It is believed in Ireland and some parts of Scotland that when the spirit leaves the body “it will travel all the ground travelled over while alive, and during this time it is visible”. It is also held that “the spirit of the person who has been last interred must watch the churchyard until the next funeral takes place or for a year after interment”. “The belief that the soul takes the form of animals is almost universal, and there are many examples of it in the British Isles.” Seagulls are frequently regarded as the souls of the dead on the Scottish coasts. (6) The writer recalls a humorous incident of a fight arising between two fishermen at Granton, near Edinburgh, because one of them had alluded to his dead father as “a – seagull”.
A ghost, an ancestral ghost, yet something more, the banshee has a name which may be translated “supernatural woman” and, perhaps in view of her especial characteristics, “dead woman”. Indeed, she has many of the attributes of mortality, for her nose is sunken, or not apparent, and her eye-sockets are large and hollow. Occasionally she is decked out in green silk and gold ornaments, and such cases may be associated with those tales as speak of her as the ancestress of a great family.
In some parts of Scotland, particularly in Argyllshire, the contiguous islands and Skye, the banshee is known as the cointeach, or “keener”, from her habit of indulging in outbursts of dismal wailing. In these regions she is found attached to the families of the Macmillans, the Mathisons, Kellys, Mackays, Macfarlanes, Shaws and Curries. Sometimes she is described as having the appearance of a small child; at others as “a small or very little woman in a short green gown and petticoat, with a high-crowned white cap”. One local traditionalist speaks of the cointeach as “a little white thing, soft as wool”, and without flesh, blood or bones – clearly a popular rendering of a very primitive idea of the rather amorphous appearance and condition in which the soul was supposed to exist in its separate state. In its more human shape it haunted the backs of houses, wailing and prophesying death. When a fatal event impended in the family of the clan Mackay, the cointeach, attired in a green shawl, was wont to warn them by squatting outside the sick man’s door, raising her mournful keening.
I cannot hope to review the evidence relating to the banshee in Ireland in its entirety, but must follow its main directions only. “The popular belief in Clare,” wrote the late Mr. T. T. Westropp, a major authority, “is that each leading Irish race had a banshee, Eevul, the banshee of the royal O’Briens, ruling over twenty-five other banshees, always attendant upon her progresses”. (7) Elsewhere he says : “The banshee appears in Mayo as a dark-cloaked grey-haired woman sitting on a rock or fence moaning or crying, more frequently heard than seen. In Connemara she wears a red cloak, and sings before a death; her voice travels with the gust of wind.” (8) Another of these hags, he tells us, was Bronach, “the Sorrowful one of the Black Head”, who is described as crooked, thatched with elf-locks, foxy-grey and rough like heather, with wrinkled brow, bleared eyes and a flattened blue nose. When seen, she was usually engaged in washing blood-stained garments. (9)
The Irish banshee uttered her warning only in the case of ancient and noble families. When she did so, according to Crofton Croker, she walked beside those who met ‘her on some lonely road, keening and clapping her hands, her long white hair falling about her shoulders, repeating the name of the person who was about to die. (10) Elsewhere he describes her as “a tall, thin woman, with uncovered head and long hair that floated round her shoulders attired in something that seemed either a loose white cloak or a sheet thrown hastily about her”. (11)
In The Wars of the Gaedhil with the Gaill it is told how Brian, the King of Ireland, was warned of his coming death by the banshee Aibhill (pron. Eevul) of Crag Laith. In 1318 the Normans, under Richard de Clare, were marching to engage the O’Deas of Dysert, when they beheld a bag washing armour and clothes. She said to them: “I am the Water Doleful One. I lodge in the green mounds. Thither I invite you. Soon we shall be dwellers in one country.” (12)
Dear Sir,
My grandmother, who was from Derry, Ireland saw the banshee just prior to her sister, Josephine’s, death many years ago. My grandmother lived in Florida and Josephine was living in Canada. My grandmother said she first heard the banshee wailing loudly and mournfully outside her door. Then she saw the old woman in white in a horse-driven carriage going by her house. She noted the date and time and later found out that her sister had died around the same time. My grandmother was a MacDonagh.
No one else in our family has seen the banshee.
i was wondering where you got the name chapel of st. malvey i can trace my family name back to 1734 in ireland county cork
It’s not me that got that name, this article is The Celtic Spirit World
by Lewis Spence
from ‘The Magic Arts in Celtic Britain’
(chapter VII)
i dont want to be a pest but do you have any idea about the origin of the chapel of st malvey?
You’re not being a pest. And, no, I don’t know the origin of the chapel of St. Malvey. Sounds like a good topic for you to research, though (considering your last name).
Dear Sir,
my grandparents lived in Croatia. They have been born in a little village by the name Seona.
It´s an unusually name for a croatic village.
I can remember that ma granny teach me then I was a child a lot of fairys.
She believed in them and the other older pupil in the village , too.
I have heard stories about fairies in this village.
My granny says they always lived there with the people helped them or punished them.
She tells me, if I don´t lost the faith in them, one day I would see the fairies, too.
In the wood of this village is a spring and there was an old man living. The people called him brother John.
He lives like an eremit allone and he was praying for the ill people. He was healing the humans.
My grandmother shaws me the place there the fairies were dancing in the ring.
She gives me so lot my granny and I beginn to understand now.
Three months ago I became the idea to search about the name Seona in Slavonia (Croatia).
This is a name from scotish gaellic and comes from the name Seonaid (God is great).
I´m sure that in Seona the celts build one of them first villages, then they come to Croatia.
All this I tell a Dr. of archeollogy in Zagreb and he writes me back, that he has found some celtic graves and this story from me can be a way to find something more about our history.
Today,if you ask me if I believe in fairiey, yes do.
Why?
So I am catholic, but my grandmother tells me that god is great, he lives everythere and I can talk with him also in the nature.
I grove up with the belive in god and the fairies.
I loved them and talked to them, too. I see them as my sisters in soul.
Sometimes I can here them singing in the wood or crying on places there bads thing happening.
They are real the fairies. My granny says if the humans lost the faith they can´T never see the fairies again.
One day I was so tired, I hear voices from the door like children laughing. I think my children are coming home with my husband, but it was a litle green ghost.
He was small ,like a child from 6 years.
I can´t see a face only circle on his head with symbols like celtic art. He talks somthing to me, but I don´t understand. It was a language warm and deep. The louds sounds like drrhh, krch, shhr, chaarhh,,, somthing like this.
On the top of the wall from my room something litle flyes. They looked like small white princes and they laughed all time. The voice of them sounds like children laughing.
I have open my ices and I was thinking I´m dreaming, but in the next second I feel how thr little green ghost take my plaid from the bed and takes it over me. I was falling in a deep sleep.
Then I awaked I have feel so good. I never sleeped better.
It was a good feeling. This I will never forgett.
Bye, from Germany, yours Mirela
It’s been quite a while but I found out some info about St. Malvey the real name of the church is St Moluag’s church (locally known by its gaidhlig name of Teampull Mholuaidh) is a 13th Century temple in the village of Eoropie in Ness in the Isle of Lewis
Ed I located documentation including a reference from Charles Dickens. The church is still there and active. St Malvey was born in 590 AD and went with St Columba to bring Christianity to Scotland. Are you Molly’s son, brother Jimmy now Father Seamus , my cousin – email for me nihildat@yahoo.com Slainte
I have documentation on the church from a journal written by Charles Dickens in 1887. He calls it the church of St Malvey. I traced him back to 590 AD. He and St Columba et al were called the disciples of Ireland. I think you might be Molly’s son, brother Jimmy now Father Seamus, and my cousin.
i am indeed mollies son please reply cous
Ed
Hiya. Donald Trump’s mother was born on Lewis Island. It’s the largest island in the Outer Hebrides.
Does you know the Gaelic equivalent of the surname “Malvey”?
I had a dream about a year ago that seems to fit with your description of the ‘banshee.’ The dream showed an old woman in a white cloak who was sitting on this throne in a grove of trees. I entered and there was a large hewn stump with three “tree branch fairies” sticking out of it. They started singing a whimsical and melodious song. I didn’t get the feeling that the song was for me. since then there have been several deaths that may have been suggested by the banshee and other dream indicators. I’ve had numerous encounters with spirits, mostly in dreams, over the years who have taken the form of mythical figures. Please share any insights. Is there something I can do to intercede? I get the message that these dreams are to prepare, initiate or to avoid pitfalls. Thanks!