Magic Gardens: Coll, letter C: our Hazel Nut Tree

Written by Isabel del Rio

Sunday, 01 November 2009 00:00

Isabel del Río

Directora de arte de Yareah magazine: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

http://www.jardineria.pro/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/avellano.jpg

Hazel Nut Tree

In Druidic culture, letters were known by the name of a tree which started with its same initial: for example, “duir” -our oak- was also the letter “D” and “saille” –our willow- was the letter “S”. They have five vowels and thirteen consonants and these last ones had magic meanings (the same as the tree they reprensent) which explain some roots of our current celebrations and beliefs.
Summarizing the information appeared in previous issues:
“Beth”, letter “B”, is our “birch”… see Yareah/January.
“Luis”, letter “L”, is our “wild ash tree”… see Yareah/February.
“Nion”, letter “N”, is our “ash tree”… see Yareah/March.
“Fearn”, letter “F” is our “alder”… see Yareah/April.
“Saille”, letter “S” is our “willow”… see Yareah/May.
“Utath”, letter “H” is our “hawthorn”… see Yareah/June.
“Duir”, letter “D” is our “oak”… see Yareah/July.
“Tinne”, letter “T” is our “holly tree… see Yareah/October
This month of November, we are going to speak of the ninth consonant letter or “magical” tree and about its legends.
“Coll”, letter “C” is our “hazel nut tree”.

It is the tree of the wisdom.
In old Druidic tradition, letter C was also the number 9, because 9 is the number consecrated to Muses and because the hazel gives its fruits after 9 years.
The hazel nut tree was the Bile Ratha, the place where lived the poetic Aes Sidhe and it gave its name to a god called Mac Coll (“son of the Hazel”). According to the History of Ireland by Keating, he was one of the oldest rulers of Ireland and had two brothers: Mac Ceacht (“son of the Plough”) and Mac Greine (“son of the Sun”). They married with the Triple Goddess of Ireland: Eire, Fodhla y Banbha and this legend seems to speak about the destruction of matriarchal system by the patriarchal invaders of the Metal Age.
However, according to Robert Graves, Mac Greine was a goddess too and since the Irish Goddess ruled agriculture and wisdom, this legend is speaking about new invaders’ obedience to the matriarchal goddess, the Mother of the Nature, queen of the Neolithic religion.
This ninth tree dominated from the 5th of August to the 1st of September.
**This article is following the teachings of Robert Graves, “The White Goddess- A Historical Grammar of Poetic Myth”. It is very interesting to know that Druids had a secret system of communicating without words: they used their hands. Every letter was represented in a part of the hand and when they moved a finger were signalling a letter and after some movements… a word… a sentence… a complete message.

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