Blair Collection > Carmina gadelica > Volume 2

340 NOTES
Teanacsa, avert, safeguard, ward away. 'Teanacsa gorta," avert famine; 'teanacsa
dosgain,' ward away misfortune from cattle, protect from danger, distress, or
difficulty.
Teasdam, I preserve, secure, keep, help, assist.
Teilg, teilig, a chord, string of a lyre, of a harp, or other stringed instrument.
Teilin, teilinn, a musical instrument, a stringed instrument. Welsh ' telu/ a harp.
Teiiie, fire. (Vol. i. p. 174.)
' Cha loisg teine, grian, no gealach mi.' No fire, no sun, no moon, shall burn me.
Similar immunity from fire is mentioned in an Arthurian ballad taken down
in Uist : —
' Cha loisg teiue 's cha dearg arm air an No fire shall buru, no arm can hurt the
fliear, man,
Ach a chlaidhe geal glan fein.' But his own white sword of light
— therefore while he slept his enemy killed him with his own sword.
Tein-eigin, neid-fire, need-fire, forced fire, fire produced by the friction of wood or
iron against wood.
The fire of purification was kindled from the neid-fire, while the domestic
fire on the hearth was re-k^ndled from the purification fire on the knoll. Among
other names, the purification fire was called 'Teine Bheuil,' fire of Beul, and
'Teine mor Bheuil,' great fire of Beul. The fire of Beul was divided into two
fires between which people and cattle rushed australly for purposes of purifica-
tion. The ordeal was trying, as may be inferred from phrases still current. ' Is
teodha so na teine teodha Bheuil ' — Hotter is this than the hot fire of Beul.
Replying to his grandchild, an old man in Lews said : — ' A Mhoire ! mhicean, bu
dhurra dhomh-sa sin a dheana dhusa na dhol eadar dha theine mhor Bheuil ' —
Mary ! sonnie, it were worse for me to do that for thee than to go between the
two great fires of Beul.
The neid-fire was resorted to in imminent or actual calamity upon the first
day of the quarter, and to ensure success in great or important events.
The writer conversed with several persons who saw the neid-fire made, and
who joined in the ceremony. As mentioned elsewhere, a woman in Arran said
that her father, and the other men of the townland, made the neid-fire on
the knoll on ' La buidhe Bealltain ' — Yellow Day of Beltane. They fed the fire
from ' cuaile mor conaidh caoin' — great bundles of sacred fagots brought to
the knoll on Beltane Eve. When the sacred fire became kindled, the people
rushed home and brought their herds and drove them through and round the
fire of purification, to sain them from the ' bana bhuitseach mhor Nic Creafain
Mac Creafain ' — the great arch witch Mac Crauford, now Crawford.
That was in the second decade of this century.
John Macphail, Middlequarter, North Uist, said that the last occasion on
which the neid-fire was made in North Uist was ' bliadhna an t-sneachda