School: Gurranes, Bandon
- Location:
- Garranes, Co. Cork
- Teacher: Nóra O' Halloran
Archival Reference
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0315, Page 068
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- XML School: Gurranes, Bandon
- XML Page 068
- XML “May Morning”
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- (continued from previous page)People will not allow a branch of whitethorn in bloom in May to be brought into their houses. I remember when I was young to be very fond of bringing in little branches with great clusters of white bloom & my mother telling me the fairies would be vexed with me. She did not throw it out but even lately I saw a woman rushing out with a branch a child brought in.
But stealing the milk and the butter with the aid of "the fairies" on May morning was practised in most town lands. In most cases it was a woman who could get it but men tried the art also. There is a place about ¾ mile from the school a cross near the local pub where three townlands 3 parishes 2 baronies & 3 farms meet & long ago a man of the locality always managed to be on the spot before sunrise on May the 1st & to "beckon" the three ways saying in Irish "come from there" each time. He seemed to have all the luck as his five cows made more butter than any three farms around.
Long ago when people made the butter at home. No one dare leave the dairy while the "churn was making" without(continues on next page)
