Lyn Armstrong has written a powerful series of five books with a Celtic setting. Her writing is passionate and an adult rating/warning is given for these books! As an avid reader of historical romances for over 20 years, Lyn has a passion for writing this genre. She has spent six weeks in Scotland touring the castles and museums to gain a chronological feel of the country. Volunteering as a cast member for the Renaissance Festival in Florida, Lyn mastered the language of olde English and gained additional historical knowledge.

The Last Celtic Witch #1

A painful death… a prophecy foretold. Pursued by evil forces for her powers, recluse Adela MacAye foresees her own agonizing death. She must seek the chosen one to produce an heir and pass on her Celtic powers. To fail would be the end of good magick, plunging the world into darkness. Plagued by enemies and undermined by sabotage, handsome Laird Phillip Roberts must save his clan from bloody feud by making an alliance through marriage… a marriage he does not want. After a night of white-hot sensual delights with the alluring witch, his heart commands he break the pledge of peace. With treachery around every corner, will he be too late to save… The Last Celtic Witch? Continue Reading »

Well done guys – you’ve done a superb job of putting this together!

Pic: Stephanie Pui-Mun Law

There is a certain cosmic sensibility to the myths and legends of the Celtic peoples. A sense of things being bigger than they seem. Power flows beneath the skin of the world to the Celtic mind, accessible along the path of dragons and the mouth of stones. It was the Druids who could see it, interpret it for their brother-Celts, follow the lines of power and show them where to build their villages and sanctified places.

 A Mystery

The Celts are a mystery even now. They once ranged across the width and breadth of Europe, from the forests of Germany to the hills of Northern Italy. Their greatest concentration was perhaps in Scotland, Ireland and England. The Celts of Great Britain are what many modern people think of when they hear the word ‘Celt’. But in truth, they were a people who spread from one end of ancient Europe to the other, and they left their mark stamped upon the face of the continent, though they themselves are gone now, for the most part.

Druids and Dragons

Druids and Celtic dragons, on the other hand, are more familiar to the modern mind. What do you think of, when you hear the term ‘druid’? A robed figure, mistletoe in one hand, a scythe in the other, standing over a stone slab and a screaming victim. Horror films have a lot to answer for in terms of our familiarity with the concept of the Druid. In reality, druids were the priests and seers of the Celts. Druids engaged the cosmic on a daily basis, pitting their knowledge against the raw force of the mystic energies which the Celts believed permeated their lands. They would pinpoint the best places to till the soil or carve stone or build a home, and show their people the places to best avoid. Too, they had a strange relationship with the concept of the dragon.

Dragons, while commonly thought of as fire-breathing marauders, were, to the Celts, indicators of places of great power. Where dragons trod, mystic energy flowed, and where they laired where invariably places of great sanctity and mystical harmony. While dragons were dangerous, they were also indicators of fertility, of life. ‘The Path of the Dragon’ was the Celtic term for ley lines. And ley lines, for the uninitiated, were the stretches of mystic power which criss-crossed the land. Druids hunted these lines, and made a ley lines map for their people, instructing them to build their temples and homes along the lines in order to harvest the energies.

Dragons, Druids and Celts are all inextricably linked by these bands of power. For the Celt, dragons, though deadly, and frightening, represented the continuation of life and health. They were omens of a good harvest, of a year of plenty. And the Druids were the ones who found the dragons and interpreted their meaning for a given group of Celts. For these ancient peoples, everything hummed and sparked with the lightning of the gods. Where dragons walked, the lightning was visible, and where Druids indicated, the lightning was controllable for the good of the Celtic people.

About the Author:
Tim Lazaro is a Celtic Symbols enthusiast. Visit All About Celtic Symbols for more expert advice on Dragons Celts and Druids and more information you can use right now to gain insight into the mysteries of the ancient Celtic World.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Tim_Lazaro

Well, it’s Midsummer. Or actually, just after Midsummer and it has been absolutely swelteringly hot here. Absolutely glorious weather! If the weather is like this for you, I recommend a nice, long, cool drink, an comfy chair, headphones and settling down for a Monster of a Show! For reasons many and varied, you know – all those things life throws at you, we’ve had a bit of an enforced break. But we’re back! It’s been such a while and you’ve all been so patient and so caring, that we offer this whopper as a way of saying Thank You to the Celtic Myth Podshow clan!

We’ve got six great pieces of music for you, some chat about the Festival of Midsummer, a really exciting section from Rhonda Carpenter’s Celtic novel, The Mark of a Druid and some listener contributions to bring you – a poem and a beautiful story. Oh, and don’t forget our regular trip to the highlands to meet up with old Duncan in another trip to the Dragon’s Head for a story from our resident Scottish Shannachie. Don’t blame us if the world misses you for an hour and a half while you get into some serious fun!

The Episode is available for subscribers on the feed, or you can download it or listen to it from our Episodes page. You can find the Shownotes for this episode in the Shownotes section. If you come to the site and listen or listen from one of our players – have you considered subscribing? It’s easy and you automatically get the episodes on your computer when they come out. If you’re unsure about the whole RSS/Subscribing thing take a look at our Help page.

Pic: Brothersoft

Banshees, and other Death-Warnings Of all Irish ghosts, fairies, or bogies, the Banshee (sometimes called locally the "Bohēēntha" or "Bankēēntha") is the best known to the general public: indeed, cross-Channel visitors would class her with pigs, potatoes, and other fauna and flora of Ireland, and would expect her to make manifest her presence to them as being one of the sights of the country.

She is a spirit with a lengthy pedigree—how lengthy no man can say, as its roots go back into the dim, mysterious past.

The most famous Banshee of ancient times was that attached to the kingly house of O’Brien, Aibhill, who haunted the rock of Craglea above Killaloe, near the old palace of Kincora. In A.D. 1014 was fought the battle of Clontarf, from which the aged king, Brian Boru, knew that he would never come away alive, for the previous night Aibhill had appeared to him to tell him of his impending fate.

 The Banshee’s method of foretelling death in olden times differed from that adopted by her at the present day: now she wails and wrings her hands, as a general rule, but in the old Irish tales she is to be found washing human heads and limbs, or bloodstained clothes, till the water is all dyed with human blood—this would take place before a battle. So it would seem that in the course of centuries her attributes and characteristics have changed somewhat.

Very different descriptions are given of her personal appearance. Sometimes she is young and beautiful, sometimes old and of a fearsome appearance. One writer describes her as "a tall, thin woman with uncovered head, and long hair that floated round her shoulders, attired in something which seemed either a loose white cloak, or a sheet thrown hastily around her, uttering piercing cries." Another person, a coachman, saw her one evening sitting on a stile in the yard; she seemed to be a very small woman, with blue eyes, long light hair, and wearing a red cloak. Other descriptions will be found in this chapter. By the way, it does not seem to be true that the Banshee exclusively follows families of Irish descent, for the last incident had reference to the death of a member of a Co. Galway family English by name and origin. Continue Reading »

Pic: Science News

Bruce Bower of Science News reported this week That people made musical instruments out of bone and ivory soon after reaching Europe. The hills may be alive with the sound of music, but so were vulture bones and mammoth tusks for ancient Europeans.

Researchers working at two Stone Age German sites have unearthed a nearly complete flute made from a vulture’s forearm as well as sections of three mammoth-ivory flutes.

These 35,000- to 40,000-year-old finds are the oldest known musical instruments in the world, says archaeologist and project director Nicholas Conard of the University of Tübingen in Germany. Continue Reading »

Pic: CESNUR

The Center for Study on New Religions (CESNUR) has released a report about Ár nDraíocht Féin (ADF), one of the most widely spread forms of modern druidry or druidism. This paper called A Pathway to Druidism is the text of a paper read by Michael T. Cooper, Ph.D. (Trinity International University, Deerfield Illinois, USA) at the 2006 International CESNUR Conference. Unfortunately, I do not have permission to quote from it but hopefully my introduction will prompt you to head over to CESNUR and read it. My introduction and paraphrase follows:

The Introduction to the paper examines Druidism as one of the expresses of the Neo-paganism movement, whose ideals can be expressed as egalitarianist, pantheist and environmental responsibile. He defines ADF as a typical example of North American neo-paganism that meets these ideals as well as the spirituality of North Americans. Continue Reading »

Originally posted 2008-10-23 09:47:36. Republished by Blog Post Promoter