Celtic sacred trees

Many types of trees found in the Celtic nations are considered to be sacred, whether as symbols, or due to medicinal properties, or because they are seen as the abode of particular nature spirits.

The ancient geographer Strabo (1st century AD) reported that the important sacred grove and meeting-place of the Galatian Celts of Asia Minor, Drunemeton, was filled with oaks.

In an often-cited passage from Historia Naturalis (1st century AD), Pliny the Elder describes a festival on the sixth day of the moon where the druids climbed an oak tree, cut a bough of mistletoe, and sacrificed two white bulls as part of a fertility rite.

Britons under Roman occupation worshipped a goddess of the oak tree, Daron, whose name is commemorated in a rivulet in Gwynedd.

According to the pseudo-history Lebor Gabála 'Book of Invasions', the sacred oak of early Ireland was that of Mugna, probably located at or near Dunmanogoe, south Co. Kildare.

When Lleu Llaw Gyffes is about to be killed by Gronw Pebyr, his wife's lover, he escapes in eagle form onto a magic oak tree.

[3] There are several recorded instances in Irish history in which people refused to cut an ash, even when wood was scarce, for fear of having their own cabins consumed with flame.

The French poet who used Breton sources, Marie de France (late 12th century), wrote a lai about an ash tree.

The Brythonic Avalon in Arthurian tradition in certain medieval narratives, attributing Welsh origin, is translated as Insula Pomorum; 'The Isle of Apples'.

In the Ulster Cycle the soul of Cú Roí was confined in an apple that lay in the stomach of a salmon which appeared once every seven years.

In the Irish tale Echtra Condla (The Adventure of Conle), Conle the son of Conn is fed an apple by a fairy lover, which sustains him with food and drink for a month without diminishing; but it also makes him long for the woman and the beautiful country of women to which his lover is enticing him.

Hazel leaves and nuts are found in early British burial mounds and shaft-wells, especially at Ashill, Norfolk.

Thought a fairy tree in both Ireland and Wales, wood from the hazel was sacred to poets and was thus a taboo fuel on any hearth.

Traces of hazelnuts have been found in a 'Celtic' style three-chained suspension bowl discovered in a post-Roman burial dated to 650 CE in London.

[8] The elder, having clusters of white flowers and red or blackish berry-like fruit, has many associations with the fairy world in oral traditions of recent centuries in Celtic countries.

[9] The evergreen yew with dark green, poisonous, needle-like leaves and red berries has commonly symbolized death in classical antiquity.

One of Conchobar mac Nessa's residences at Emain Macha, Cráebruad, has nine rooms lined with red yew.