Some say that Aine’s true dwelling-place is in her hill; upon which on every St. John’s Night the peasantry used to gather from all the immediate neighbourhood to view the moon (for Aine seems to have been a moon goddess, like Diana), and then with torches (cliars) made of bunches of straw and hay tied on poles used to march in procession from the hill and afterwards run through cultivated fields and amongst the cattle. The underlying purpose of this latter ceremony probably was—as is the case in the Isle of Man and in Brittany (see pp. [124 n.], [273]), where corresponding fire-ceremonies surviving from an ancient agricultural cult are still celebrated—to exorcise the land from all evil spirits and witches in order that there may be good harvests and rich increase of flocks. Sometimes on such occasions the goddess herself has been seen leading the sacred procession (cf. the Bacchus cult among the ancient Greeks, who believed that the god himself led his worshippers in their sacred torch-light procession at night, he being like Aine in this respect, more or less connected with fertility in nature). One night some girls staying on the hill late were made to look through a magic ring by Aine, and lo the hill was crowded with the folk of the fairy goddess who before had been invisible. The peasants always said that Aine is ‘the best-hearted woman that ever lived’ (cf. David Fitzgerald, Popular Tales of Ireland, in Rev. Celt., iv. 185-92).
In Silva Gadelica (ii. 347-8), Aine is a daughter of Eogabal, a king of the Tuatha De Danann, and her abode is within the sidh, named on her account ‘Aine cliach, now Cnoc Aine, or Knockany’. In another passage we read that Manannan took Aine as his wife (ib., ii. 197). Also see in Silva Gadelica, ii, pp. 225, 576.
[25] ‘In some local tales the Bean-tighe, or Bean a’tighe is termed Bean-sidhe (Banshee), and Bean Chaointe, or “wailing woman”, and is identified with Aine. In an elegy by Ferriter on one of the Fitzgeralds, we read:—
Aine from her closely hid nest did awake,
The woman of wailing from Gur’s voicy lake.
‘Thomas O’Connellan, the great minstrel bard, some of whose compositions are given by Hardiman, died at Lough Gur Castle about 1700, and was buried at New Church beside the lake. It is locally believed that Aine stood on a rock of Knock Adoon and “keened” O’Connellan whilst the funeral procession was passing from the castle to the place of burial.’—J. F. Lynch.
A Banshee was traditionally attached to the Baily family of Lough Gur; and one night at dead of night, when Miss Kitty Baily was dying of consumption, her two sisters, Miss Anne Baily and Miss Susan Baily, who were sitting in the death chamber, ‘heard such sweet and melancholy music as they had never heard before. It seemed to them like distant cathedral music.... The music was not in the house.... It seemed to come through the windows of the old castle, high in the air.’ But when Miss Anne, who went downstairs with a lighted candle to investigate the weird phenomenon, had approached the ruined castle she thought the music came from above the house; ‘and thus perplexed, and at last frightened, she returned.’ Both sisters are on record as having distinctly heard the fairy music, and for a long time (All the Year Round, New Series, iii. 496-7; London, 1870).
[26] ‘The Buachailleen is most likely one of the many forms assumed by the shape-shifting Fer Fi, the Lough Gur Dwarf, who at Tara, according to the Dinnshenchas of Tuag Inbir (see Folk-Lore, iii; and A. Nutt, Voyage of Bran, i. 195 ff.), took the shape of a woman; and we may trace the tales of Geróid Iarla to Fer Fi, who, and not Geróid, is believed by the oldest of the Lough Gur peasantry to be the owner of the lake. Fer Fi is the son of Eogabal of Sídh Eogabail, and hence brother to Aine. He is also foster-son of Manannan Mac Lir, and a Druid of the Tuatha De Danann (cf. Silva Gadelica, ii. 225; also Dinnshenchas of Tuag Inbir). At Lough Gur various tales are told by the peasants concerning the Dwarf, and he is still stated by them to be the brother of Aine. For the sake of experiment I once spoke very disrespectfully of the Dwarf to John Punch, an old man, and he said to me in a frightened whisper: “Whisht! he’ll hear you.” Edward Fitzgerald and other old men were very much afraid of the Dwarf.’—J. F. Lynch.
[27] ‘Compare the tale of Excalibur, the Sword of King Arthur, which King Arthur before his death ordered Sir Bedivere to cast into the lake whence it had come.’—J. F. Lynch.
[28] ‘It is commonly believed by young and old at Lough Gur that a human being is drowned in the Lake once every seven years, and that it is the Bean Fhionn, or “White Lady” who thus takes the person.’—J. F. Lynch.
[29] It was the belief of the Rev. Robert Kirk, as expressed by him in his Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns, and Fairies, that the fairy tribes are a distinct order of created beings possessing human-like intelligence and supernormal powers, who live and move about in this world invisible to all save men and women of the second-sight (see this study, pp. [89], [91 n.]).