Dun Briste

This is Dún Briste (literally Broken Fort) in Co. Mayo, Ireland. This 50 metres tall sea-stack stands just off Downpatrick Head, in the townland of Knockaun, east of the quiet village of Ballycastle. The stack is crowned by an old ruined fort...

There is a local legend that explains the name "Broken Fort". It was collected by Douglas Hyde and published in 1914 book "Legends of Saints & Sinners"...It is called "St Patrick and Crom Dubh" and I will here give a short version...With interpretation 🙂

...Before St. Patrick came to Ireland there lived a chieftain...in Co. Mayo, and his name was Crom Dubh. Crom Dubh lived beside the sea in a place...which is now called Dún Briste, or Broken Fort. My story will tell why it is called Dún Briste...

...Crom Dubh was one of the worst men that could be found, but as he was a chieftain over the people of that country he had everything his own way; and that was the bad way, for he was an evil-intentioned...man, with desire to be avenged on every one who did not please him...

...He had two sons... (who were) were worse than himself, and that leaves them bad enough! Crom Dubh (also) had two hounds of dogs...and if ever there were [wicked] mastiffs these two dogs were they....

...And, to go further, Crom Dubh had a big fire kindled...Anyone who displeased him, used to be brought before Crom Dubh, as he sat beside the fire, and Crom used to pass judgment upon him, and after the judgment the man used to be thrown into the fire...

...It is said that a fairy sweetheart walked with Crom Dubh, and giving him knowledge according as he used to require it. And every scheme hatched against Crom Dubh to put him out of the world, he overcame them all, for he had too much wizardry from the fairy sweetheart...

...The fame of Crom Dubh and his two sons, and his two mastiffs, went far and wide, for their evil-doing; and the people were so terrified at his name, not to speak of himself, that they used to hide their faces in their bosoms when they used to hear it mentioned in their ears...

...Crom Dubh was continuing his evil deeds for many years...and every year it was getting worse...Some say that he was a native of hell...But people had no knowledge of God or Mary...and for that reason they could not put trust in any person beyond Crom Dubh...

Here is the interesting bit 🙂 

...because they thought, bad as he was, that it was he who was giving them the light of the day, the darkness of the night, and the change of seasons... 

Who gives light and darkness and seasons? The sun god of course...The god for whom the Bronze Age Grange stone circle was built. 

The stone circle aligned to Crom Dubh's day, the day that marks the moment of maximum heat and to summer solstice, the day of maximum daylight...

It is Crom Dubh that St Patrick had to defeat to Christianise the Irish...After which Patrick took over Crom Dubh's holy mountain. 

And became "the one who decides the faith of the Irish"... 

And so enters Patrick:

...During this time St. Patrick was going throughout Ireland, working diligently and baptising many people....

...St. Patrick began explaining to the Pagans about the light and glory of the heavens. Some gave ear to him, but the most of them paid him no attention...Patrick took all those who listened...to be baptised to the well which is now called Tobar Phadraig or Patrick's Well...

...When these Pagans got the seal of Christ on their forehead...they began telling St. Patrick about the doings of Crom Dubh and his evil ways, and they besought him...to chastise Crom Dubh, rightly or wrongly, or to give him the Christian faith if it were possible...

Interesting right? The pagans get baptised and the Old God becomes Devil. Actually not even Devil, as that would give the Old God too much importance. The Old God becomes an Evil Chieftain...Much easier to deal with...

To cut the long story short, St Patrick arrives to Crom Dubh's house "...with his defensive company with him..."

Now does this imply that St Patrick used force during his conversion of the Irish?

...Crom Dubh set his dogs on St Patrick, with coals of fire coming out of their mouths, and a blue venomous light burning in their eyes...But Patrick tamed Crom Dubh's hounds and they become Patrick's hounds. Then Patrick extinguished Crom Dubh's fire. Then Patrick tried to "put the seal of Christ on Crom Dubh's forehead, but Crom Dubh did not give any ear to St. Patrick's words"...

...Then Crom Dubh tried "deviltry, druidism, witchcraft and  black art" trying to gain the victory over St. Patrick. But it was all no use for him, for the words of God were more powerful than the deviltry of the fairy sweetheart...

Finally:

...St. Patrick gave a blow of his crozier to the cliff under the base of the gable of the house, and he separated that much of the cliff from the cliffs on the mainland, and that is to be seen there today...and that is the cliff that is called Dún Briste or Broken Fort...

...Crom Dubh had to remain on top of the cliff "until the midges and the scald crows had eaten the flesh off his bones". And that is the death that Crom Dubh got...

...The people gathered in multitudes from every side doing honourable homage to St. Patrick, and the pride of the world on them that an end had been made of Crom Dubh...There was a well near and handy, and he baptised them all...

...There is not a year from that out that the people used not to make a pilgrimage to the well, on the anniversary of that day; and that day is the last Sunday of the seventh month, and the name of the Sunday is Crom Dubh's Sunday...

And so the people, on whose foreheads Patrick put the sign of the cross, after he banished their Sun God Crom Dubh, continued celebrating Crom Dubh's day...🙂 Under the pretext that they celebrated the victory of Patrick over Crom Dubh...I mean the day is still today known as "Domhnach Crom Dubh" which means "Crom Dubh's Sunday"...

Being a proper Sun God, Crom Dubh's day is Sunday. But not any Sunday. Sunday marking the middle of the hottest part of the year, the time when Sun's fire burns the strongest (like Crom Dubh's fire). Which accidentally falls in the middle of the Dog Days (like the Crom Dubh's ones which breathe fire and have light flashing out of their eyes)...

Oh by the way, did you know that right about the time when Patrick killed the Sun God and extinguished his fire, there was a major drop in temperature in Europe? You see the sudden drop in the second part of the 5th century AD?

How cool is this story? 

It is a historical account of the forceful conversion of the Irish and turning of their Sun god into Devil basically, by "The Patron Saint" of the Irish St Patrick "and his defensive company"...Oh and of the beginning of the medieval ice age...

Fasting against god

Fasting  is typically a religious act; an individual deprives themselves of food to concentrate the mind better on God. However, in ancient Ireland, fasting was not only religious. It also had another purpose. The ancient Irish law books explain that a person could fast against a man who had injured him in some way and who was of a higher social rank.

The wronged individual went to the wrong-doers house and sat outside from dawn to dusk refusing to eat. By so doing he brought bad luck or ‘pollution’ to his opponent. The one fasted against then had two options. He could either admit his wrong and redress it – the fasting would stop and social harmony would be restored. Or he could counter fast to ward off the curse.

There is a story recorded in the Tripartite Life of St Patrick which describes how the saint forced God to grant him his requests through an act of ritual fasting. 

Patrick's requests were:

1. That the Irish people would not live permanently under oppression
2. That the country would be submerged seven years before the end of the world and so be spared the final devastation
3. That Patrick himself would be allowed to judge all the Irish people on the Last Day.

When Patrick asked God to grant him these wishes, God originally refused. The saint then, following the ancient Irish law, decides to fast against God, in order to force him to change his mind. 

St Patrick went to Croagh Patrick in County Mayo, the holy mountain of Ireland. There he climbed to the top, sat down and told a passing angel that he would not leave the mountain "till I am dead or until all my requests are granted".

The Tripartite Life of St Patrick then goes on to say that Patrick stayed on top of the Croagh Patrick without drink and without food, "with much badness of mind" and "singing malicious psalms" when God decides to test him, from Shrove Saturday to Easter Saturday. 

At the end of these forty days and forty nights God, faced with his servant’s fasting, gives in and grants Patrick his wishes...

Do you know of any similar customs involving fasting?

Now here is an interesting bit. According to the ancient Irish law: "The wronged individual went to the wrong-doers house and sat outside from dawn to dusk refusing to eat." Patrick went to Croagh Patrick, the mountain which was holy to Crom Dubh, the pre Christian Irish god. So technically Patrick was fasting in front of Crom Dubh's house...

Why? Who was Patrick really fasting against?

St Patrick and snakes

Patrick banishes all snakes from Ireland

The absence of snakes in Ireland gave rise to the legend that they had all been banished by St. Patrick. Apparently he chased them into the sea after they attacked him during a 40-day fast he was undertaking on top of Mt Croagh Patrick.

The problem is all evidence suggests that post-glacial Ireland never had snakes. So the official interpretation of this story is that St Patrick drove pagans (who wore snake shaped torcs???) and are thus symbolically replaced in this story by snakes??? Possibly. St Patrick did in a very short time convert Ireland to Christianity. 

But maybe the snakes that Patrick "expelled" or which have left Ireland during his lifetime were not real terrestrial snakes but symbolic celestial snakes?

In my post "Fulacht fiadh - salt extraction facility?" I talked about the climate change patterns in Ireland over last 5,000 years and how they could have affected people's ability to extract salt from sea water. 

The Greenland Ice Cores provide a temperature record for the last 5,000 years. Clearly manifest are three temperature peaks which correspond with the archaeologically and historically documented Warm Periods in the North Atlantic region: Minoan Warm Period 1450–1300 BC, a Roman Warm Period 250 BC – 0 AD, the Medieval Warm Period 800–1100 AD. On the chart you can also clearly see the well documented extreme cold period known as the little Ice Age 1350 to 1850 AD.

"The Bronze Age Optimum" starts with the sudden sharp rise in temperature during the Minoan Warm Period which started right about 1500 BC. How warm was Atlantic northern Europe during the Minoan Warm Period can be discerned from the fact that during the Minoan warm period, millet was grown in southern Scandinavia. Today Millet is grown in tropical and subtropical regions, it is an important crop in Asia, Africa and in the southern U.S.. The average annual temperature in Mississippi and Alabama where millet is grown today is about 10 degrees, which should be compared with today's average annual temperature in Denmark, which is 8 degrees.

The temperature after the Minoan Warm Period drops and has another minimum around 1200 BC rising to another maximum around 1000 BC. After that it oscillates around relatively stable low value until it suddenly starts to rise around 250 BC. This is the beginning of the Roman Warm Period

The Roman warm period started quite suddenly around 250 BC. Some studies in a bog in Penido Vello in Spain have shown that in Roman times it was around 2-2.5 degrees warmer than in the present. The Roman warm period is amply documented by numerous analyses of sediments, tree rings, ice cores and pollen – especially from the northern hemisphere. Studies from China, North America, Venezuela, South Africa, Iceland, Greenland and the Sargasso Sea have all demonstrated the Roman Warm Period. Additionally, it has been documented by ancient authors and historical events.

How warm was Northern Europe during the Roman Warm Period can be seen by the fact that during the culmination of the Roman warm period olive trees grew in the Rhine Valley in Germany. Citrus trees and grapes were cultivated in England as far north as near Hadrian’s Wall near Newcastle.

The temperature then has a sudden drop during the first century AD but it then rises as suddenly and stays stable high until the end of the fourth century AD when it suddenly drops during the first half of the fifth century to an extreme low level. 

The dates of St Patrick's life are uncertain. His own writings provide no evidence for any dating more precise than the 5th century generally. The Irish annals for the fifth century date Patrick's arrival in Ireland at 432 AD. His sermon on the Mt Croagh Patrick, during which he banished snakes from Ireland must have happened soon afterwords...

St Patrick's arrival to Ireland coincides with the beginning of the sudden huge drop in average temperature, which during his life fell to the level comparable to the temperature during the so called "Little ice age". 

So Patrick arrives to Ireland. He defeats the old Sun God Crom Dubh, whose holy mountain was the same Mt Croagh Patrick from which Patrick drove snakes into the sea. He converts people to Christianity. And at the same time during the destruction of the old religion based on sun worship, the sun "dies". The heat of the sun disappears. 


In my post "Three suns" I talked about the symbolic link between Snakes and Dragons and the heat of the sun. This link was clearly preserved in Slavic mythology. Snakes come out during the hottest part of the year and thus symbolize the summer. Slavs believed that snakes "suck the heat out of the sun" and that this is why summer sun eventually looses it's heat and autumn and winter arrive. The dragon is actually the symbol of the summer sun's extreme heat, destructive heat which brings drought.  

Symbolically with the disappearance of the sun's heat, the snakes and dragons, the symbols of sun's summer heat, disappeared too. 

The belief that snakes and dragons were driven out of Ireland by Patrick, could be remnant of the blame that the Sun worshiping Pre-Christian Irish put on Patrick and his Christianization efforts for the sudden (and probably catastrophic) climate change. Basically they blamed Patrick for driving the summer out of Ireland.

On the other hand, it is actually quite possible that Patrick's owes his success in converting Ireland to Christianity, and driving out the pagans (snake worshipers) to this sudden (and probably catastrophic) change of climate. To worshipers of the Sun God Crom Dubh, it must have looked like their god has abandoned them. So they turned to Christ, the "savior"...

It is also possible that monks coming to Christian Ireland from still mostly Pagan parts of Britain during the centuries after Patric's death, attributed the lack of snakes (Devil's creatures) to Christianity and not to the naturally cold and wet Irish climate (Hibernia = Cold place)...

But there is another possibility. Patrick replaced Crom Dubh, the god which arrives on Crom Dubh Sunday (last Sunday in July or first Sunday in August). The old Bronze Age monuments like Grange circle are aligned with the 1st (2nd) of August, the day that marks the end of Summer and the beginning of Autumn. This is the day when Storm gods arrive to kill the dragon (great snake) of Summer...Is this the reason why Patrick is killing snakes?