OPINION (AN COLÚN): Visiting the place where Halloween came from

SOME YEARS AGO I was standing in a grass field in Roscommon, underneath steadily falling rain, looking at a small hole beneath a thorn bush. It was hard to imagine that this unprepossessing, seemingly inconsequential feature in the landscape once played a major role in our Celtic ancestors' mythology and has a direct link with Halloween, being the original source of the contemporary holiday's traditions.
The hole was about a couple of feet high and a few feet wide, and was topped by a limestone lintel. I got down on my stomach, coming into contact with the wet, compacted earth and crawled into the entranceway. Our Celtic ancestors believed that this was the entranceway to Tír na nÓg.
Tír na nÓg was, of course, the Celtic people's version of paradise. It was a land of the blessed. A place where people lived for ever in a state of happiness. In contrast to other mythologies, where the afterlife was located in the heavens, Tír na nÓg was to be found in the Underworld.
Our ancestors knew this entrance to the underworld in the Roscommon field as Oweynagat; which comes from the Irish Uaimh na gCat, meaning the Cave of the Cats. It was one of the most important places in ancient Ireland, and was located in the Rathcroghan landscape, which nowadays is one of the most archaeologically significant places in our nation.
Rathcroghan is a complex of 250 archaeological sites. It was one of Ireland's great centres, being the traditional capital of the Connachta, the prehistoric and early historic rulers of the western territory. The Cave of the Cats held a primacy in the minds and imaginings of the Connachta. It's possible that the long banks which we can see in the contemporary landscape may once have been a ceremonial passageway for people proceeding to the Oweynagat entranceway for the holding of religious events.
Centuries later, medieval monks referred to the Cave of the Cats as “dorus iffiirn na Hérend”, Ireland's Gate to Hell. The Celts told tales about evil creatures emerging from its depths. At Samhain, they said, flocks of birds emerged; these hellish birds possessed a breath so foul that it withered the leaves from the trees. Another tale said a herd of magical swine escaped the cave and caused chaos in the land; wherever they passed the vegetation would not grow for seven years. Other creatures included three-headed monsters, female werewolves, ferocious wild cats. Bands of otherworldy warriors also sometimes appeared, their intent being to destroy Rathcroghan. Overseeing them all was the goddess known as the Morrígan, a shape shifter who appeared in the world in different animal or bird guises. The Morrígan dwelt in Oweynagat, and she opened the portal between the world of the Connachta and the Underworld every year during Samhain.
Some scholars think it's possible that the Connachta disguised themselves as the monsters and demons that emerged during Samhain, to avoid being brought back down into the Underworld at night’s end.
In the 1800s the Samhain tradition from Oweynagat and Rathcroghan was brought by Irish immigrants to the United States where it morphed into the massively popular event of Halloween, a holiday which has increased in popularity in Ireland in recent years.
I crawled a few feet into the entranceway and paused. In front of me was another lintel stone, this time with an Ogham inscription, which stated “The stone of Fraoch, son of Medb”. To my left the passage was blocked off, but to my right was a ten metre souterrain heading slightly downwards. I proceeded along this, on my stomach once again, over rocky, unpleasant ground; until I emerged into a 37 metre long cave and was able to stand up. The deepest point of the cave is seven metres below ground level and the entire length of the cave, from entrance to its end was about fifty metres. I was delighted to be here, in the heart of this massively significant spot.
Fraoch and Medb feature in the famous text, the Táin Bó Cúailnge, the Cattle Raid of Cooley. They show, as the tale unfolds, that they have character traits which are still evident in contemporary people. Medb is envious and competitive. She wants the famed bull of Cooley so bad that she is willing to go to war. Fraoch is proud and unbending. As he is being drowned by Cuchulain, Cuchulain takes pity on him and offers him his life if he surrenders. Fraoch refuses and is therefore drowned. The Sí take away his body afterwards.
The purpose of the nearby Rathcroghan mound was a mystery until recently. Modern technology has revealed much. A magnetic gradiometry survey conducted in the area uncovered a substantial circular enclosure, which measured 360 metres in diameter. This enclosure was in the form of a ditch, dug one metre deep and five metres wide, cutting into the limestone bedrock. The survey also uncovered a previously unrecorded substantial circular enclosure. This enclosure is beside Rathcroghan mound. The two together, my guidebook said, were “clearly designed as an impressive theatrical device for use in some form of ceremonial procession.”