Larissa

This is apparently the only menhir ever discovered in Greece. Two metres tall, it depicts a female figure, and dates to the Early Bronze Age (3300-2200 BC). Discovered in Central Greece at Soufli Magoula, Prefecture of Larisa, currently in the Diachronic Museum of Larisa...

I always loved the name Larissa. I always loved the name Larissa. In mythology, the nymph Larissa was a daughter of the primordial man Pelasgus. The man who taught people how to eat acorns... 

 

Peleus, the hero beloved by the gods, father of Achilles lived in Larissa...Homer says in the Iliad that: 'Hippothous led the tribes of Pelasgian spearsmen, who dwelt in fertile Larissa"...

Officially: "The name Larissa (Λάρισα Lárīsa) is in origin a Pelasgian word for 'fortress'. There were many ancient Greek cities with this name"...

The Larissa of Peleus and Achilles, where the above Bronze Age menhir was found, lies in the plain of Larissa in Thessaly. A fertile flat pan like plain surrounded by high mountains. Pic: Mount Olympus from Larissa, Thessaly, Greece, 1850–85 by Edward Lear

This plain was the centre of the ancient Thessaly, one of the traditional regions of Ancient Greece. During the Mycenaean period, Thessaly was known as Aeolia... 

The fertile plains of Thessaly were continuously inhabited at least since the 8th millennium BC, when we find the first traces of the Neolithic farmers of the so called Sesklo culture...

But around the beginning of the 3rd millennium BC something very important happens. Yamna descendants start moving into the Balkans...Now guess who was making the first anthropomorphic stelae in the world? Yamna people...Here is one from Odessa... 

Now these Yamna guys were metalworking warriors...And were associated with the introduction of the warrior cult into Europe and the R1b haplogroup...Which language did they speak? It is accepted that it was an Indoeuropean language. I would further suggest that it was Gaelic...

What? I can hear you say. Based on what? Well based on the Irish oral histories, which were first written down in the early medieval time...And they say that the forefather of the Irish, Partholon, came to Ireland from Scythia, via Anatolia, Greece, Sicily and Spain...

Interestingly, according to the Irish Annals, Partholon's migration happened during the 3rd millennium BC, at the same time Yamna descendants moved west out of the Pontic steppe... 

Like for instance, that Partholon brought metalwork to Ireland, which were confirmed by the arc archaeological evidence which showed that around 2500 BC a completely new genetic population, R1b metalworkers, arrived to Ireland from oversees...I wrote about this in my post "Or, Ireland's gold"...

Or that during the first 300 years after Partholon arrived, lakes kept erupting... There is dendrochronological evidence  that right around the time when the Irish Annals say the Partholon arrived to Ireland, climate suddenly changed, resulting in years of rain and catastrophic flooding...I wrote about it in my post "Partholon and the great flood"...

These R1b people, the first metalworkers to reach Ireland were probably the first Irish, Gaelic speakers to reach reach Ireland...So it is possible that Irish was spoken in the Balkans before it was spoken in Ireland...

And it seems that these first Gaelic speaking (???) Irish came from the Balkans skipping the rest of continental Europe. At least based on archaeological evidence in both Balkans and Ireland. 

I wrote about this in the series of posts about the "Montenegrian Tumuluses"...

Did they arrive via Sicily and Spain, like the Irish Annals say? Well, most likely as there was a maritime trading network connecting Balkans, Sicily, Spain since Neolithic. I wrote about this in my post "Neolithic seafarers"...

Now, finally here is the interesting bit 😁 What is the root of the name Larissa? Apparently this is Pelasgian word. "Pelasgian language" just means pre Greek, not of any specific Pelasgian language...Pre Greek could be anything from any age. Could it be Gaelic? From Bronze Age?

Did you know that in Gaelic, the word "lár" (pronounced lor but also laer) means "earth, ground, flat surface, floor, plain, centre, middle"... 

This is plain of Thessaly...Flat plain surrounded by mountains...The centre of Thessaly... 

The name certainly matches the landscape...And there was enough time and enough further mixing of people in Thessaly to end up with Larissa from "lár" by the time the name was first recorded...Who knows...I am curious what those other Larissa's look like landscape wise???

But maybe this is just a complete coincidence...As I said, I always liked the name...

The young one

In this article, I will give another proof for the incredible age of the Irish oral tradition, first written in medieval time.

This is Newgrange, a prehistoric monument in County Meath, Ireland, located about one kilometre north of the River Boyne. It was built about 3200 BC...

Once a year, at the winter solstice, the rising sun shines directly along the long passage, illuminating the inner chamber...Pic: Irish Archaeology.

The sun shines through a box like opening above the entrance...

In this post about Newgrange I postulated that this ancient structure was primarily built as a temple dedicated to the rebirth of the new young sun, new solar year...

Anyway, few years ago I came across an article, in which Michael Gibbons, a former State archaeologist, claimed that: "Newgrange may be Ireland’s match for Stonehenge, but it has gained international renown for all the wrong reasons..."

According to Gibbons, "The theory that our Stone Age ancestors designed the passage tomb to capture the rising sun during the winter solstice is a 50-year-old construct rather than accurate reconstruction of a 5,000 year-old practice..."

Gibbons, who was a student of Prof Michael O’Kelly, who excavated and reconstructed Newgrange, argues that O'Kelly's contention that the tomb was largely unaltered from the Neolithic period some 5,000 years ago is not true...

Mr Gibbons claims that late Prof O’Kelly lifted the Lightbox during reconstruction of the entrance "to make the sun shine through it on winter solstice"...

He also says that: "When Prof O’Kelly revealed his new Newgrange Solstice phenomenon at a lecture 40 years ago, it did not get support... Too polite to speak, we said nothing, but it must have dawned on everyone there afterwards that it constituted a monumental mistake..."

Soooo...What are we to make of this? Is Newgrange Winter Solstice phenomenon a modern forgery, or was this structure originally built as a solar temple? I believe that Professor O'Kelly was dead right. Newgrange was definitely built in such a way to let the Winter solstice sun in

And the Irish have preserved the proof of this in their oral tradition. In my post about the Flood of Partholon, I already gave one proof that these stories are in some cases over 5000 years old.

There is another story, directly linked with Newgrange, that is as old. This is the story of Aengus. In Irish mythology, Aengus, is one of the Tuatha Dé Danann. He was a son of Dagda (Giving god) and Boann (Goddess of the river Boyne). Pic: Victorian depiction of Aengus...

Officially 🙂 Aengus was "probably originally a god associated with youth, love"...In Old Irish his name is Óengus or Oíngus. The name is attested in Adomnán's Life of St Columba as Oinogus(s)ius. Officially: "This is believed to come from a Proto-Celtic name meaning true vigour"

Hmmm...The god of youth and love? Well this "probably" comes from the fact that Aengus was also known as "Óengus Óc/Aengus Óg" (Aengus the young), "Mac Óc/Mac Óg" (young son)...

I find it very interesting that the Gaels had to qualify Aengus  as "The young one"...When his name sounds sooooo much like "Jungaz" (The Proto-Germanic root meaning young one). But that is surely "just a coincidence"!!!

Remember Mr Gibbons, who slated Professor O'Kelly for his claim that Newgrange was built to capture winter solstice sun? He suggested that Newgrange may have been an Iron Age burial site dedicated to an “Irish elite” with links to Roman Britain...Based on archaeological evidence from the site. Any Germanic speakers among them?

That is very interesting indeed...

I will let this simmer 🙂

This, however controversial, is nothing compared to the legend related to "How Aengus stole Brú na Bóinne (an area of the Boyne River Valley that contains the passage tombs Newgrange, Knowth and Dowth) from Dagda"...

According to the 11th century Book of Lecan, the Dagda had built the Brú for himself and his three sons Aengus, Cermait, and Aed. But Aengus wanted it all for himself. The 12th century Book of Leinster describes how Oengus tricked Dagda into giving him the Brú for all eternity...

Aengus asked his father if he could live in Brú na Bóinne for "a day and a night", and Dagda agreed. Irish has no indefinite article, so "a day and a night" is the same as "day and night", which covers all time, and so Aengus took possession of Brú na Bóinne permanently...

Well, this is the story and its interpretation. But what if Aengus actually really meant "a day and a night" and the "cunning trick" part was added later because the original meaning of this story was forgotten?

Here is what I think. Aengus, Jungaz, Mac Og, The Young one, is the young sun, known in Slavic mythology as Jarilo. Just like Aengus, Jarilo was the "Youngest son". According to Slavic beliefs, Jarilo is born on Winter Solstice. The same day when the first morning sun, new born sun, enters Newgrange through the entrance. The only day sun enters Newgrange...

The new sun is born in one day, the day of winter solstice. Interestingly, the story of the birth of Aengus tells us that Dagda, had an affair with the river goddess Boann, when Aengus was conceived. In order to hide Boann's pregnancy, Dagda made the sun stand still for nine months so that Aengus was conceived, gestated and born in one day...

Very interesting indeed.

I believe that Aengus was The young sun and that his name actually means "Young one", not "True vigour". Just like Jarilo, whose name also means "Young one". 

Their equivalent in Greek mythology was Apollo, the Young Sun. 

Now look at this:  

When Apollo was born, "swans circled Delos seven times".  From his father Zeus, Apollo had also received a golden chariot drawn by swans.

What is very interesting is that Swans of Apollo are not just any swans. They are Singing Swans. And the only swans that sing are "Whooper swans".

The whooper swans live and breed in far North of Eurasia (yellow). They winter in Southern and Western Europe (Blue, Green).

They arrived to Greece at the beginning of winter. To announce the immanent arrival of Winter Solstice and the birth of Apollo, the birth of new Sun, the birth of new Solar Year.

Interestingly, "It was said that four swans always hovered round Aengus's head..."

The arrival of Singing Swans to Ireland in the late autumn, signals the immanent arrival of Aengus, Young sun...

All this points to Aengus being the Young sun. 

Now this is an old photo of the Newgrange entrance before it was reconstructed. The Lightbox is covered by earth, the support stones are half collapsed. No light ever entered Newgrange...

By medieval time, the link between Newgrange and winter solstice was completely forgotten and the main date associated with the whole area was Samhain...

Two hills in the Boyne Valley were associated with Samhain: Tara, where the entrance passage to the Mound of the Hostages was aligned with the rising sun around Samhain, and Tlachtga which was the location of the Great Fire Festival which begun on the eve of Samhain...

The fact that Gaels associated Newgrange with Samhain, Aengus's request to reside in Newgrange for "a day and a night", coupled with the Winter Solstice phenomenon observed in Newgrange, can mean only one thing: This is a story describing the original function of Newgrange...

And it comes from the time before this tumulus fell into disuse and disrepair...From the time when Newgrange was the centre of the solar cult, where people celebrated rebirth of the new sun, new solar year, on the day of winter solstice...

When was the last time Newgrange was used for this before it was restored to its old glory 50 years ago? This is how old this story is...

PS:

As I finished my post I was pointed to the article which discusses the same issue entitled:

"Re-discovering the winter solstice alignment at Newgrange, Ireland. In C. Papadopoulos and H. Moyes (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Light in Archaeology" by Robert Hensey

In it I found that some Irish historians have come to the same conclusion before me. 

"Waddell (2014) contends that certain kinds of information were more likely to transfer through time, and notes that for a prehistoric person, the rebirth of the sun may have been equivalent to the resurrection for medieval Christians—thus significantly increasing the likelihood for the survival of knowledge of Newgrange’s solar associations. He further suggests that it is ‘quite conceivable that figures such as the Dagda, … Óengus and Bóand or their precursors—and events associated with them—were part of the beliefs of those who frequented Newgrange over such a long timespan’, even allowing that ‘Aspects of their myths may well be incorporated in constructional and morphological elements of the monument"


"John Carey (1990) has argued that the unique motifs in myths centred on Newgrange (and Dowth) in medieval Irish manuscripts (see below), viewed in light of the discovered solar orientation at Newgrange, suggest that elements from these stories may have Late Neolithic origins, or at least ‘cannot be dismissed as mere coincidence’ (p. 29). These literary tales, in several cases directly connected with Newgrange, contain an intriguing set of references to the manipulation of time, specifically to the manipulation of time over one day, and the control of, or temporary stopping of, the sun. Furthermore, as observed by O’Kelly (1982) and Ó hÓgáin (1999), these tales feature recognized solar deities, in particular the Dagda, keeper of the Brugh, and his son Oengus"

The article also states that the locals actually told archaeologists that "on certain dates" the sunlight enters the tumulus and illuminates the stone with the triple spiral...

The article then goes to postulate that it is possible that Newgrange was used as a sacred place where solstice was celebrated until Christianity arrived to Ireland. That would then explain the solar mythology related to Newgrange not as survival of the Neolithic mythology, but as survival of the Iron Age mythology. 

I don't know what is more fascinating. The fact that Neolithic solar temple was still used by the local inhabitants for solstice ceremonies during early medieval time, or that the memory of the Neolithic solar temple survived among the local inhabitants until early medieval time. 

What do you think?

Sceptre

BronzeAge warrior with a "Shillelagh", type of blackthorn knobstick. Sardinia, Nuragic Culture. 

This is the so called "Ptuj inscription", a line of text written in Noric language, a little known Central European #Celtic language spoken in Roman province of Noricum. 

It reads: ARTEBUDZBROGDUI

This is interpreted as two personal names: Artebudz [son] of Brogduos. The name Artebudz is proposed to mean "bear penis" (compare Welsh arth "bear" and Irish bod "penis")... 

In Serbian we have these two words: 

budža - knobstick, also anything that sticks out, that can be stuck into something else, like a penis. 
budžiti - to stick something like budža into something tight, like a penis into vagina 

This is an Irish knowbstick. I believe most people reading this know what penis looks like 🙂 

Serbian word budža also means someone important, someone who is sticking out...🙂 

In Brittany we find "Penn Bazh" which is exactly the same as the Irish knobstick. 

Penn Bazh was and still is used as a weapon. It literally means head stick where the word "bazh" means stick, basically Celtic "budz" or Serbian "budža" 

Interestingly in Serbian we have another version of the word "budža" meaning someone imortant: "badža" which corresponds with Breton "bazh". So we find both variants of the Celtic word for knobstick, budz and bazh in modern Serbian... 

The official etymology for the Irish word "bod" meaning "penis" is that it comes from Middle Irish "bot" (tail, penis) which comes from Proto-Celtic "*buzdos" (tail, penis).

Interestingly, there is a Serbian word "buzdovan" means a knobstick, battle club just like "budža". So we have two old Irish words (bod, buzd) in Serbian both meaning the penis (knob), knobstick.

In English the phrases "to be a knob" or "to be a dick" both mean that the person in question is showing off, is full of himself, is unpleasant, offensive or even abusive. Like someone who has or thinks he has absolute power, superior worth and right over others.

In Serbian when someone has power over others, he is called "budža" literally a penis, a knob, a knobstick. This is not a derogatory term, but an expression of respect. Knobstick is here directly linked to importance and power over others and is the symbol of that power

In Serbian when someone is "budža", has power over others he is also "neki kurac" meaning a penis, a knob. Like in "on misli da je neki kurac" meaning he thinks that he is important. This directly links a knobstick and knob, the power over others and reproductive power...

Here is a perfect example of the use of "neki kurac": "Modern paradox: The bigger cunt you are (obvious), the bigger chance you have to become a dick (not obvious, means powerful, important)"🙂

This is completely natural and logical, because in clan societies, where all clan members are blood relatives, the oldest male, "Djed" (grandfather) is the one who holds the position of power over others. And unsurprisingly in the Balkans, knobstick is the symbol of that power

Like on this medieval fresco from Macedonia where the elders called "Djed" (grandfather) carry knobsticks both as weapons and as symbols of power.

I believe that this is ancient. It is the simplest the most direct expression of the patriarchal power that you can get. I made you, you came from my penis, therefore I have power over you. 

In Serbian the word for descended from is "potekao" literally "poured out of (his penis)" 🙂

Originally the elders probably held their penises as symbols of powers. In Serbian when someone is behaving like he has power we say "kurči se", meaning "he is showing off, he is being a dick" but literally "he is sticking his dick out" and "he is wielding his knob" 🙂

In Serbian the expression "ponaša se kao da je uhvatio boga za kurac" means "he is behaving like he has absolut power", but literally means "he is behaving like he is holding God's dick". 🙂

Serbs believed that they descend from god Dabog. That they were children of Dabog. So Dabog being the oldest male, the DJED, means that his dick is the symbol of absolute god given power. Is knobstick the symbol of the Dabog's dick? And is this where sceptre of power comes from?

These medieval stećak standing stones from Bosnia all have engraved knobsick. As all the medieval stećak standing stone engravings have religious symbolism, this shows that knobsick was a symbol of not just civil but also religious power at the time. These were djed, elder graves...

And just so you know I am not the only one who has seen penis as the original sceptre, here is a line form the Sumerian lexicon by John A. Halloran:

ñišuš-bar: ruler's staff; scepter. Literally 'penis'+'to see,show'

Slogan

A slogan, is a short and striking or memorable phrase used to quickly and effectively capture the attention of the audience.

It is used in advertising

And in politics

Slogan can be written but it can also be vocal. Please note that the people on the above picture are carrying a placard with a written slogan but they are also shouting slogans. And this is the original meaning of the word slogan: a short and striking or memorable phrase shouted by a group of people to describe their common cause. 

If we look at the etymology of the word "slogan" in the online etymological dictionary we find this:

"Slogan first written down 1670s, earlier slogorne (1510s), "battle cry," from Gaelic sluagh-ghairm "battle cry used by Scottish Highland or Irish clans," from sluagh "army, host, slew" and gairm "a cry". Metaphoric sense of "distinctive word or phrase used by a political or other group" is first attested 1704"

This is following picture is a scene from the movie Braveheart. In it, just before the main battle with the English, Mel Gibson, who plays the Scottish leader William Wallace, yells a battle cry: "Alba gu bràth" which in Scots Gaelic means "Scotland until judgment" or roughly "Scotland Forever". And all the Scottish warriors repeat it, to show to the enemy, and to each other, that they stand united and that they will fight united. 

This unity, this readiness to fight together and for each other, is what transforms a group of people into a sluagh "army, host, slew". 

Now the Irish word "sluagh" comes from Old Irish "slúag, slóg" meaning "army, host, throng, crowd, company, assembly". This word is then said to come from hypothetical Proto-Celtic "*slougos" meaning "troop, army", which is then said to have come from hypothetical Proto-Indo-European root "*slowgʰo-", "*slowgo-"  meaning "entourage". Now what is interesting about this proposed PIE root is that the only other words that come from this PIE root, apart from the Celtic ones, are Proto-Slavic "*sluga" meaning "servant", whose descendants are found in all Slavic languages, and Lithuanian "slaugà" meaning "servitude". 

Again we see interesting connection between Celtic and Slavic languages....

But I believe that the connection is even more interesting. 

What is it that turns a group of people into a troop, an army? The common cause that unites them. Original troops, armies were groups of family, clan, tribe members united together in order to protect the family, clan, tribe and its property. Or take over another family, clan, tribe's property. It was their unity, the readiness to fight together and for each other, that gave them their power. The mobilization of the people to join the family, clan, tribe army was done through shouting slogans. Like "For McLeods" or "Death to McLeods" depending on the situation :) Once the army was mobilized, the morale and unity of the troops was reinforced by shouting the same slogans that made them join the army in the first place. And just before and during the battle, the same slogans were shouted in order to show to further reinforce the morale of each member of the troop and show him that he is not a lonely individual, but a member of a united army which is fighting together. And also to show the same thing to the enemy. You have to deal with all of us, a united army...

Nothing really changed here since the beginning of time. People still most commonly fight for their families, their clans, their tribes, their nations, their countries....And it is the common cause, declared and reinforced through slogans, that motivates them to do so. 

Unless they fight for money that is...But that is another sad story...

Now in Slavic languages the word for unity, the thing that turns a group of men into an army, and which is achieved through common motivation reinforced by the use of slogans, is "sloga"... :) 

Could this word be somehow related to the Old Irish "slúag, slóg" meaning "army, host, throng, crowd, company, assembly"?

Àth Cliath

On the Wiki page "History of roads in Ireland" we can read that according to an entry in the Annals of the Four Masters for AD 123, there were five principal highways (Irish: slighe) leading to Tara (Irish: Teamhair) in Early Medieval Ireland. The entry in the Annals claims that these routes were 'discovered' at the birth of Conn of the Hundred Battles:

"The night of Conn's birth were discovered five principal roads leading to Teamhair, which were never observed till then. These are their names: Slighe Asail, Slighe Midhluachra, Slighe Cualann, Slighe Mhór, Slighe Dala. Slighe Mhór is that called Eiscir Riada, i.e. the division line of Ireland into two parts, between Conn and Eoghan Mór."

In reality, the ancient road system (such as it was - there cannot have been a developed national system) fanned out not from Tara but from Dublin.

The Slighe Assail went due west towards Lough Owel in Co. Westmeath, then to Cruachain. The Slighe Midluachra went towards Slane, through the Moyry Pass north of Dundalk, round the base of Slieve Fuaid, near Newtownhamilton in Co. Armagh, to Emain Macha, ending at Dunseverick on the north coast of Co. Antrim. The Slighe Cualann ran south-east through Dublin, crossing the River Liffey via a "hurdle-ford", then went south "through the old district of Cualann, which it first entered a little north of Dublin, and from which it took its name". The Slighe Dala ran towards and through Ossory in Co. Kilkenny. Finally, the Slighe Mhór ("Great Highway") joined the Esker Riada. It then, more-or-less, followed the Esker Riada to Co. Galway.

It is believed that this "hurdle bridge" was built across the river Liffey in 1014 AD.

In "A Smaller Social History of Ancient Ireland..." which was published by Joyce, P. W. (Patrick Weston) in 1906, we can read in the section entitled "Bridges" that the place chosen for the erection of a bridge was very usually where the river had already been crossed by a ford; for, besides the convenience of retaining the previously existing roads, the point most easily fordable was in general most suitable for a bridge. There is no evidence to show that the Irish built stone bridges before the Anglo-Norman invasion. Bridges were very often built of planks laid across the stream from bank to bank if it was narrow enough, or supported on rests of natural rock or on artificial piers if the river was wide: a kind of bridge occasionally used at the present day. Sometimes bridges were constructed of strong hurdles supported on piles; like that across the Liffey which gave Dublin its old name. These timber bridges of the several kinds were extremely common, and they are frequently mentioned in old authorities.

The fact that both articles talk about the "hurdle bridge" across river Liffey, which "gave Dublin its old Gaelic name" is actually very interesting.

This is because the old Gaelic name for Dublin is "Baile Atha Cliath" which translates literally as "town of the hurdle ford" and not as "town of the hurdle bridge".

Irish "baile" meaning "home, settlement". From Old Irish "baile", meaning "place; settlement; farm, farmstead; (fortified) village, town, city".

Irish "áth" meaning "ford, river crossing". From Old Irish "áth" meaning "ford, open space or hollow between two objects, a shallow area of the river that can be crossed on foot", from Proto-Celtic *yātus meaning "ford", from Proto-Indo-European *yeh₂- meaning "ride, go".

Irish "cliath" meaning wattled, latticed frame; hurdle. From Old Irish clíath, from Proto-Celtic *klētā. Cognate with French claie (From Gaulish *cleta attested in medieval Latin clida) and Welsh clwyd, both meaning hurdle, wattle (stick) fence.

There are other towns of the same name, such as Àth Cliath in East Ayrshire, Scotland, which is Anglicised as Hurlford.

So before any permanent bridge was built, river Liffey was crossed at the ford.

The ford's exact location is a mystery today. It is proposed that it could have been somewhere near Usher's Island (when it still was an island), maybe a hundred yards west of what is now the Father Mathew Bridge, near St Paul's Church.

So ford is basically a river crossing. The place where you can "walk across the river".

I came across this artist's impression of the "hurdled ford":

I doubt that this is actually what the "hurdle ford" looked like. This half submerged structure would not provide any benefits to the people crossing the river. They would still get wet. But there is another type of wooden structure that would fit the description of a "Àth Cliath":

This is the type of a primitive wooden river crossing that can be seen in remote rural areas all over the world. The most primitive type consists of one or two long logs placed across the river. They are supported either by the banks alone or by the banks and wooden stakes stuck into the river bed.

The walking surface can be made wider and more stable by nailing or tying short cross logs on top of the original two logs spanning the river.

If you spread the logs spanning the river and make the cross logs wider, and add you get something like this, a narrow corduroy road bridge.

Now in my post "Togher wooden trackways" I talked about a millenniums long Irish tradition of building wooden walkways (toghers). They are basically corduroy roads and bridges built all over the country across marshes and bogs from Bronze age until Early medieval time.

Exactly the same construction can be used, supported on parallel logs lying on stakes stuck into the river bed, to build bridges. Like this one:

So if there ever was "Àth Cliath" across river Liffey, it probably went through these evolution steps, from a simple logs crossing to the logs bridge. 

But, I can hear people saying, cliath means hurdle. 

In my post "Kolac - Golac" I talked about the existence of a whole cluster of words based on the base word "cleath" meaning stick, pole. 

cleath, -eithe, -eatha, f., a goad, a wattle, pole, stake; a fishing-rod.
cleath thiomána, a goad.
cleath-ailpín, a short stick with a knob.
cleathach, -aighe, a., ribbed, composed of wattle-work (cage, basket, granary).
cleathar, -air, pl. id., m., a stake, a pole; a pile or post; fig., a prince, a chief.
cleatharáil, -ála, f., a severe beating, a dressing, a flogging.
cleath-chur, m., a planting of trees; hence the correlative or collateral branches of a pedigree 

I also talked about the fact that this cluster has its cognate, and possible root, in Slavic word "kol" meaning "stake, stick" and which comes from the word "gol" meaning "naked, bare, stripped" of leaves, branches, which is how you make sticks and stakes. I also talked about the Slavic word "klada" which means log (a tree trunk stripped of branches) and which probably comes from the same root "kol, gol". 

Now if we look at the above walkways we can see that they are made from stakes (Irish cleath, Slavic kol) and logs (Slavic klada). If a Slavic person wanted to describe the walkway construction he could describe it as "koljat, koljast" (made of kolje, stakes, sticks).

That takes care of "cliath". It actually doesn't have to mean hurdle. It can mean anything made from stripped off branches, trunks (sticks, stakes, logs). 

Now about the word "Àth". In Irish the word means ford, the place where you can walk across rivers. The official etymology states that this word comes from "Proto-Celtic *yātus meaning ford, from Proto-Indo-European *yeh₂- meaning ride, go". I would not agree with this. The proposed "Proto Celtic" root was never attested. The only descendant is Gaelic Àth (pronounced "oh" but which used to be pronounced "oth"). 

In my post "Odin the wandering deity" I talked about the Serbian word "od" meaning "walking". This Serbian word comes from Proto Slavic "xodъ" and has cognates in all Slavic languages. It also has a cognate in Ancient Greek "ὁδός" (odos), alternative "οὐδός" (oudós) – Homeric (used only once in Odyssey) meaning "way, road, path", basically something you "od", walk on. 

The official etymology says that these words come from Proto-Indo-European *sodos, from *sed- (“to sit”)!!! I don't have to say how ridiculous this sounds...The root has to be preserved in Slavic "od, hod" meaning "walk, walking"...Road, path, way is what you walk on and derives its meaning from the fact that you walk on it...

Now if the Irish "Àth" meaning "ford, walkway, place where you can walk across the river" has any cognates, they have to be Slavic "od (hod)" meaning "walk, walking" and Ancient and Modern Greek "ὁδός (odos)" meaning "way, road, path". 

Now knowing all this, let's have a look again at the phrase "Àth Cliath":


Irish: "Àth Cliath (Cleath)" = Ford, Walkway, the place where you walk across the river made of sticks, stakes
Serbian (Slavic): "Od koljat" = Walkway, the place where you walk across the river made of sticks, stakes

Interesting don't you think?