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Taghairm, sometimes interpreted as "spiritual echo," or calling up the dead, was an ancientScottish mode ofdivination. The definition of what was required varied, but often involved torture or cruelty to humans or animals and sometimes included animalsacrifice.
The Scottish writerMàrtainn MacGille Mhàrtainn describes three different ways of consulting spirits common in the ScottishHebrides in the 17th century. All involved acts which were supposed to summon spirits or demons in the form of animals which would answer questions concerning the future.[1]
In one version of the taghairm said to be one of the most effective means of raising thedevil, and getting unlawful wishes gratified, the ritual included roasting cats alive, one after the other, for several days without tasting food. This version of the taghairm supposedly summoned a legion ofdevils in the guise ofblack cats, with their master at their head, all screeching in a terrifying way.[2] The ritual is described in Gustav Meyrink’s book onJohn Dee,The Angel of the West Window.[3][4]
An 1825 text described a different technique:
The divination by the taghairm was once a noted superstition among the Gael, and in the northern parts of the Lowlands of Scotland. When any important question concerning futurity arose, and of which a solution was, by all means, desirable, some shrewder person than his neighbours was pitched upon, to perform the part of a prophet. This person was wrapped in the warm smoking hide of a newly-slain ox or cow, commonly an ox, and laid at full length in the wildest recess of some lonely waterfall. The question was then put to him, and the oracle was left in solitude to consider it. Here he lay for some hours with hiscloak of knowledge around him, and over his head, no doubt, to see the better into futurity; deafened by the incessant roaring of the torrent; every sense assailed; his body steaming; his fancy was in ferment; and whatever notion had found its way into his mind from so many sources of prophecy, it was firmly believed to have been communicated by invisible beings who were supposed to haunt such solitudes.[5][6]
A similar description was given for taghairm inTrotternish in a 1772 account of the region,[7] and a number of closely matching accounts with hides and waterfalls can also be found, with some additionally including the diviner being beaten for a while with a pole or a staff after being covered by the animal skin.[8][9]
Scottish historical novelist SirWalter Scott scornfully described a third method in a footnote to his influential poemLady of the Lake. He further adds that it could involve another situation "where the scenery around him suggested nothing but objects of horror." However, Scott could not speakScottish Gaelic and his concepts of Gaelic culture were sometimes distorted.
Other variations practiced have been recorded, and the same name has also been applied to other ritual customs. One variation of the ritual was said to summon a demonic cat called Big Ears, who would grant the summoners answers to their questions and fulfill their wishes. The last ceremony of this kind is said to have been performed on the island ofMull in the beginning of the seventeenth century, and was recorded in the LondonLiterary Gazette of March 1824.[10][11]
The animal skin and waterfall method of divination was also known inWales.[12]
This article incorporates text fromDwelly's [Scottish] Gaelic Dictionary (1911).
