Clare Island Survey — History and Archaeology. 2 51 



round flat platform 20 feet to 21 feet across, marks yet another house-site 

 on that unsheltered summit. 



Sidh. — Besides the last-named haunted knoll, the chief fortress of the 

 fairy-folk lies in the commons to the north of the last. It is a remarkable 

 site ; there were evidently once two lakes above it, each banked up by a cross- 

 ridge. The streams gradually cut deep channels through each ridge, and the 

 lakes became marshy fields, the little stream still following its old course. In 

 the southern gate-like gap the eastern rock rises straight like a wall, with a 

 door-like recess, apparently closed by a slab of smooth grey stone ; this is the 

 portal of the Fairies' Palace. I am told that a shaft runs deep into the rock 

 overhead, and is their chimney. 



"Fantastic spirits are called by the Irish 'men of the sidh ' because they 

 are seen, as it were, to come out of pleasant hills to infest men, hence the 

 vulgar belief that they reside in certain subterraneous habitations within these 

 hills ; and these habitations, and sometimes the hills themselves, are called by 

 the Irish sidhe or siodha." 1 Tirechan's very early annotations give " viros sidhe 

 aut deorum terrenorum aut fantassiam estimaverunt." 2 O'Conor translates 

 Ath na sidhe in the "Annals of Inisfallen," "Vadum lemurum." The early 

 Icelanders also " believed that they " (their spirits) " passed into the 

 knolls at death." 3 The sidh is called " Campul na niucka," evidently akin to 

 the Oogh and Lough na mucka to the south-west. I did not hear of any 

 supernatural pig to account for these names ; is there any connexion between 

 them and the constituent of the island's name hire ? 



I was told that a young man, in bravado, threw sods of turf down the 

 " chimney " in contempt of the inmates. By degrees he felt uncomfortable in 

 his leg ; then a dull pain and swelling ; then he took to bed in constant agony. 

 A poor " wise woman " received charity at his house, and, learning what had 

 happened, undertook to cure the patient. She went out, gathered certain 

 herbs, and made a hot poultice for his leg. Before long the swelling opened 

 and she got out a long object like a traneen, or blade of grass ; she then bound 

 up the limb and it healed ; the youth eventually recovered. It is evident that, 

 whatever the cause, it was a mere case of necrosis of the bone. I recall 

 similar treatment near Patrick's "Well, Co. Limerick, about 1885, by an old 

 servant, Michael Hazelton, an astrologer and herb doctor ; but the patient 

 after the bone was drawn out, had to go to hospital to get the wound to heal. 

 Some thirty years since this rock was still greatly feared. Another young 



1 See "Colgan, Acta SS.," March 17th, and Eoderie O'Flaherty, " Ogygia" ; also Dr. Joyce's 

 " Irish Names of Places," ser. i, chapter v, and Lady Wilde's " Ancient Cures" and "Ancient 

 Legends." 



2 Tirechan's annotations (Tripartite Life of St. Pairick, Bolls Series, vol. ii., p. 316) from the 

 Book of Armagh. 



3 Laiiunamabok, 2—16. 



G2 



