More than 30 years ago, along with others, Woman Spirit Ireland initiated Festivals of Brigit. We had several aims: to transcend the religious divisions that had characterised the Troubles; to enable women to “hear each other into speech”; and to investigate how Irish indigenous traditions might bring healing to our divided country.
As wars continue to rage around the world, in 2026 our theme is “Brigit’s Blessings: Healing and Peaceweaving”, beginning with a story.
In the famous Irish saga, the Táin, the legendary Queen Maeve was setting off for battle. A woman arrived wearing an embroidered cloak; she had three pupils in each of her eyes (one symbolising her “third eye”), and she carried a distaff. Maeve asked her name and where she had come from. Her name was Feidelm and in one version she says that she “came from Albion after learning the arts of divination”. In another, she is the prophetess or poet from Síd Chrúachna.
Maeve called on her for advice. “O Feidelm Prophetess, how do you see our host?” Feidelm answered sagely: “I see it bloodstained, crimson, I see it red”. Maeve ignored her advice, went to war and was defeated. (Her period arrived just as she was about to confront the hero Cúchulainn.) Brigit and Feidelm have much in common: the cloak; far-seeing eye; and her distaff.
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Cloaks play an important role in all of these stories, whether it is the cloak of Brigit, the Indian Sarawathi, the Buddhist Tara “of active compassion”, the Chinese Quan Yin who absorbs the dew of mercy, pouring it on their petitioners for healing. The prophet’s cloaks of mercy challenge the world views and altars of sacrifice. In medieval images, Mary and saints wrap their cloaks around all ethnicities and genders.
Brigit used her cloak to confuse warriors. She put mists between opposing armies and gave them sweet dreams to divert them from war mongering. Awakening, they happily went home never having shed a drop of blood.
The Old Brehon Laws recognised “crimes of the eye”. Passive onlookers, those who aid the crimes of others, or who protect, shelter, advise or are otherwise silent or complicit in crimes, are subject to the same penalties as the actual perpetrators.
Eyes feature throughout Brigit’s traditions. Brigit’s crosses, in various forms, are known as “God’s eyes”. They symbolise the acute eye of discernment required to maintain vigilance over the social order.
Brigit healed her mother and foster-mother of diseases of the eye. When Brigit wanted to enter a convent, her father and brothers wished her to marry a rich poet. The story goes that Brigit pulled out her eye; blood dropped to the ground. She instructed her brother to take her distaff and touch the earth. A well sprang up and she washed her eye from the water.
But while Brigit’s cloak and crosses are well known, we seldom hear about her distaff.
Distaffs feature in many traditions, including the Irish and Scottish figure of the Cailleach; the Northern European Baba Yaga; the Egyptian Neith; the Moirai (the Fates); the figure of Lughia of Sardinia, fairy godmothers and many others.
The spindle of the Roman founding mother, Gaia Caecilia, was held in the Sabine temple of Semo Sancus; blessings and other qualities were attributed to her distaff.
In Irish Lives of Saints, distaffs are used to protect animals, guard territory, divine water and make wells. Distaffs often symbolised union between humans and divine.
Both practical and symbolic items, distaffs are an ancient symbol of authority. They represent the integrity and functions of peace-weavers: that of knitting and weaving the fragile threads of community through rituals, gifting, sharing, hospitality, nurturing relationships, weaving and building peace.
In ancient Ireland, three classes of women held special status. Healers, queens, and those who turn back the stream of war. Their authority did not derive from weapons.
Brigit and the peace-weaving abbesses of Kildare were sovereign in their dignity. As a king once told Brigit’s father, who had tried to sell Brigit to him as a slave (given that she constantly donated his goods to the poor), “this woman can neither be bought nor sold”.
The abbesses of Kildare were stripped of any authority (and probably their distaffs) in 12th century church synods. We know little about their traditions.
Woman Spirit Ireland’s event, next Sunday at Dublin’s Mansion House, Brigit’s Blessings: Healing and Peace-Weaving, looks at these issues and aims to revive the distaff symbol today.
Proceeds from the event will be donated to Médecins Sans Frontières.
- Mary Condren, ThD is the voluntary chief executive of Woman Spirit Ireland and a research fellow at Trinity College Dublin
