The Pre-Celtic Traditions of Holed Stones
By C. Austin
The wheel of the Celtic year has turned from Spring to Summer. The
time of one season has passed to another, with the great festival of
Beltaine on May 1 to mark the threshold.
“Threshold” moments were venerated by our ancestors.
Threshold events can be considered those in which one way has ended
and other is yet to, but has not begun. These can be the great and
lesser Celtic festivals, midnight and noon or the household doorway.
In these places the Otherworld holds sway as time and even space is
suspended between the then and the now, the before and the after.
Another area of threshold space is the holed stone, that is, a
stone with a hole drilled through it. These stones, known as “An
cloc cosanta” or “luck stone” were thought to promote
healing, fertility and seership.
Holed stones can be megaliths, usually standing alone, which exist
near and are associated with a more complex structure, such as a stone
circle. The size of the hole in the stone determined its use from
passing babies and young children through the hole for healing
purposes to grasping hands to form a Teltown marriage; a marriage of a
year and a day in which either party can return to the spot a year
later, renounce the marriage and walk away from the stone (and their
paramour).
Looking through a holed stone is thought to give “second
sight” and some later Christian pilgrim sites retain the holed
stones which exist in the area so that pilgrims, when visiting the
station, may get a “glimpse of heaven.”
Holed stones were, and are still today, worn on a thong around the
neck to provide protection and luck to the wearer. When not being
worn, the stone is hung over the bed or the doorway to ward off evil
spirits which may be lurking thereabouts.
The origin of the special powers associated with holed stones may
derive from the construction of some pre-Celtic structures such as
cairns. Many of these structures contain a small opening in the stone
which allows light to pierce the architecture to the centre where
entombed remains lie. The light passing through the portal may have
been intended to provide passage or second life to those within. An
excellent example of this is the famous passage grave Newgrange,
located in the Boyne Valley, Ireland.
If you are lucky enough to visit a holed stone, pause to take a
look through the opening and visit, for just a moment, a place that is
not a place, in a time that is not a time.
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