regional kings: the king of the northern province of Ulster ruled from Emain Macha, a site associated with the goddess Macha; while the royal seat of the western province of Connacht was associated with the Mórrígan, a goddess whose name means “great queen.” Again and again, political authority and the relationship between the king and the land all points back to a profound spirituality—where the freedom of the people is bound up with the spirit of the Feminine Divine.
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Why does Celtic spirituality draw this unusual link between the goddesses of the land, and the concept of Sovereignty? Maybe it has something to do with power. A king, after all, is a powerful person. A society can only function if its members are willing to support their leaders. But where does a king derive his power and authority? Most monarchies, at least in the Christian world, have suggested their royal power comes from God. Here, Celtic spirituality offers a radically different perspective. To the Celts, royal authority comes from the goddess: from the spirit of sovereignty, the spirit of the land. This is not meant to undermine belief in God in a traditional or Christian sense. But it does imply that the God of monotheism shares divine power, at least in the Celtic world. He shares power with the goddess, who is as connected to the earth and the land as surely as God is associated with heaven above. So the goddess is Sovereignty as a subtle way of saying that she answers to no one—not even God. She is God’s partner in ordering the universe—not his slave.
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The Irish language does not have a word for the coronation of a king; instead the ceremony by which a new king was installed was called the banais righe, or the wedding-feast of the king. Who was the king marrying? The goddess, of course: Sovereignty herself, in one of her various forms. Ancient annals describe this wedding-feast as involving two elements: the goddess (or a priestess assuming the role of goddess) offering a sacred drink to her new “husband”—perhaps mead, from which the goddess Meadbh takes her name; and then the consummation of the marriage itself, symbolizing a sacred union between the land and the people—land symbolized by the goddess, and people symbolized by their king. So here is a profound clue into the heart of Celtic wisdom: life is lived truly and bountifully out of a harmonious, marriage-like relationship between humanity and nature. Nature is not some inert resource for us to exploit as we wish, but rather is divine, and can be related to as a Divine Feminine: a goddess.
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The Irish word for sovereignty is flaitheas. It is related to flaithiúil, a lovely word that means “generous.” To understand the Celtic concept of sovereignty, consider how generosity can be related to it. The goddess of Sovereignty is, in essence, a generous, abundant, and nurturing spirit. The hag by the well was perfectly willing to share of her water. All she asked in return was one loving kiss.
As most people understand it today, sovereignty is not so much a topic related to generosity, but rather has to do with dominion (lordship). The sovereign is the lord, the one who gets to make all the rules and tell everyone else what to do. But that is hardly a Celtic understanding of the concept. Sovereignty in the Celtic world is the spirit of authentic freedom, which extends not only to the political freedom that an independent state enjoys, but also the empowered ability to relate to others out of a profound inner-directed liberty. This includes, of course, the power to be giving (generous) as circumstances dictate. The goddess can only be giving because she is free. This is a point well worth considering. Perhaps we can only be free to the extent that we are generous.
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The fact that sovereignty is related to generosity contributes to one of the most powerful themes of Celtic wisdom: the importance of hospitality as a social virtue. Hospitality is basically the generosity shown to strangers and guests in our midst. Mythology abounds with stories that suggest a king rules well when his court is filled with hospitality—that a visitor must eat till satisfied before even beginning to discuss whatever business brought him to the royal hall. By contrast, kings who do not practice hospitality are satirized, the land goes barren under their rule, and ultimately they are forced to abandon the throne. Sovereignty is not only related to generosity, but to a specific