A question, clever lad. Whence have you come?
Not hard to answer:
I spring from the heel of a wise man,
From the meeting-place of knowledge,
From the place where goodness dwells;
From the red sunrise I come,
Where grow the nine hazels of poetic art,
From the splendid circuits in a land
Where truth is measured by excellence
Where falsehood fades,
Where there are many colours,
Where poets are refreshed
~ From “The Colloquy of the Two Sages”, the Book of Leinster
Botanical name: Corylus avellana
Family: Betulaceae
Ogham: Coll
Scots Gaelic: Calltainn
Irish Gaelic: Coll
Welsh: Cyll
French: Noisette
Message: Follow your curiosity. Never stop learning.
There is a place where water reflects a tapestry of green light. The pool gurgles to itself in the shade of nine hazel trees. If you watch, you may see the flash of a salmon’s fin breaking the water.
There! Did you see it?
They say that fish bears the name of Knowledge, and he is not easily caught. But he is worth the chase.
In the Brehon law, the hazel is listed among the Nobles of the Wood, which may seem odd to a casual observer: Hazel trees are not imposing. Full-grown trees rarely reach over thirty feet, and could often be described as shrubs. Many common hazels grow only eight or nine feet high. (1) But the casual observer did not live in the 6th, 7th, and 8th century, when hazelnuts were one of the most important staple foods throughout the Celtic world. Nutritionally, the nuts are impressive: a 100 gram serving provides 18 grams of protein, 50 grams of LDL fat, and all the calcium a grown person needs. (2) Add that to the fact that hazelnuts store well, and you begin to understand their importance.
Archeological evidence shows that the Celtic peoples were harvesting hazelnuts on an industrial scale as far back as the Mesolithic era. At sites in Farnham in England’s Surrey county, at Cass ny Hawin on the Isle of Man, and on the island of Colonsay in Scotland, shallow pits have been found filled with hundreds of thousands of burned hazelnut shells, accompanied by fire pits and storage chambers. Those in Colonsay have been dated at nine thousand years old. (3)
The poetry of the people reflects the proof the land offers up. A recurrent compliment for a land or a tribe was the worth of its hazel trees. In the 11th century tale, The Guesting of Athirne, we are told of the joys of autumn in the words:
“the hard ground is covered with heavy fruit
Hazel-nuts of good crop
fall from great old trees on the dikes” (4)
Other reflections are seen in such expressions as “Doire nath on which fair nutted hazels are constantly found,” and “O’Berga, the chief for whom the hazels stoop,” (5) which are peppered throughout the lineages of kingdoms and the recordings of the lines of kings in all the manuscripts available today.
Often hazel and oak are mentioned in the same legend or poem, and there is a logic to this: the two trees were viewed as the two forms of knowing. In the Irish language, there are two separate words for two separate types of knowing: eagna, the wisdom of experience, and imbas, the spark of new ideas and the thirst for knowledge. (6) The nuts of the two trees embody the difference. Both oak and hazel trees produce nuts in plenty, but while acorns require much processing to become edible, hazelnuts need only be cracked open at the right time. The truths of the oak are bone-deep wisdoms, and those who take the oak’s way were droi-vid, wise as the oaks.
Knowledge of today and the search for it belonged to the fillid, or poet, and their tree is the hazel. The fillid of the legends held not wisdom but imbas, usually translated as inspiration. We’re told in the tale of “The Colloquy of Ancients” from The Book of Leinster that the place for the aged sage is among the oak trees, but the place for the clever young folk who served in the warrior band of the Fianna was the hazel grove, and their food was hazelnuts. (7)
It is fitting that Finn would want to feed his warriors on hazelnuts, for legend tells us that is where he gained his own abilities as a genius and a general. In the 12th century manuscript Macgnímartha Fionn, The Boyhood Deeds of Fionn, we’re told that the poet Finegas found a secret pool beneath nine hazel trees at the head of the Boyne river, and realized that he’d come upon the Tobar Segais, the Well of Knowledge. In the water a single salmon swam, fat with the hazelnuts he’d eaten. Finegas knew that the man who tasted the salmon’s flesh would know all there was to know in the world, and he spent seven years in hunting it. But it was his new servant boy Finn who cooked it, Finn who burned his thumb on hot fish grease and unwisely stuck his burnt thumb in his mouth, and Finn who gained the knowledge. At times it’s the student, not the master, who makes the great leap in understanding. The student, you see, has not learned what is impossible.
But Finegas would not have found the pool, and Finn would not have gained his knowledge if someone before them had not dared to take the first step.
There is an older story in the hazel pool. It is the story of curiosity.
In the Dindsenchas we read that there was a time when no imbas existed in the world, save in a single pool. High King Nechtan had entrapped all knowledge and all inspiration in a pool beneath nine hazel trees, and had a great well cover fitted over it. Every person who wanted to lead or tell tales had to pay Nechtan three rods of gold, three rods of silver, and three years of servitude for one sip from the well. Soon Nechtan grew wealthy, and his wealth bought him the friendship of a lord with a beautiful daughter. She was called Boann of the Fair Face, and she went to the court of Nechtan as his bride.
At first Boann was happy. But her husband’s stinginess upset her. In Nechtan’s court, the scraps of the table went to the pigs rather than the poor, and his harpers sang dull songs; even they were not given a taste from the Well of Knowledge.
“Husband,” she said, “Could we not give more? We have so much.”
“Hush woman,” Nechtan barked, “do you see to the kitchens.”
For a time Boann was content. Since there was little for her to do, each day she went walking. In time she found a path barred by three spears; the path to the hazel pool.
“Husband,” she said, “May I see the hazel pool? I have heard of its beauty.”
“Hush woman,” said Nechtan, “Only I and three cupbearers may go near the pool. It is death to all others. Do you go and see to your loom.”
Now Boann was incensed. She was of no use in the court, but the people thought her too great to let her roll up her sleeves and aid in the daily work of the town. And if she heard ‘hush woman’ once more she’d shriek like the bean-sidhe.
It was coming time for the great Midsummer fair in Nechtan’s land, and he as king would be presiding. Boann went to him.
“Husband,” she said, “I would go to the fair.”
“Hush woman!” cried Nechtan. “Do you stay here and see to your weaving. I will be back in three days or so.”
He rode out.
Boann pulled on her mantle and walked into the forest. Soon, she came to a place where nine hazel trees drooped over a great well covering set in the earth.
Boann stepped beneath the trees. She opened the hatch in the well cover, dipped in her hands and drank.
For three days Boann sat by the hazel pool, ate the nuts, drank the water, and learned. On the third day she acted. Walking three times counterclockwise around the pool, she broke the enchantment laid over the waters within. The well covering burst and the water that had been trapped so long bubbled out, and Boann laughed as it flowed out into a stream, then a river, and she ran beside it as it grew. The running stream was passing Nechtan’s castle as he came riding up.
“Woman!” he cried, “What have you done to my well?”
“It was never your well to claim, Nechtan!” she called in reply as she ran.
“Wife, come back!” he roared.
“I am not your wife. You treated me as none, and so I am none to you,” she called over her shoulder, and ran on. He spurred his horse after her, but she became an otter and leapt into the water.
The river flowed on, down to the sea. It soaked into the land and fed the crops. It became rain and fell in all places.
Today the Boyne river still flows, and there is imbas in all things and all places. We have only to dive in and go looking for it.
- The Trees of Britain and Northern Europe, Mitchell, A. F., Collins, 1982
- “SELF Nutrition data, Nuts, hazelnuts or filberts”, http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/nut-and-seed-products/3116/2
- Before Scotland: The Story of Scotland Before History, Moffat, Alistair, Thames & Hudson, 2005
- A Celtic Miscellany: Translations from the Celtic Literatures, Jackson, Kenneth, Dorset Press, 1986
- A Social History of Ancient Ireland: Treating of the Government, Military System, and Law; Religion, Learning, and Art ; Trades, Industries, and Commerce ; Manners, Customs, and Domestic Life, of the Ancient Irish People, Volume 2, Weston Joyce, Patrick, Longmans, Green, and Company, 1903
- Nature in Ireland: A Scientific and Cultural History, Foster, John Wilson, Chesney, Helena C. G., McGill-Queen’s Press, 1998
- “The Colloquy of the Two Sages”, Stokes, Whitley, Revue Celtique 26, 1905