The concept of a Patron Deity is more or less a modern one, and suits contemporary Paganism because the relationship tends to be an individual, solitary, private dynamic rather than a community-based public practice. It is not without precedent though. I tend to look to the Medieval Irish culture of claiming a patron Saint to devote to, to become “Maol” or “Giolla” for (for example, Maol Choilm is what gives us the name Malcolm. It means a devotee of Saint Columba/Colm, specifically one you have become “maol” or “bald” for, ie cut your hair into a tonsure (Irish style, of course), or Giolla, servant or devotee gives us, for example, the name of a comrade of ours, “Fitzpatrick”, which in the original Irish is Mac Giolla Phádraig, “son of the devotee of Saint Patrick”, after a 10th century king of Osraighe who gave himself the name Giolla Phádraig, and transmitted the name to his whole sept and clan; it also gives the Scottish “Gilly”, meaning “retainer”… I project this practice into Gaelic Paganism and imagine that it must have come from a practice of devotion to a god or goddess, as it is not well-attested elsewhere in Medieval European Christianity. Thus, I myself shave my head “for Manannán”, and claim the title “Maol Mhanannáin”, as part of my personal practice. I don’t claim it’s “authentic”, but I know that it is in keeping).
What shall we do, in a World in which the Old Enchantments seem departed? In which Disenchantment seems to be the default State of the Image-in-Nation? In which we can visit these Old Places, Old Ways, and feel a melancholy sort of emptiness, a grief, a bereavement?
I think that’s part of it: the old Sacred Places are seeming derelict, abandoned. But have you tried focusing your Subtle Senses in the filthy alleyway behind a Denny’s on a Full Moon recently?? Some pretty wild shit going on there, if you ask me! I’m being flippant, but do you see the point I’m making? The places where we used to constrain and focus the Numinous are leaking, they have run dry. I mean sacred sites, but also Churches, Institutions of Power like law courts or government-buildings, the Ancien Régime. Wild strange energy is abroad though, in the world we thought profane. It is profoundly frightening, if you are attached to the Old Ways (which we all are to some degree). But the High Strangeness of an abandoned housing estate at night, or neon-lit service-tunnels of an underground shopping mall, the vague, troubling expanses of train station concourses, the non-place of the food court in the weak tired filtered light, perambulated by shuffling half-alive creatures, the muzak a mindless piping of instrumental soft rock hits you can just about not remember, as the Idiot God at the centre of this numb and purposeless creation stirs from its millennial slumber and the Time is Out of Joint…
We may seek, in places that themselves are emblems of the Loss and Grief and Emptiness we feel. We may seek to revive, reanimate, reappropriate half-forgotten, long-effaced practices, traditions, names, concepts … Are they Authentic ? Are they Real? These are just not the right questions.
I think of the conversation with Paddy Bushe that recently was podcasted on The Hollow Path (see here for his interview with Malachas Ivernus, our Esteemed Leader and Benefactor : https://www.buzzsprout.com/2136267/12548744 ), and how he describes the continuance and the persistence of the Myth of a very obscure figure in Gaelic lore, linked to the very specific island just off the coast of Waterville in Kerry, in view of his house; he circles it in a tiny canoe, conscious of the echoes through the ages of this shred of Story. It is linked to Donn, one of the Milesian brothers who led their landing, and if I remember correctly, dies and becomes assimilated with a Death God, and associated with that small island off the Kerry coast called Tech Duinne (“The House of Donn”), where the Dead were supposed to pass through, and onwards…?
It’s interestingly a near homophone with the Welsh Dôn, who is a mother-ancestor, but here is identified as male and given a psychopomp role … I tend to associate it too with the Roman-identified Gaulish God that they claimed as cognate with “Dis Pater”, but who I don’t think is mentioned by a local name (classic Romans, TBF… Interpretatio Romani For the Bin!). So, the Lord of Wealth, the Dark Father of the Underworld…
Having read much, and thought much, I’m inclined to think upon the similarly-named Danú (presumed Patroness and Matriarch of the Túatha de Danann, though mentioned almost nowhere else) and identify her with a primordial, almost elemental force that perhaps long-predates the later God-folk and their genealogies and adventures. I feel a similar case can be made for the Cailleach (also interestingly paired with Bríghid as a later avatar, or with whom she operates a seasonal alternation). These “Elder Gods”, if you’ll excuse my going a little bit Cthulhu Mythos on you, seem to leave a strong “trace”, but not to really interact with the later stories. I surmise that the Celtic culture might have associated them with the vestiges of the Neolithic Megalithic cultures …?
And again, this is more a hunch than anything else, and I will have to one day do more digging on it, but I might suggest also such figures as Lír, the Sea-God father of Manannán, who might in turn be seen as his later avatar or successor. Is it possible to draw a direct line between this Lír and the later one, who features in the tragic tale of “The Children of Lír”? It’s hard to say: but there is a continuing thread there of troubled fatherhood. How not to also bethink ourselves of Shakespeare’s King Lear. Similarly, three children. Similarly, one of whom heroically resists through her honour and stubbornness. But there it ends. Or does it? From the Irish Lír/Ler (meaning “sea”, it would appear), to the Welsh Llŷr, to the British Leir, whom Shakespeare was aware of from Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Chronicle, by way of Raphael Hollinshed, this legendary British King was supposed to have flourished around the time of the Founding of Rome, in the 8th century BC. Who is this Primal Embodiment of the Western Ocean? Why does the single lilting syllable “Lir” evoke the Wave, the Sea, and Loss? Can you not feel it though? Does it not somehow speak a deeper sense to you?
And again, there is Crom, whether Crom Crúach or Crom Dubh, a figure of fearful sacrifice associated with the monoliths, with harvests, with blood… A Dark God of the Standing Stone, the Crooked Idol, before whom Tigernmhás (the “Lord of Death” …? Maybe?) worshipped, with thousands of followers on Magh Slécht, the “Plain of Prostration”, at which they were all struck down, and only Nemed and his few followers survived to flee and give rise to all the succeeding generations of Invaders of Erann … Obscure, lost, forgotten tales. Crom Dubh, maybe merely a Dark Double of Lúgh, His Day marked on a day in August not far from Lúghnasa. What does that hard, dull syllable mean? “Crom” : Crooked? Head? What is “Crúach”? A pile, a mound? Of grain … of stones … of severed heads … It goes too far back, it goes too deep. Only echoes remain. That Fallen Idol. “Look on my works, Ye Mighty, and despair … Nothing beside remains.”
One might even want to attempt such speculation about shadowy figures like “Bel”, who is unattested except in a doubtful etymology of Bealtaine as “Bel-tinne”, Bel’s Fire (which seems to be pretty clearly erroneous, but resonates with the Continental Belennos). Or even the Horned God Cernunnos figures, again of whom scant written attestation remains.
It feels often like there are these huge, mysterious, Chthonic Deities, looming in the mists of pre-History, upon whose footprints we may stumble, whose long-echoing voices we may hear the last reverberations of … The sacred history of our Land is like the waves of the sea below which glide the vast shadows of the whales, and we know them only by their wake….
(Photo by Pete Oxford/Minden Pictures, from Glen Jeffries, “The Path of the Unseen Whale”, HAKAI Magazine, 2017)
But I can tell you: this is how I make sense of it. I cannot claim to know. I cannot claim Authenticity, only that I attempt a Practice that can resonate, can rhyme, with what little we know. I pick through the fragments. I glean. I gather, small remains, scant reminders. Traces, imprints, signs. I cobble them together: this is bricolage, a modern syncretism. This is métissage, a way of making mixture and admixture into a virtue, a thing beautiful for itself.
I know the Ways of Orienting Oneself, from several sources : to the Celts, to the Gaels, the compass points were of vital importance. I know the lists of associations of the Directions of the Four Cúige, the Provinces, North and South, and East and West, and the Fifth, the Centre, Mídhe, where the Ombilicus stands. I know, and have lived deeply within, the Elemental Correspondences proposed by other lineages and traditions: I first learned of one imbricated within the other, in Yeats’s Occult Stories, where he attempts to propose a Celtic Golden Dawn, and places the Sword of Nuada, the Spear of Lúgh, the Cauldron of the Dagda, and the Lía Fáil at the obvious Cardinal Points. I followed Michael Robartes and Owen Aherne, in “Rosa Alchemica” and “The Tables of the Law”, as they pursued their mystical dreams to a strange temple on the Western Shore. These things are Where I’m Calling From. These things were, to me, a Call.
And so, I do perform that classic Opening Ritual, and Call the Quarters. But am I casting a Circle, or setting a Compass, or placing myself at Axis Mundi? All of these, surely; I do not create a barrier, but rather situate myself in relation to my world, both its physical geography around me, and its metaphysical topography in the Imaginal. With Knife or Wand, I face East (or as I will, depending on the purpose), and draw not a Pentagram, but rather a Cross, Encircled (drawn North-South, East-West, Circled Deiseal; which is how we say Sunwise). The Celtic Cross, the Quartered Circle: the Compass Rose, la Rose des Vents; the Rosy-Cross. All of these things, and more: the Signs Sought by the Seeker, Will Stanton, in The Dark is Rising, which is as good a book of legendry as any, to the child I was, and still is, if I am honest: as good or better as any others that are out there. Not for Authenticity, but for Poetry, certes. At the East, I sing out BEL; at South, CROM; at West, LIR; at North DIS (for strangely, that’s what stuck: it should be DONN, and I try. The very sound is like a bell, and that is as it should be). And sometimes I start one place, sometimes another. And sometimes I work Deiseal, and sometimes I work Tuathalach, which is widdershins. And sometimes I close, in reverse. And sometimes, I leave open. And sometimes, I use Spirals, and sometimes Pentagrams. And sometimes, I Call In. And sometimes, I Cast Out.
These are the Four Fathers; my Elder Gods, my Primal Gods. They are not Authentic: they are Echoes of Forgotten Things. They please me well. I please Them too. I propitiate them; they are not amenable to Knowledge and Conversation: They only ARE.
Another time, I’ll write of the Matronae, the Ladies, the Maidens, the Weavers: they are not so easy to piece out; they are not so Four-Square. They are Triplicities within Wheels within Spirals: Danú/Anú/Ana, na Mórrigna, the Three Bríghids, Arianrhod – the Silver Wheel and Her Sisters, the Cailleach, Áine/Gráinne/Gréine, Medb the Queen, Sadb Amhaltach, Síle Ní Ghoill: so many Strange Sisters, so many Washers at the Ford, and Women of the Mounds, Dread Phantoms, Night Riders, Great Mothers.
For now though, I only offer as an example of this rewriting, reappropriation, reviving: a prayer I wrote, made, cobbled together, from the bits and pieces I had gradually gathered about that One I call “Patron”, Foster-father, Friend. It was for the purpose of defending, and avenging, a loved one of a loved one, who had been sorely hurt. It was, it transpired, for me myself as well, and now, it is for you, should you ever need it. Here: a New Prayer to an Old Tune; a spell to guide and guard your life.
“The Invocation of the Protection of Manannan Mac Lir”
Assemble on your altar or working space the following: a sea-stone in the North, a goblet of spring water in the West, a burning censer (or stick!) of incense, perhaps myrrh, frankincense, in the South (the more visible and thick the smoke, the better), and a sharp blade in the East. In the centre, a scrap of material from a cloak or coat that has protected you, or them, from cold, rain, harm, and loneliness.
Make a heartfelt prayer to Manannán, Son of the Sea, Wanderer in Mists, Magician, He Who Hid the Tuatha de Danann in the Sídhe, Foster-Father to Heroes, Giver of Gifts, Warrior of Renown. He will appreciate any offerings of fresh water, bright flames, sharp knives, or the promise to send your children to him for instruction and protection (for a very loose acceptation of “your” children, “send”, and so on … fostering is part of his Gift; the children of others are also our children: that is his Lesson). He would love a painting or drawing of the sea-foam-wave (Caiple Manannáin – the Horses of Manannán).
“Oh Disappearing Man, oh Druid who was here before the Shining Host landed, oh Sailor out of the Western Sea, oh you man who comes in sunset, who makes your way to us from beyond the Ninth Wave, who fosters our children, who gives us our weapons, who wraps his cloak of mist and silence around us; You who led our forebears into the Mounds, on the Day of Sundering, you who led each to their appointed place; you who apportioned the Kingdoms of the Unseen, who passes us through the Veils to the Otherworld … Hear my plea, for it is Justice. Hear my cry, for it is Suffering. Hear my heart, for it is broken.
Grant unto my Dear One, your Three Things. Grant unto my Dear One, the spinning wheel of the Triskele, and the passage between the Three Worlds: from Underworld, to Thisworld, to Upperworld. From Sea, to Land, to Sky. Let them fade, as the People once faded, into the Otherworld; Let their troopings and their revels, and their sorrowful path, and their weeping for the World, be enfolded in your kind mists. Give unto them your gifts, your Three Things:
The Mist of Forgetting, the Cloak of Protection, the Sword of Answering.
I thus invoke the Three Things of Manannán Mac Lir :
“féth fiada : brat bhaoil : Freagarach”
(repeat three times. Continue to repeat three times the Three Things every time you need to. It winds up the whole charm and repeats it. The pronunciation is “Feh Feeatha Brot Vweel Fragarach (“th” as in “the”, not “thing”)(-ch as in “loch”) …)
The Mist surrounds the Sidhe and their Mounds, to hide them from Mortals; the Cloak will turn any blade, and if placed between us and someone else, makes us forget each other completely; the Sword, the Answerer, will only flash out in just retalitation, but when it does, it is unerring: it never misses, and always kills.
ANTON MERRILL
He comes from a family of ridiculous over-achievers, and gladly fulfils the role of black sheep. A true Renaissance man, he has dabbled in being an impresario, a Svengali, a rabble-rouser, a guru, a rock-star, a tramp, a prophet. He has been a star of stage and screen. He has whipped the crowd into a frenzy.
A scholarship to study screenwriting at Berkeley in California was combined with a brief flirtation with Hollywood, but Hollywood was found sadly lacking. Several years of vagabondage followed, with spells in Paris, Edinburgh, Budapest, Barcelona, Prague, Svalbard, New Mexico, Malawi, Ramallah, and Marrakesh. He currently lives between Berlin and Paris, writing on culture and society for a variety of small-press journals and radical websites. His major work, The Key to All Mythologies, completed in his mid-twenties, is now sadly out of print.
